“The world doesn’t need two Dels,” she said. Her younger brother was a handsome, glib, womanizing con man. When he wasn’t sponging off her parents, he was making a play for some woman—usually one young enough to be his daughter. “Are he and Sheila still together?” Sheila was Del’s third wife, the one who’d put up with him the longest.
“No, they’ve split up.” Sara shrugged. “No surprise there. She never let the boy have any peace. Talk about a shrew.”
“I’d be a shrew, too, if my husband couldn’t keep his pants zipped or his bank account from being overdrawn.”
“Now, your brother has a good heart. People—especially women—always take advantage of him.”
No, Del had a black heart, and he was an expert at taking advantage of others. But Karen knew it was no use arguing with her mother. “If Del’s so good, maybe he should be the one looking after Dad,” she said.
Her mother frowned at her. “You know your father and Del don’t get along. Besides, for all his good qualities, Del isn’t the most responsible man in the world.”
Any other time, Karen might have laughed. Saying her brother wasn’t responsible was like saying the Rocky Mountains were steep.
She checked her watch again. Eleven-twenty. At home she’d be making the last calls on her morning’s to-do list.
Here, there was no to-do list, just this sense of too much to handle. Too many hours where she didn’t know what lay ahead. Too many things she had no control over. “Do you think he’s ready yet?” she asked.
Her mother stood. “He probably is. I’ll help you get him in the car. Del said he’d meet you at the house to help get him inside, but after that, you’re on your own.”
“Right.” After all, she was Karen, the oldest daughter. The dependable one.
The one with sucker written right across her forehead.
Of course Del was nowhere in sight when Karen pulled her father’s Jeep Cherokee up to the new wheelchair ramp in front of his house. She got out of the car and took a few steps toward the mobile home parked just across the fence, but Del’s truck wasn’t under the carport and there was no sign that anyone was home.
Anger gnawing a hole in her gut, she went around to the back of the Jeep and took out the wheelchair her mother had rented from the hospital pharmacy. After five minutes of struggling in the already oppressive May heat, she figured out how to set it up, and wheeled it around to the passenger side of the vehicle.
“Okay, Dad, you’re going to have to help me with this,” she said, watching his eyes to make sure he understood.
He nodded and grunted again, and made a move toward the chair.
“Wait, let me unbuckle your seat belt. Okay, put your hand on my shoulder. Wait, I’m not ready…well, all right. Here. Wait—”
Martin half fell and was half dragged into the chair. Sweat trickled down Karen’s back and pooled at the base of her spine. She studied the wheelchair ramp her brother had built out of plywood. As usual, he’d done a half-ass job. The thing was built like a skateboard ramp, much too steep.
In the end, she had to drag the chair up the ramp backwards, grappling for purchase on the slick plywood surface, cursing her brother under her breath the whole way. At the top, she sagged against the front door and dug in her purse for the key. A bird sang from the top of the pine tree beside the house.
She felt a tug on her shirt and looked over to find her father staring intently at the tree. “Northern Cardinal,” she identified the bird.
He nodded, satisfied, apparently, that she hadn’t forgotten everything he’d taught her.
Inside, the air-conditioning hit them with a welcome blast of cold. Karen pushed the wheelchair through the living room, past the nubby plaid sofa that had sat in the same spot against the wall for the past thirty years, and the big-screen TV that was a much newer addition. She started to turn toward her father’s bedroom, but he tugged at her again, and indicated he wanted to go in the opposite direction.
“Do you want to go to your study?” she asked, dismayed.
He nodded.
“Maybe you should rest first. Or the two of us could visit some. I could make lunch….”
He shook his head, and made a stabbing motion with his right hand toward the study.
She reluctantly turned the chair toward the back bedroom that none of them had been allowed to enter without permission when she was a child.
The room was paneled in dark wood, most of the floor space taken up by a scarred wooden desk topped by a sleek black computer tower and flat-screen monitor. Karen shoved the leather desk chair aside and wheeled her father’s chair into the kneehole. Before he’d come to a halt, he’d reached out with his right hand and hit the button to turn the computer on.
She backed away, taking the opportunity to study the room. Except for the newer computer, things hadn’t changed much since her last visit, almost a year ago. A yellowing map filled one wall, colored pins marking the countries where her father had traveled and listed birds. Behind the desk, floor-to-ceiling shelves were filled with her father’s collection of birding reference books, checklists and the notebooks in which he recorded the sightings made on each expedition.
The wall to the left of the desk was almost completely filled with a large picture window that afforded a view of the pond at the back of his property. From his seat at the desk, Martin could look up and see the Cattle Egrets, Black-necked Stilts, Least Terns and other birds that came to drink.
On the wall opposite the desk he had framed his awards. Pride of place was given to a citation from the Guinness Book of World Records, in 1998, when they recognized him as the first person to see at least one species of each of the world’s one hundred and fifty-nine bird families in a single year. Around it were ranged lesser honors from the various birding societies to which he belonged.
She looked at her father again. He was bent over the computer, his right hand gripping the mouse like an eagle’s talon wrapped around a stone. “I’ll fix us some lunch, okay?”
He said nothing, gaze riveted to the screen.
While Karen was making a sandwich in the kitchen, the back door opened to admit her brother. “Hey, sis,” he said, wrapping his arms around her in a hug.
She gave in to the hug for two seconds, welcoming her brother’s strength, and the idea that she could lean on him if she needed to. But of course, that was merely an illusion. She shrugged out of his grasp and continued slathering mayonnaise on a slice of bread. “You were supposed to be here to help get Dad in the house.”
“I didn’t know you were going to show up so soon. I ran out to get a few groceries.” He pulled a six-pack of beer from the bag and broke off a can.
“You thought beer was appropriate for a man who just got out of the hospital?”
“I know I sure as hell would want one.” He sat down and stretched his legs out in front of him. “Make me one of them sandwiches, will you?”
“Make your own.” She dropped the knife in the mayonnaise jar, picked up the glass of nutritional supplement that was her father’s meal, and went to the study.
When she returned to the kitchen, Del was still there. He was eating a sandwich, drinking a second beer. The jar of mayonnaise and loaf of bread still sat, open, on the counter. “I’m not your maid,” she snapped. “Clean up after yourself.”
“I see Colorado hasn’t improved your disposition any.” He nodded toward the study. “How’s the old man?”
“Okay, considering. He can’t talk yet, and he can’t