While They're Still Here by Patricia Williams

Author:Patricia Williams
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: She Writes Press
Published: 2017-04-08T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 27

It dawned on me that since he now seemed muddled and sullen, maybe he wasn’t just cold; maybe he was low on oxygen. Had I really blown it by not convincing him to use his oxygen tank at night?

I used my “oh boy!” voice again and said, “Hey, Dad, let’s try out that oxygen while we’re just sitting here at the table and see how it works.” I quickly left to retrieve it so any naysaying wouldn’t be in my hearing range. I adjusted it to his face, and he pinked and perked up within minutes. He practiced adjusting the tubing to his face and turning the tank on and off. He managed it well by feel alone, so I said, “Great! Since you’re sleeping right there in your chair, it will be easy for you to use it.”

“No.”

This was one of those pivotal points where I wanted him to feel in charge of his own decisions, but he had to change his mind. I looked at Mom with a question on my face, and she shrugged her shoulders.

“Dad, this is why we have the oxygen—so you can use it when the power’s out.”

“I’m fine. I don’t need it,” he huffed.

I really didn’t want to tell him he had been rummy and the wrong color. “Why don’t you want to use it?”

“It’s too close to the fireplace. It’s dangerous.”

I should have realized that was the problem. My parents had tried to return the tank after its initial delivery because they were afraid it would spontaneously ignite as soon as they read the warnings. “I’ll call the company and find out if it’s safe,” I said.

I placed the call within Dad’s earshot so he wouldn’t think I was inventing the conversation. I described our setup, including its proximity to the fireplace, and the technician assured me it was okay. When I told Dad it was safe, his ambiguous responses did not convince me that he had resolved to use it. I knew the oxygen presented one more complicated contraption to perturb him in the pitch-black, frozen night.

I ran out of tools to sway him, so I switched to my last resort: the truth. “Dad, you were gray and fuzzy-brained when I got here, but you’re already better after just a few minutes on the oxygen. Could you just trust me and put it on every night?”

“Fuzzy-brained?” he asked, while the meaning sank in. “Okay. Every night,” he assured me.

That resolved, Mom took her turn at a problem, demanding, “We need supper. Aren’t you going out? I’m hungry. Can’t you do something about the electricity? This has gone beyond ridiculous.”

Supper was not on my priority list, since they had plenty of stew left. I excused myself before the wrong words came out of my mouth. They didn’t know we were starting to worry about frozen water lines rupturing or that Katy was in the process of relocating her difficult mother and cat to our house because her mother had no heat at all at her house.

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