Roy answered this time, the words gruff. “You think you can fix everything, Em. I wanted to do this myself. If it failed, you’d know I tried. And thatyoudidn’t have anything to do with the failure. If it worked—well, here we are.”
Emily looked down at her hands, which had gone pale and clawlike against her jeans. She tried to imagine all those weeks—holidays, the push and pull of daily life, her mom disappearing and Roy trying to still pitch in with the family as though he were fine—while her parents had been living this secret life, one appointment at a time. And she had agreed to keep the secret when Patricia had finally let it slip, hoping her father would eventually confide in her.
“We wanted to protect you,” Patricia said.
Emily’s voice, when it came, was a whisper. “Don’t ever do that again.”
Patricia nodded, tears starting fresh. Roy made a move to stand but changed his mind, instead pulling Emily toward him in their seats in a half-hug, his arm awkwardly around her shoulders. Emily let herself sag into the hug, and for a second, she was a child again, not the woman who ran everything, or a mother herself, or anything but someone’s daughter.
When everyone was composed, they gathered their things. Roy moved slowly, as if unsure of his new, healthy body. Emily watched as Patricia steadied him, then looped her arm through his. The three of them made their way out of the office, into the parking lot, into the first day of the rest of whatever time they had. They didn’t go straight to the car. Instead, Roy steered themto a bench just outside the revolving glass doors of the oncology office.
No one said anything at first. Emily waited, determined not to be the one to break.
Patricia gave in first. She cleared her throat and turned to Emily, eyes rimmed with red but her voice unnaturally steady. “You have questions. I think we owe you answers.”
Emily stared at her mother. “You think?”
Patricia’s lips thinned. “We made a decision, your father and I. He was doing worse, much worse, before the new treatments, but we didn’t want to put you through the wringer. Not again.”
Roy let out a grunt, then shook his head. “It was me, Em. It was my call. I didn’t want you or Daniel or the girls to have to watch me fall apart day by day. It’s hell on a kid.” He paused, then corrected himself. “It’s hell on everyone.”
Emily watched the two of them, so much older and more fragile than they’d been even last year, and couldn’t marshal even an ounce of anger. She just felt hollowed out, her whirlwind thoughts rattling in the empty spaces.
“I wanted palliative only when I first got my diagnosis. That’s what I told you. It was true,” Roy said.
“But it wasn’t,” Emily said. “Because you did treatment. Chemo. And it started to work, and it actuallyworked. You should have told me that it was working.”
“I almost did,” Roy said. “Twice. I chickened out both times.”
Emily thought back over all the weeks she’d been so sure she was losing him, all the time spent bracing for the crash, when instead he’d been fighting it off in secret. And she’d been waiting for him to confide in her, after Patricia had told her that the treatment had been going on.
“I didn’t want to be a burden,” Roy said, repeating it like a mantra. “Not ever.”
Emily turned to her father, all those childhood years of fearing his disappointment and craving his approval suddenly telescoped into this one moment. “You’re not a burden,” she said, and even she was surprised at the strength in her voice. “You’re my dad.”
Roy’s face was naked with regret. “I know I was a bastard sometimes, Em. I thought I was doing you a favor, keeping the chemo quiet. But that wasn’t fair.”
Emily shook her head, as if that could shake the image of them, driving hours in the cold, just to sit through the drip of poison in a windowless room. “So, the ghosting, mom, the weird distance, I know the why of that—”
“It was easier to keep you at arm’s length than lie to your face.” Patricia grimaced.
“But not why I wasn’t let in after you started treatment,” Emily finished, looking at Roy.
Roy cleared his throat. “I’ll be honest, Em. I was ready to let go. Then Charlotte was born. And now, the new baby’s coming.” His eyes flicked to her belly, then up to meet hers. “And then I saw you, Daniel, and those girls. I couldn’t stand the idea of missing out. That’s what did it. I got greedy.”
Emily let the tears come, hot and fast and, for once, free of shame. She swiped at her cheeks with the heel of her hand, then forced herself to breathe.
“I would have wanted to be there, emotionally,” she said, hiccupping. “For all of it. Even the awful parts.”
Patricia’s shoulders hunched, and she sobbed again, ragged and loud. Roy, eyes shining, wrapped an arm around her.
Emily stared at her parents, the two of them knotted together in grief and relief and apology, and felt the last of her anger burn off. She leaned forward, pulled Patricia Roy both in, and let herself be folded into the clutch of family, messy and mortal and terribly, beautifully human.
Finally, Roy let go. He wiped his face with the heel of his hand and, in a voice, Emily hadn’t heard since she was a girl, hopeful and light, he said, “I can’t wait to meet the new baby.”
***
Jamie Marsh’s office was one of those rooms designed to make you sit carefully. Emily stepped inside and immediately wondered if her boots had left dirt on the entry mat—she wiped them twice, just in case, before following Daniel to the pair of velvet-upholstered visitor chairs. The effect of the space was more like a cozy vintage lounge than local government: moldings heavy as wedding cakes, ceiling tall enough to make anyone under six feet feel small, and, most notably, a set of ornate stained-glass windows that ran the length of the far wall, pouring rainbows of light across the polished floors.
