I Am No One You Know Read Online Free Page B

flowing in. In a drowse of morphine Daddy’s droopy-lidded eyes held more puzzlement than anger or judgment. He had trouble keeping them lifted to me, but I believed he was listening as I spoke of my life with the earnestness of one who must take it on faith that her listener cares for what she’s saying. “…Teaching, in Boston. This summer I’ve been invited to Venice…” But there was the hospice nurse, Yolanda. She was cheerful, young. Half my age. I saw Daddy watching Yolanda, too. Possibly he thought that Yolanda was his daughter. His favorite daughter, who’d never left home. Never betrayed him. Never “ratted.” The hospital had discharged him and sent him home to die. It wasn’t just emphysema, it was heart congestion. Exhaustion. My father hadn’t been a placid man, yet his ending would be placid, we were grateful for this. I was speaking softly. “Daddy? I had to do it. I didn’t have any choice…” I wondered if this was true: don’t we always have choices? Even a child of thirteen has a choice. I knew what was right, I did what was right, I’d do it again. I was stubborn, defiant. This was my truest nature. Maybe I’d ruined my brothers’ lives and maybe even my own, but I would do it again.
    I didn’t tell Daddy this. His left eyelid drooped as if winking at me. He was trying to smile, was he? Curly Red. How’s my girl? My hair wasn’t red any longer, and it wasn’t curly. I was a passionate AA advocate: one day at a time, the highest wisdom. You can eke out a life like that. Like Daddy’s labored breathing, in which desperation was put to good use. When you have less than 40 percent of your lungs remaining, you use every cubic centimeter of those remaining lungs.
    Of Daddy’s seven children, Leo was the one who hadn’t returned. Leo had served five years in prison, was released to parole at the age oftwenty-four, choosing to reside in the Red Bank area; two years later he left New York State and never returned to Perrysburg. Where Leo was, somewhere on the West Coast, my mother and sisters knew, but I didn’t dare inquire. Why do you want to know? Why you?
    Mario had stayed away from Perrysburg for fifteen years, then he’d returned. He worked for a local construction company as a carpenter. He’d married twice, like me. Divorced twice. Like me, no children. I wondered if he’d given up drinking. He’d become a boneless-looking man of middle age, taciturn, purse-lipped, like an awkwardly hip high school teacher in tinted aviator sunglasses and suede leather jackets from Sears. We’d met on the front walk of the house on Crescent Avenue, by accident; Mario was leaving as I was approaching. I tasted panic seeing him, recognizing him immediately, my brother Mario I’d betrayed…I was frightened he might spit into my face. Or—the walk was slick with melting snow—he might kick my legs out from under me. My terror must have shown in my face. Mario laughed. He grinned, shaking his head, as if there was an old joke between us, moving past me on the narrow walk with no intention of speaking, certainly not of taking my hand, which I was holding out tentatively, but at the curb where his car was parked he called back, “Lili Rose, it’s O.K. Only just too bad about the old man, huh? Seventy-three isn’t old.” I said, “Mario!” But he was in his car gunning the motor.
    Now at Daddy’s bedside I’m thinking, suddenly excited, I’ll call Mario. Tonight. If he hangs up, I might drive by his place. I’ll get the address from Mariana. I’ll knock at his door, I’ll see Mario again. God damn, I will.
    I’ve taken Daddy’s unresisting hand. I believe I can feel his fingers tightening. I’m thinking the wild extravagant thoughts you think at such times: the world is a hospice, we’re all in it together. “Daddy, I love you. Even if…” Even if I’ve hated you. I lived with Aunt Bea and Uncle Clyde, who’d waited for me to love them like a daughter, but that hadn’t