Is This What You Call a Family?

“Juli - Juliet, can you please calm down? I don’t want your nurse to come back and yell at me. She made it very clear she would. Please.”

I knew it was the guy - my grandfather - whoever the hell this guy was - talking to me and I should probably respond to him but my thoughts were swirling together in an incomprehensible speed. Why was he just suddenly here? Shouldn’t someone have let me know my grandfather was coming to visit me? Surely Ruth would have mentioned it. Which just made me more uncertain about who this man could be. What if Marcus really did have someone come to finish me off? Lull everyone into a false sense of security that he was related to me and the minute we were gone, bam! Next time I’m seen, it’s in a gutter around the pier.

“Juliet! Jules, hon, I need you to take deep breaths. C’mon, in and out. In. And out.”

I finally focused on the exaggerated breaths being directed at me and after what felt like hours, my heart was finally beating at what would be considered a normal rate. As my sight cleared up, I was able to see Ruth standing right next to my bed while the man had retreated towards the window. Both wore similar looks of concern and I offered a half assed smile.

“I told you not to upset her or I was going to toss you to the curb, damnit,” Ruth seethed at the man once she was sure I wasn’t going to die. The man held his hands up in surrender again as his face twisted up in confusion.

“I don’t know what I did! I just told her I was her grandfather and she just...I don’t know!”
“It’s called a panic attack,” I grumbled as I wrapped the sheet around my body. Ruth and the man turned to look at me as I kept moving the cover around to attempt to turn myself into a cocoon. “It happens when you have anxiety. It could have easily been avoided if I was warned about a visitor.”

“I’m sorry,” Ruth apologized as she fetched me a cup to pour water into from the jug on a table separate from the one connected to my bed. As I was sipping it, she explained, “We wanted it to be a surprise. No one mentioned you had bad anxiety.”

“Even if I didn’t have it before, my mother died in the past forty-eight hours. I saw her get beat almost to death. No one thought I might be susceptible to panic attacks? Hospital full of morons, great,” I snapped. Both adults looked like kicked puppies which caused me to sigh deeply. “So this is true, no bullshit? You’re my dad’s dad?”

“Uhm, yes. No bullshit,” the man agreed wholeheartedly. “I’m Brian, but most people just call me Papa Gates.”

“Why?”

“Because your father is a junior and it’s easier that way.”

“Why ‘Gates’?” My relentless line of questioning finally got a shifty of his eyes rather than an actual response. I raised an eyebrow as he struggled to figure out how to answer that exact question.

“I’ll let your father explain that one,” is what he finally settled on with a sigh.

“And where is he?”

“Business trip. He’ll be back on Monday.”

“What kind of business?”

“Again, I’ll let him tell you about that. It’s not really my place to talk about for him.”

“He’s a provocative dancer, isn’t he?” Ruth let out a snort from where she had been pretending to fiddle with the machines around me while ‘Papa Gates’s eyes got wide.

“No! What? - No.” I almost laughed at his face, almost. Now that I fucked with him properly, I guess I can believe he’s my grandfather. That blush is something a grandfather would probably experience from something like that being said. Why do I have such weird tests for these things? Oh well, point stands.

“Thanks, Ruth. I’ll make sure to call you if I need anything. And I promise I’ll still go to therapy,” I vowed. Ruth studied me for a few moments before smiling and giving a nod. She tried to hide it from me, but I saw the warning glare she sent Papa on the way out. I knew she was worried he was going to do something to set off my anxiety again, but it wasn’t very likely now that he was going to set me off. Once the door was shut again, I motioned towards the chair next to the door. “You can sit down, dude. It’ll be tiring just...standing the whole time.”

“Oh. Uh, thanks.” He grabbed the chair and moved it next to the bed. He lowered himself into the seat and glanced uncomfortably around the room. I glanced with him and frowned. This kind of place sucks life out of people, which is kind of funny considering the fact that this is where people are supposed to get healed. I wonder if he was wondering how many people didn’t make it out of this room.

I sucked in a deep breath, my eyes instantly shutting. Why do I have to fuck myself up, why? I rubbed at my face with my sheet covered hands and breathed out slowly as I attempted to hold back tears. I had one freak out in front of him already, I don’t need to make it two and just completely ruin my first impression to him. What if he already wants to tell my father it would be safer to not take me in? No, stop it, stop it, stop it.

“Uh, Juliet?” My head snapped up a bit too fast making my temples pulse painfully. Papa had half raised himself from his chair, looking unsure if he should try to move forward to console me or not. “Are - are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” I had to struggle not to snap at him as I said this. I knew it wasn’t his fault - it was absolutely all my fault - but it didn’t stop me from lashing out at everyone else around me. Goddammit, that’s not fair at all. I took another deep breath and rubbed at my eyes once last time before lowering my arms and offering a smile. “Sorry. My mind isn’t fully awake yet, I guess.”

“You sure?” I nodded and Papa lowered himself back onto his seat. He opened and closed his mouth for a few seconds before he left it shut. I guess he was at a lost for ideas to speak about. Poor sap.

“So, Mr. Gates, what do you do for a job?”

“Mr. Gates?” Papa mused with a small smirk.

“Well, I have no idea what your real name is. I didn’t wanna say old man. Feels a bit rude,” I remarked. He paused for a moment, seemingly thinking it over, before he nodded in agreement.

“Well, for future reference, my name is Brian Haner. Senior if you wanna get really specific. And I am a...guitarist for hire, I guess? I teach classes and go into studios if people need a guest guitarist.”

“That’s...that’s actually really cool.”

“Nice to know I’m not a completely lame old fart,” Papa joked.

“Well, not completely.” Papa rolled his eyes at me. “So were you the one that taught my father?”

“You know he plays?” Papa actually seemed incredibly surprised at this news. I nodded, blushing and dropping my head.

“Mom mentioned it a few times before. I don’t think she meant to, but she did talk about it.” I crossed my arms and pouted at him. “You didn’t answer my question though.”

“Okay. I want to say I did, but really, I think it was only the basics. He ended up taking lessons downtown and even went to college to study too.”

“You can go to college to study guitar playing?”

“At the Musicians Institute in Los Angeles, yeah. You can.”

“How much money did he waste?” Papa raised an eyebrow at me and I cleared my throat, turning to look out the window instead. “I mean, did he do anything with it?”

Just as Papa was about to tell me, a knocking came at my door. We both turned in time to see Dr. Starling enter the room. He offered a broad smile as he gently shut the door behind himself. I fidgeted a little bit as I realized that Ruth wouldn’t be here with us. What if he threw around more technical terms no one in their right mind understood? This is going to end terribly, huh?

“Hello, Juliet. Who is your visitor?” he questioned with his smile that wasn’t faltering in the least. Which, honestly, was kind of creepy.

“Brian Haner, her grandfather,” Papa introduced as he stood to his feet and offered out his right hand. The doctor shook it and I swear his smile broadened. How is that physically possible? Is his face going to crack? I wonder what the medical term for that would be.

“Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” Papa nodded and took back his seat. Dr. Starling then turned to me with his weirdo smile. “How are you feeling, Juliet?”

“Just as great as I was about an hour ago when you were here last,” I said. Seriously, why the hell are you here again so soon? Go away. I’m trying to have a moment here.

“Well I heard that a relative of yours was here and I wanted to make sure they knew everything that was going on. It would hopefully stop my pager from being blown up from calls too,” Dr. Starling spoke, giving Papa a particular look that I couldn’t quite decipher. Papa looked guilty and rubbed his neck uncomfortably.

“Sorry about him. Being across the world right now, he’s anxious to know what’s going on,” Papa spoke. Wait, who’s across the world? My father? Why was he across the world?

I blanked out on Dr. Starling and Papa’s conversation as my thoughts got carried away. Was he a photographer or archeologist or something? Wouldn’t that be wicked. Oooh, what if he was actually an actor or something? Finally, my dreams were coming true. Maybe Robert Downey Jr. really was my father. That’d be too awesome. Not likely in any case but I would love to accept it anyways if it was an option.

“Juliet?”

I looked up from where I had apparently been studying the sheets covering my legs to see Ruth and Papa staring at me. I looked around as I blinked a few times and noticed the lack of Dr. Starling. Trying to make it seem as nonchalant as possible even though it was a half minute late, I asked, “Wassup?”

“We really need to get you to the rehabilitation room,” Ruth said.

“Oh, yeah, sure.” I saw Papa fidgeting in his seat and saw the unsure look dance across his face. “Can Papa come with us?”

“I don’t see why not,” Ruth spoke up as she saw his look too. Soon enough he was beaming at me.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’m pretty sure you can keep up with me well enough. You don’t have a cane yet so I’m assuming you have some kind of pep in your step,” I remarked as I pushed the covers off of my body. Ruth helped ease me off the bed before I grasped the IV pole. Papa scoffed at me as he held the door open for me to shuffle through.

“I would offer a race, but that’d be pretty embarrassing for you,” Papa boasted. I glared half heartedly at him as the door clicked shut behind me and Ruth led us down the hall to the elevator again.

“Alright, no need to be rude,” I scoffed.

“Just giving what I get,” Papa remarked. I opened my mouth to say some kind of witty comeback but found I had nothing. It was true. We were natural born teasers I guess. Soon enough we were all piling into the elevator and waiting as it began its descent to the first floor. We walked down the mostly empty hallway in the opposite direction from the cafeteria as Ruth began to explain all the different options of physical activities I could choose from. To be honest, all of it sounded particularly painful to attempt minus walking on the treadmill. I could pull off turtle speed but that was about it.

“And here we are!” Ruth chirped as she pushed open a set of double doors. Once male nurse turned his attention to us for half a second before he settled his eyes back on the man who was in about his mid-twenties who was doing sit ups. His face was twisted up with concentration and I honestly thought he was going to have an asthma attack in a moment or two. “What tickles your fancy?”

“Let’s never use that phrase please. It just sounds dirty,” I grimaced, causing Papa to chuckle and Ruth to roll her eyes. “But seriously, I think I can only handle the treadmill for now. At about slow zombie pace, but even that might be too fast.”

“Alright, well, let’s get you set up then.”

Both Ruth and Papa had to help me manage my way onto the rough fabric of the exercise machine. I never really thought about it before. What was a treadmill belt made of? It felt...calloused. Can a fabric be calloused? Ruth made a big show of instructing me to hold onto the bars on either side of me and to let someone know if I got too tired or winded because they really didn’t want anything else to happen to me. Once I nodded okay, she barely turned the knob controlling the speed which set me off to a slow shuffle.

A loud groaning was heard and all three of us looked over at the man who I was just worried about. He was now curled up on his side, moaning about abdomen, as the male nurse that was stood next to him was shaking his head in annoyance. Ruth sighed and also shook her head. “I’ll be right back guys. Looks like Tom did something stupid, again.”

With that Ruth headed off to the two demanding to know ‘what happened now’. I turned my attention to Papa who was still staring at Tom with his eyebrows knitted together in concentration. “Hey Papa?”

“Yeah?” He blinked hard and was focusing on me again with a small smile tugging at his lips.

“Could you...” I swallowed hard and took a deep breath to work up my nerves. “Could you tell me more about my mom? Like when she was younger and stuff. And maybe my dad too?”

“Of course!” Papa was practically beaming as he leaned on the side of the treadmill, his arms crossed on the edge with his chin resting on top of them. “Where do you want me to start?”

“Well, how did they meet?”

Papa laughed at the memory and began to explain with a far away look in his eyes. “Naturally it all began with a call from the principal.”