The phone rang

The phone rang, and I could not find the energy to pick up.

When the machine picked up, and suddenly we heard Pat’s voice: “Pat, Maria, Camille, PJ and Cal can’t come to the phone now, please leave a message and we will get back to you….”

After years of singing and doing radio shows and podcasts, Pat took any recording, even one for the family answering machine, seriously. He had this lovely voice with just a light touch of a Dublin accent, not the harsher Drogheda accent of his youth. He had recorded the message several years ago, when he was strong and healthy. The new chemotherapy had stolen this voice from him a few months ago. It had been months since I had heard this voice.

I was not the only one who heard him, Cal and her nurse Peggy heard the message as well. Even the dog Pat claimed to despise (the same dog that never left Pat or my side this month and howled so pitifully at the moment Pat stopped breathing) perked his ears in search of his missing master. We were all hypnotized by the phone message, like it was some sort of message from beyond. I ran to see Cal’s reaction, and like the rest of us, she was riveted, she opened her eyes and started to smile, eyes fluttering.

Since Pat’s death, Cal has been listless, quiet, and more remote.

I told her that Daddy was gone and that he had not wanted to go but he was not able to return. I had cried so much when I explained, “Daddy is gone and he did not want to leave,” I could hardly breathe.

It’s not clear what Cal comprehends about death, but she knows her father is gone. She seems angry about his disappearance from our lives. For her, death is a sort of abandonment that is so out of character with the man who has always been so devoted to her. She can’t make sense of any of it.

Once the message finished, I was reminded how Pat was not coming back, and I started yet another morning with a convulsive ten minutes of weeping.