Maybe

When you are young, it’s easy to miss just how hard life can be.  The world seems to be an adventure waiting to happen, the possibilities seem limitless and the future can only be better. Each new love, new job or new place is just another experience waiting to happen. Risk is just a fancy word for fear and pain is just a fleeting sensation. The world is waiting to be conquered and happiness is sure to follow.  Maybe riches lay around the corner. Maybe true love. Maybe great adventures.

Howard Scales was no longer young. And with age came inevitable limitations on the possibilities that lay out there. The world has a habit of knocking you down, he told his only child repeatedly. The mortgage brokerage he had worked so hard to build over the course of 10 years was wiped out in just 10 short months during the financial meltdown of 2008. He and Marcie had lost everything – the house they loved so much was gone in foreclosure. The nice cars traded for 100,000 mile beaters. The dinners out exchanged for tilapia on the grill. Most of all, though, they’d lost their sense of pride, of purpose and the belief that life inevitably progressed to better things.

Eventually, they rebounded. Howard found a job at a local credit union. He wasn’t his own boss any longer. The money, like the job, was lackluster but it kept food on the table and, with Marcie’s income as a receptionist at an optometrist’s office, they’d managed to find a small, comfortable house a couple of suburbs farther out from the city. By 2012, four long years after the earthquake that shook their lives, they felt like they were back on their feet and moving forward. They started talking about the world again as full of possibilities. Maybe it was time to take another shot at owning their own business. Maybe they could move somewhere warmer. Maybe. 

Howard would never forget the heart-pounding terror when his phone rang at 2:37 AM and the Caller ID showed the caller as the Highlands Police Department. Joey, he immediately thought as he fumbled in the dark to answer his phone. Their 20 year old son still lived at home while he attended community college and, as he was frequently the case lately, Joey was still out.

The accident had been small. The cause, major. Oxycotin and cocaine. Neither Howard nor Marcie had had any idea before that moment that their beloved son had fallen rapidly down a hole of drugs and desperation. Sure, he had been withdrawn but kids can be moody. Some of Marcie’s jewelry had disappeared but it was probably just lost. Joey’s grades had dropped dramatically but… But, but, but. In retrospect, Howard realized they had been living in denial for at least a couple of years. 

Still, there was hope. Rehab, though expensive, would turn things around. And it did until it didn’t. Back to rehab, more vows of permanent change, more disappointment. It was a cycle that too many families knew. Over time, Howard began to feel numb to it all. It felt useless to hope that “this time” was really the time Joey was going to stay off of drugs. Marcie continued to believe that things would turn around but, after a couple of years, Howard only mouthed the words that he knew she expected. 

Over time, though, life did calm down. After years in and out of treatment, Joey finally seemed to be clean of his drug habit. He was holding down a job at a warehouse while going back to school at night. He seemed to have some hope for the future and that hope inevitably gave his parents hope. Life was still a grind but as they entered their fifties, they started to talk about a quiet retirement. Maybe a small house on a lake somewhere. Nothing fancy but a nice view and quiet days together. It was still a long way off but possibilities once again filled Howard’s thoughts. Maybe they’d finally make the move south to warmer days.

Of all the possibilities Howard considered, a worldwide pandemic had never entered his thoughts. Other than a select few whose jobs were in the field, that didn’t make Howard special. Previous scares – letter jumbles like SARS and MERS – had come and gone without impacting his life or the lives of anyone he knew. When newscasts starting talking about something called “Covid”, he was interested in a distant way. It was like watching the news of a far off tornado destroying some small town in the south or a plane crash in another country. Tragic, to be sure, but not something that was going to impact his life. Something to be informed about but not something to worry about. 

He was wrong. So very wrong. Just a few weeks after the news had started to talk about the strange virus, Marcie came home from work with a bad cough. Things happened fast after that. The next day, she was struggling to breathe and on her way to the hospital. The hospital was overwhelmed seemingly overnight and, to make matters worse, Howard was barred from entering. Over the next couple of days, he got spotty, hurried reports from a series of overworked nurses. Oxygen, a little better. Respirator. Hanging in there. Still some hope. I’m sorry, she’s gone. A cough on Monday, a funeral to plan on Saturday. To add insult to grievous injury, no real funeral was allowed as the country shutdown in response to the spreading pandemic. 

Time passed slower for Howard without Marcie but it passed nonetheless.  Eventually, he went back to work and trudged through the days. He spent hours in the evenings watching sporting events that he didn’t really care about to fill the long nights. At times, he was happy. It took a while but he eventually went back to playing tennis a couple of times a week. Joey’s wedding, two years after Marcie’s death, was bittersweet – Marcie’s absence felt so enormous to Howard but that balanced with the joy he took in seeing his once-troubled son happy and moving forward. Still, he fought a lingering depression that kept telling him that there really was nothing left for his future. There was nothing to do but “exist”, without purpose or aim, until his own inevitable demise.

Howard was lighting the grill on his birthday in 2023 when his cell phone rang. Joey. Calling to wish me a happy birthday, Howard thought, as he closed the grill lid to let the heat build.

“Hey, Joey,” Howard answered standing on the back deck enjoying the spring thaw.

“Hey, Dad, Happy Birthday.”

“Thanks, Joey. How are you and Tina doing?”

“Great, Dad, really great. You should come down and see us some time soon.” Joey and his wife Tina had de-camped for Tampa shortly after the wedding. Joey was working as a investment advisor and Tina had just passed the Florida Bar exam. 

“Yeah, will plan something soon,” replied Howard unconvincingly. He enjoyed visiting them but he felt like a third wheel disrupting their lives after a few days. And a sad third wheel, at that. “Well, Joey, I’d love to talk but I’ve got a steak about to go on the grill and my mouth is watering. I’ll talk to you soon?”

“Wait, Dad, before you go. I have something to tell you. Consider it a birthday present.”

“OK,” Howard chuckled.

“I guess, well, I guess the best way to say this is – you are going to be a grandpa.”

It took a moment for Howard to absorb the news. His mind kept repeating Grandpa, again and again. Finally, he processed his surprise and felt a wave of joy unlike anything that he’d experienced since the day Marcie died.

“Joey, that’s fantastic. Amazing. Wow, I’m so happy for you. Is Tina OK? How is she? How far along is she? Are you nervous? Don’t be. You will be great as a Dad.” The words, and the emotions, could not be checked.

Later, as he sat on the deck, alone on the spring evening, finishing the perfect steak that had never tasted quite so good, his mind began to wander. Maybe I should move to Tampa. Get a townhome in one of the suburbs. Some place with a second bedroom in case the little one spends the night. You know, the housing market is really hot down there. I’ll bet I could start up a small mortgage brokerage. That way, I’d make my own hours and be available if they needed me to watch the baby. Or I could pick him up from school every day. Ooh, what if it is a little girl. Maybe I could take her for one of those princess makeovers in Disney World when she gets to the right age. Maybe I would finally learn to fish if I lived down in that area. I’ve always thought fishing looked fun. Maybe even go on one of those charters boats some day. Maybe. Just maybe.