Daddy's Gifts

         The room was bare so the flash of the answering machine stood out. There was a lone chair often referred to as the Throne due to talon feet; a stack of books held the pulsing red light. She quickly shut the door, hurried across the small room and pushed the play button. She walked to the kitchen—a wall with the necessary appliances and cabinets above them—to fix a drink, avoiding the only other furniture in the room, a table with two chairs.
         “Jennifer. You’re father. I’m in town, at St. Mary’s. I haven’t been doin’ so hot. I need to see you.”
         Suddenly Jenny was six again. Her parents’ had divorced three years ago; she’d never know them together. He still came around drunk and only to see Mom. He wanted her and had no time for her. It made her wonder what was wrong with her.
         “Here,” he’d said, his voice deep and graveled, as he thrust his big tattooed arm out.
         He gave her a mug shot from a recent stay in the big house, as he called it, and a colorful but useless plastic card. It had his name on it, Terence Bruce Shay. In the picture, he looked like Charlie Manson. She cherished both the picture and the card as if he had given her the Holy Grail. They were the only gifts she ever received from him. It was the last time she saw him.
         The smell of Budweiser still reminded her of him 20 years later.
         “No. No. I won’t let him do this to me again. Not anymore. Not after the last time,” Jenny rushed over and erased the message.
         He’d left her with nothing and now he needed her. He’d said the things he’d said and dared to call her home. It was salt into a very fresh wound, on top of a bad day. She’d just blown another job interview, she didn’t need this. She needed a job.
         She took a drink of the tequila sunrise as she stroked the Russian Blue, who anxiously awaited her daily treat.
         “Sorry, Trubble Bubble. I gotta put you on a diet. Limited money.”
         The cat gave a frown reminiscent of her mom and jumped down from the table. She misjudged something and instead of landing on either the chair or floor, she tumbled between the two chairs and disappeared.
         The cat had always been clumsy but Jenny still thought Trubble Bubble had gotten brain damage from several concussions. At her mom’s house before she died, Trubble would jump from the couch straight into the wall. Repeatedly and on purpose. No one ever knew why and they tried to stop the stupid cat, but there’s not stopping a cat on a mission.
         Jenny chuckled to herself, shaking her long brown hair back, and tossed the plastic glass in the sink. She set out a little tuna in Trubble’s food bowl. Then she went through one of the two doors to wash up for the night and then went through the other door.
         In her room, she sat down on the bed next to a bear that was half as old as she was. His name was Cuddles. Her mom had bought it for her when her Grandma died. It was important and needed for comfort. She got out her journal and wrote about the disastrous job interview and message before getting ready for bed.
         That night she had a restless sleep, filled with haunting dreams she only vaguely remembered. There was a broken rocking chair that made a little girl sad, and her father was smoking a cookie. She was trapped with someone she didn’t know in a room that was small and brown. Nothing made sense and Jennifer was glad to be free of the dreams when she woke up.
         As she was biking around, trying to find a job in an economy where there weren’t any, she was listening to her mini radio she had strapped to her arm. A decent station had decided to come in so the music had been going good enough to blast. Then the Spin Doctors came on. Of all the bands in the world, that 80s has been band had to come on. It was a song she avoided due to a connection with her dad.
         “Damn it,” she muttered as she just turned the thing off.
         It was too late. What had been creeping in the shadows of her memories, just waiting to jump out with a big boo, came running to the forefront. The last time she’d seen her father.
         She went to college the same place her dad lived. He had finally shown up for graduation and she met him for the first time since she was six. They agreed to keep in touch, so while away at college, she would visit with him.
         He was finally sober after having six heart attacks. He regretted not knowing her. At first it was cool. College and her dad, no mom; it was every girl’s dream. After a while though, Jennifer couldn’t help herself and she started questioning him. The bitter anger from all those abandoned years came flying out.
         “How come you stopped coming to see me? Did you not love me? Wasn’t I good enough?”
         And the lies he told, putting all the blame on her mom and painting himself innocent. Accusing her of cheating on him all those years ago and never trying to make the marriage work or the beatings she took that left her whole body black and blue. He would not acknowledge the abuse he gave her had caused health issues she’s had to deal with after all these years. No, he was innocent. He tried to be a good dad but it was never enough and yada, yada, yada.
         Jennifer argued, angry and trying hard not to cry. She defended her mom; after all, after they divorced she was the one there, not him. He was off drinking because that was more important. She made a point of telling him all that and then she went back to college to flunk out and go home to her mom. She never saw her dad again but he did writer her a letter.
         That letter told her she was brainwashed. That her mom and said all that to paint him out bad.  Even what were Jennifer’s own memories that she knew to be factual, he said were lies. It was a sad, pathetic, and vicious attack on everything Jennifer had accepted as true. It got to her in a bad way. She decided that she survived without him for all those years; she can survive without him for the rest of years.
         Sitting on her bike, Jennifer shook her head at the memory. It all hurt even worse with her mom gone and she’s not ready to even think about that pain again.
         “Time to go home and chill,” she said to herself, turning her bike around.
         The next day, she was trying to read when the phone rang.
         Hesitant, she answered, “Jenny speaking.”
         “Arlene Winslow from Borders. I looked over your app and you’ve got an interview. Tomorrow, 10 am.”
         “Great. I’m looking forward to meeting you.”
         “Tomorrow.”
         Line dead, Jenny hung up while jumping off her chair, knocking the book down, and losing her place. She flailed around in her own version of the happy dance as she sang a song from her favorite cartoon Ren and Stimpy.
         “Happy, happy, joy, joy. Happy, happy, joy, joy.”
         She decided to go out and celebrate. She felt like dancing and there was this place called Somewhere Else, a club with drag queens and a bartender she knew. She’d be safe and dance the night away in six inch heels to raise her height to average. She was always conscious of her four foot nine inch frame.
         At Somewhere Else she lost track of time. She stayed too late dancing with some frat boys and played one too many games of beer pong. She ended up running late the next morning, oversleeping and almost missing the interview, her reason for celebrating.
         “Just like your father, you don’t know when to stop,” she heard her mom’s voice in her head.
         Ready in less than ten minutes and out the door, she hurriedly unchained her purple bike, slung her purse over her left shoulder, and sped off.
         As she raced to the intersection to make her turn, a car ran the red light.  She was struck full force and thrown flying into the middle of the intersection. She never even saw what hit her and while she lay unaware, her Schwinn completely destroyed, the car raced off.
         The last coherent thought she had was that she’d be late. When she woke a doctor and nurse were hovering over her. They looked like McSteamy and Aunt Bea.
         “She’s a lucky woman,” the doctor said. “Has the family been contacted?”
         “Mother’s gone. Father’s unknown. No one else,” the elderly nurse said.
         A loose tear slid to her ear, drawing the nurse’s attention.
         “Doctor.”
         “How do you feel?” he asked.
         “Everything hurts.”
         “Do you know what happened?”
         “I…had…a job interview…Friday.”
         He made notes as the nurse called out numbers like an auctioneer.
         “You were hit by a car. You just had surgery to fix your legs, they were injured severely.” he said, making Jenny wonder if the position had been filled. “My name’s Dr. Harris, by the way.”
         “Why does my chest hurt so much?” Jennifer struggled to ask.
         “Well, it’s like this, only your legs are broken. The kneecap on your right leg was crushed, that’s the side you were hit. Your left leg was broken after you hit the concrete. Both are clean breaks and will heal in time.”
         “But my chest…”
         “You’re ribs are bruised. Those will heal much slower and hurt for quite some time, I’m afraid to say. Due to the bruising, we checked the lungs to see if they too were injured. They weren’t.”
         “So the ribs are what hurt.”
         “Doctor,” the nurse said as she kept her eyes on a machine.
         The doctor looked over at the machine next to Jennifer, than he looked back into Jennifer’s eyes. This time he seemed a little blurry and Jennifer shook her head.
         “Jennifer, do you have a doctor? We couldn’t find any medical records anywhere.”
         “I don’t…no med…no insurance…why?” Jennifer asked through her labored breathing.
         “Well it would appear…”
         But he couldn’t continue because Jennifer slipped into a coma. Machines were going off like the fryers in a McDonald’s.
         This time when she woke up, she felt better. Nothing hurt. She looked around the room. Sun light poured in through a big picture window with the olive curtains pulled wide. The room was tones of brown, not a normal looking hotel room. It was more like a hotel with a nice, tan couch under the window with a built in end table. Of course the TV hung in the corner with a nice chair and desk area underneath it. Cherry oak closets and a giant office calendar caught her eye. She’d missed her own birthday and Independence Day, her favorite holiday.
         A nurse was sitting in the corner in a chair. She was reading what looked like the Bible but looked up as Jennifer looked around the room.
         “You’re awake I see,” the nurse said as she stood up and moved to Jennifer’s bedside.
         “What’s going on? I had bruised ribs and broken legs? Why did I pass out?”
         “So you remember?” the nurse asked, making notes in Jennifer’s chart. “What else do you remember?”
         “I remember a doctor talking to me. I had a job interview and some asshole hit me. That’s all I remember.”
         “You seem to have had an epidural hematoma from your head hitting the pavement. That was an easy fix.”
         An easy fix, Jennifer thought, she didn’t even know what the nurse had said. “There’s more isn’t there?”
         “Yes, there is. Have you ever heard of Bronchiectasis?” Jennifer shook her head no, eyes wide as she looked at the elderly woman, waiting for her to continue. “It’s a lung disease that can be easily managed if caught early enough. It’s caused by a recurrent inflammation or an infection of the airways. We usually find it’s a complication from a child inhaling a foreign object. That’s why your chest hurt so badly before. Did you inhale something as a child?”
         The nurse stood there and stared at Jennifer expectantly. How was she supposed to remember if she inhaled something as a kid?          She’d have to ask her mom and her mom isn’t around anymore. She had to go run into a knife, clumsy as she was, and joined her parents in heaven.
         “I don’t know,” she said slowly. “Did we catch mine early enough?”
         “I better get Dr. Harris. He really needs to be the one talking to you.”
         “No, no. You can tell me. I need to know. What happened? How did I miss May through July?”
         The nurse pointed to the opposite side where the table was and left the room. Jenny turned her head and saw an envelope with her name. There was also a small, plain card. It was signed, “Arlene Winslow. Job Interview’s still available. Call me.” Jennifer chuckled and opened the envelope. Inside, a letter.
         “Jennifer, if you’re reading this that means two things. I’m gone and you’re not. I gave you both my lungs. Least I could do. It’s a good thing you hadn’t deleted my message and saved it. I’m bettin’ that was an accident but that’s how they found me. Said you were in coma and it looked like you would die before me. You were hit by a car on the way to interview. Well, I may have never been there for you before, but I was when it mattered most. I owe you and always have. I left you everything. Not much. I drank it all away. You. Your mom. But, I came into some money. It’s yours and I hope you’ll be a ok. Do great things. Don’t expect your forgiveness. I’ll be watching you. I owe you, princess. Love, your Father.”