Page 40 of Blue Umbrella Sky
Billy’s hand leaped up to touch his heart. He looked at Milt then, really looked at him. It was as though he not only peered at him but peeredintohim. “I see you,” he said softly.
“I know you do. And that’s what scares me.”
“Why would that scare you?” Billy leaned forward and then sat back again. He patted the couch next to him. “Come sit beside me, okay?”
Milt wanted to. And yet he wasn’t sure he could—for to be that close would make him vulnerable, would open a door to something he couldn’t be sure he was ready for. He leaned back into the recliner, so hard it almost made the footstool extend. “I don’t think I will, Billy.” As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Milt ached to take them back.
But he couldn’t. Not yet.
Again, a sharp rap to the back of his head. “What the hell?” Milt shouted, rubbing at the now-tender spot on his scalp.
Billy laughed, and the odd tension in the room broke just a little. “You are nuts.”
“I am. Totally. I think I went off the deep end the day I realized Corky wasn’t coming back.” Milt sucked in a breath. Again, he hadn’t expected to say what he did. He wasn’t sure what he was going to say but knew it should have been something more mundane, something more pedestrian. He’d never been much for revealing his innermost feelings. He said, in a hushed tone that he wasn’t sure was even audible, “I broke a long time ago. But I couldn’t let it show. Someone needed to be strong.” Milt bowed his head. “It had to be me. I wasn’t given a choice. And if I had been, I would have chosen to take care of Corky, even as he got more and more impossible. To the very end—when he no longer recognized me.” Milt’s voice caught, and the lump in his throat grew. He stared down at the floor for a long time.
And then he got up and moved to sit on the couch beside Billy. Billy leaned over and hugged him, pulling him close. “Is this okay?” he whispered in Milt’s ear. Milt thought it was nice of him to ask. Billy recognized andsawhis boundaries and respected them.
In response Milt simply reached up to put his hand on the arm that was around him, to squeeze it. He nodded.
They stayed like that for a while, maybe even longer than Milt realized. It was long enough for Ruby to come into the room, circle around several times on her fleece bed, and then lie down. Long enough for the hurt Milt felt during those final days, taking care of someone with dementia, being all loveless and selfless, to dissipate. If he were being perfectly honest, there were times back then when he’d wanted to say the hell with it all and hide away in bed, the covers over his head. He’d felt so much guilt about those feelings and now, right now, with Billy close, he realized he needed to forgive himself. He’d done the best he could.
The people who loved him back home called him a hero. His best friend, Dane Bernard, had pleaded with him to put Corky in a home. “The one out in Glenmoor is very nice—they’ll take good care of him there. You can be with him every day, still. But they’ll be around for him at night so you can get some rest. They’ll make sure he doesn’t get into trouble, wander off, harm himself.”
Dane’s advice had been heartfelt. He’d only been looking out for Milt. He’d wanted only what would be best for him—and for Corky. Milt knew, even back then, the constant caregiving and vigilance had worn on him. He could see it when he looked in the mirror—and a prematurely gray and weathered older man looked back at him.
But he couldn’t do it—at least, not until the very end, when it was only a few days until Corky would, mercifully, draw his last breath. The thing that stopped Milt from doing it sooner was always the same. He had only to think of Corky and his occasional moments of clarity “coming to” in some sterile nursing home room and wondering where he was. Milt could clearly picture the look of hurt and confusion on Corky’s face, and he’d known there was no way he wouldn’t be in this fight until the very end.
And he was, even though there were a few days in the nursing home. He’d done the good thing. The selfless thing. The thing everyone praised him for, telling him he was a saint and that there was a special place in heaven waiting for him. They’d mostly said this at Corky’s wake, adding that he and Corky could one day be together again.
Finally, Milt wriggled just a bit to politely break the hug. He scooted over, away from Billy, so he could talk.
“I just realized something,” Milt said. “I’m still doing it. I’m still caring for Corky. I’m still here for him.” Milt smiled sadly and looked toward Billy to see if he understood what he was saying. Itwasa little crazy, wasn’t it? Still caring for a man who was beyond care? Still caring for someone who was buried almost a year ago?
But then Billy, God bless his empathic and caring soul, put some perspective on things. “You’re not crazy. You’re just grieving, Milt. That’s normal. I’m being selfish, wanting something from you that you’re not ready to give. It hasn’t been that long. In a way I’m jealous of you for having what you did with Corky—and for so long. I’ve never really had that, and sometimes it feels… hollow.”
Milt wanted to ask, “How do you know what I feel?” but thought, quite sensibly, that now was not the time to argue but to listen. In some ways Milt realized he was more than ready to accept what Billy had to give.Just look at those feet! Imagine what they’re attached to.And for a moment Milt pictured working his way upward from those feet. On his knees. Until he arrived at that beautiful, radiant, and caring face.Stop! We’re talking about Corky here.Milt let that thought sink in, and then he thoughtAnd that’s just the problem.
Milt wondered what to say, caught as he was between his loyalty to a man he’d loved with all his heart and soul, a man with whom he expected to spend the rest of his life, and the desire to free himself from the very shackles his heart imposed. His head told him it wasn’t terrible, or even unhealthy, to want to reach out for a new person, a new life, to move forward, upward, any direction away from the wallowing and the pain.
But because it was his head talking to him, Milt was mistrustful. He knew his heart told him the truth a lot more often.
But what to say to Billy?
Fortunately for Milt, Billy again had the right words.
“Earlier I said I was here trying to control things, and I just realized I’m not. I know I’m powerless over your grief, and I suspect you are too, for now. So I’m here for you. Not to control, not to push my own agenda, even though I know, in the end, it’ll be you that benefits most from that agenda.” Billy gave him a wink and a smile. “Joke. I’m here because I wanted to say that I’ll take whatever it is you want to give me. I don’t want to pressure you.
“Here’s what I propose. That we start seeing each other again. By seeing each other, Milt, I mean only hanging out. Hiking. Seeing a movie. Having breakfast at Myron’s Café. Me cooking you something decent for dinner.” Again, that smile.
“Not dating. Lord, no! Just hanging out.”
Milt felt two things arise at once inside him—disappointment and hope. Why wasn’t life simpler? Black and white? Milt chuckled in his mind as he thoughtBlack and white like Corky and me?Again, he wasn’t sure what to say. The old heart-head conundrum was really confounding him tonight. If he went along with what Billy was saying, it felt like settling, like admitting defeat. If he challenged it, he knew the lover of Corky would rise up once more, chastising him for being untrue to his memory.
He wondered if he could ever win.Will I be trapped in this limbo forever?
“Would you be willing—for us to see each other again?”
Milt nodded.
