I was walking swiftly along the hallway to the elevator, head down, when I collided with someone. “Oh, my God!” I exclaimed, instinctively reaching out for the person’s arm. But this person wasn’t steadied by my grasp, and as I raised my head, I understood why, and gripped the tall man harder, and steered him towards the wall. Walls have a wonderful way of holding a person up, if you can get there in time, and this one served that purpose well.
“Jaysus, God, did you get the number of that truck?”
“Oh, Sean! I’m so sorry! Are you all right?”
He leaned back against the wall, took a deep breath, and exhaled shakily. “I think so, but that was an awfully close call, Sarah, and I seem to have lost a crutch. Could you find it, please?” He braced himself with the crutch he’d managed to hold on to, and gripped the wooden rail running the length of the wall with his free hand.
The other crutch lay a few feet away, and I retrieved it quickly and handed it back to him.
He slipped his arm into the cuff and closed his hand tightly around the grip. The knuckles of both hands were white. Our sudden encounter had shaken him up more than he would ever admit. “Well, Hurricane Sarah, where are you blowing off to in such a hurry?”
“Are you sure you’re all right, Sean?” I asked, evading his question, even though I knew he wouldn’t let me get away with that.
“I’m a bit shaken up, but I don’t think there’s any real harm done. Never mind that for now. What’s up with you?”
“Oh, Sean, there’s just no reasoning with him!” I exclaimed, and started to cry.
“Oh! Oh, my! What happened?”
“We had a fight, and he—he yelled at me,” I sobbed. “Sean, I’m doing my best to help, and I couldn’t have done anything differently, but Ronan doesn’t see it that way, and—”
He shook his head. “Oh, Sarah, you’ve had a day, haven’t you? Come here,” he said gently, and drew me close. He was still leaning against the wall for support, in case he dropped his crutches, but the cuffs held to his wool-clad upper arms and moved with him, so he was still able to prop himself up without holding the grips. His blue-gray Aran sweater had a warm, comforting, organic smell, and I hid my face against it, and felt his arms encircle me. “There, now,” he murmured. “Things will work themselves out. Michael tells me you’ve hired a caretaker. Is that what’s causing the problem?”
I nodded.
“I thought as much. Come on, there’s a lounge down the hall. Let’s go sit and talk for a bit, so you and Ronan both have a chance to cool down.”
I fell into step with Sean, and noticed that he seemed to be having trouble walking. His right foot twisted every few steps, causing him to drag his leg and depend on the crutches for more than balance. Thankfully, it wasn’t far to the lounge, and when we got there, it was deserted. We headed for a small sofa near the window and sat down side by side.
Sean raked a hand through his hair, now completely gray but still wavy, and grown out long enough to just brush his shoulders in the back. He was still an awfully nice-looking man in spite of everything. A bit too thin, but even that was changing as time passed and his appetite increased.
“O.K.,” he said. “So, where were we? Ronan gave you a bunch of shit about hiring a caretaker, and—”
“Yeah. He just won’t listen to reason, Sean. I was trying to plan ahead, because he wouldn’t, and by next weekend he’ll probably be coming home. I couldn’t wait for him to feel like interviewing people, especially when it sounded like he planned to put if off indefinitely. He doesn’t understand that I can’t just stay home from work. I’m on really thin ice right now, and I’ve been subtly warned that if I ask for any more time off, there won’t be a job waiting for me when I come back. So, someone has to be in place to care for him when I can’t, on stand-by and ready to come over at a moment’s notice.”
“Of course. You’re absolutely right, and it is for his own good, but I can see both sides of this. If I were in Ronan’s place, I would hate like hell to have a caretaker, but I would hate being installed in a rehab hospital even more. I know what I’m talking about, too, ’cause I’ve been there and done that.”
“Was it really that bad?”
“Well—yes and no. It was a difficult situation. Mary was very pregnant when I was ready to go home after my back surgery, and I was damn near helpless, much worse off than Ronan is now. At the time, it was looking as if I’d never walk again, and I was in a brace that was more like a medieval torture rack than an orthopedic appliance. I couldn’t get in or out of my wheelchair without a great deal of assistance, and there was no way Mary could have dealt with that so late in her pregnancy, nor could we have afforded a live-in caretaker. Our home wasn’t accessible for me yet, either, so there was no other choice. I went into a rehab hospital, and I stayed there from early May to late August.”
“That long?”
Sean nodded. “A man who suddenly finds himself paralyzed has a great deal to learn about the limits of his mobility.”
“But you’re not—”
“Not completely anymore, but damn close to it then. What I’m up against now is something the doctors call paraparesis, which is just the technical way of saying I don’t have full control of my legs, or full sensation in them, and probably never will, ’cause the tumor bruised my spinal cord. That healed, for the most part, but there was some slight permanent damage. I’m very thankful to have gotten back as much as I have. When I first went into rehab, I couldn’t really feel anything from the waist down. The prognosis was grim, and all my early therapy concentrated specifically on teaching me to get around in a wheelchair without killing anyone.”
“Mary told me a little about what you went through when you and Ronan were working together. She thought you were putting in too many hours, and she was afraid you’d get overtired and end up hurting yourself, or getting sick. She wanted me to tell Ronan, and to ask him to cut back on the sessions a bit.”
He shook his head. “Sarah, Mary knows now, but she didn’t at first, so I guess maybe you don’t know, either, but I was the driven maniac in the studio, not Ronan. When I cut back on the length of the sessions, it was mainly because he said I was wearing him out. Me, I never felt like it was too much until that last night, and then it didn’t matter anymore, ’cause we were done. A few hours’ sleep, and I was back to normal again. Or as normal as I can ever get back to being.”
“You recover pretty quickly, then.”
“Sometimes I do, and sometimes it takes a little longer than one night’s sleep. It all depends on what I’ve been doing. Anyway, when I was in rehab, I only left the hospital twice, first when Mary went into labor, so I could be present for the birth of our son. The second time was to attend his baptism, and to spend the day with my family. Both times a nurse had to come with me, because I needed more specialized assistance than anyone in the family could have provided. The rest of the time, about four months all told, I was in that damn hospital, and I hated it. I don’t fault the staff in any way. They really did try to treat me with dignity and respect, but it didn’t feel like that at the time. They’re so used to dealing with all sorts of nasty stuff, it doesn’t faze them in the least to discuss such things in front of any number of people. There’s no privacy whatsoever, despite all the rules about patient confidentiality. If Ronan went into a place like that, I think he’d rocket through the roof the first time he had to be escorted to the bathroom. ’Cause they don’t just escort you, Sarah. If you can’t take care of yourself and there’s the remotest possibility of you taking a fall, they won’t stand discreetly outside the door and wait. No. They stay with you the entire time. Even after I regained control over that region of myself, I was never alone in the bathroom. Ever. I was too good a candidate for a fall, especially in that damn brace. If you start to go over when you’re stuck in a contraption like that, there’s no way to stop yourself, or bend away from anything you could crack your head on. Quite literally, a fall, no matter how minor, could have been the death of me. I knew having someone with me was for my own good, but it was the thing I hated most of all while I was there.”
“Someone’s going to have to help Ronan with all those personal things, whether at home or in rehab, and if he has a problem with letting me brush his hair, I can just imagine how he’ll react when he finds out he’s going to have to let me—”
“I know,” Sean cut in, “but if you tell him it’s that or nappies, I think he’ll see the light. Trust me. It’s far better to go to the can yourself and have someone else wipe your arse, than to be changed every few hours, like a baby.”
I winced, knowing, but not wanting to know, that he spoke from experience. He was never one to shy away from difficult subjects, though, and now was no exception. I could only hope he wouldn’t describe it further. “Sean—”
“I’ll spare you the gory details,” he said, as if he’d read my mind. “Suffice it to say it was nasty, but awful as it sounds, I saw far worse scenarios on a daily basis. Yeah, there I was, struggling with paralysis and trying to wrap my mind around the notion that I’d probably never walk again. You’d think that would be about the worst thing that could happen to a man. I thought so, too, until I started looking around me and really seeing the other residents, many of whom would never leave the place ’til the undertaker came for them. Old people who still lived and breathed though their minds had long since gone. People my age and younger with cancer, who couldn’t be cured and just lay there waiting to die. I never saw those people—the hopeless cases—in therapy. But I did see people who had lost limbs to diabetes and were working hard to adjust to life with a prosthesis. And people with arthritis so bad, at first I wondered what those twisted things at the ends of their arms were. Hands, Sarah, nearly unrecognizable as such! But when I paid closer attention, I saw that those people were trying to learn how to hold a cup of coffee, or a piece of silverware, in hopes of actually getting some sustenance into their mouths. There’s no doubt that I had it rough, but no matter where I looked in that place, I could always see someone who had it equally as rough, if not rougher. It should have made me thankful for the blessings I’d been granted, but instead it made me depressed.”
“I think it would take an extraordinary mindset not to get depressed in the midst of that.”
Sean nodded. “Yeah, though I can tell you that I did have a brief time of brightness and blessing there. Quite by accident, I got friendly with one of the cancer patients, a lady a few years older than me, who never seemed to have any visitors. She loved to feel the warmth of the sun, and to look up into the sky no matter what the weather, so every day they’d wheel her bed out to the common room, where there was a big window, and park her there for the afternoon. I was just learning to use my chair, even though it was hard to see where I was going in that ridiculous brace. I couldn’t bend or turn, or move my head. I could only look straight ahead, and though I kept telling them that would pose a serious risk to everyone else in the place, they still said I had to get out and about a few times a day. They’d get me dressed and strap me into the wheelchair, and off I’d go. One afternoon I steered myself right into the side of this poor woman’s bed, and after I apologized we—dare I say—struck up a friendship?”
“In the most literal sense, eh?”
“Yeah, you could say that. I didn’t feel right about leaving her after I bashed into the bed, ’cause getting jolted like that had hurt her—not so badly as to injure her, but enough to set her to aching, and she started to cry. Since I’d caused the pain, I figured the only decent thing to do was to try and offer some comfort, so I stayed with her and held her hand and talked to her. Turned out she was a Catholic, and when I told her I was, too, she asked if I’d mind saying the Rosary with her. Neither of us had a set of beads that day, so I counted the decades on my fingers, and we got by just fine. A few days later, my friend Matt, who was still a priest at the time, gave her a set, and I would remember to bring mine with me when I went out in the chair. It seemed to comfort her, so every day, between therapy sessions, I’d seek her out, and we’d pray and talk together, until she was too tired to do anything more than lie there and sleep. Her times of wakefulness seemed to get shorter and shorter as the weeks went by, but I still felt a sense of her being a deeply spiritual person, in a place and a situation where it was not easy to be that way. I know I wasn’t feeling terribly spiritual when I first met her. What I was feeling, was cursed and abandoned by God, and wondering if such an entity even existed. The first time Diane and I said the Rosary, it was just rote for me. I still called myself a Catholic, and as such I still prayed the Rosary, though at that point I was really starting to believe it was nothing but useles mumbo-jumbo, and I remained undecided about it for quite some time. Yet Diane told me I had brought her closer to God, and helped to restore her faith. But I think, really, that she sensed how faithless I felt then, and led me to believe that she needed prayer, when really, I was the one who needed it.” Sean’s voice broke, and he took off his glasses and wiped his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said. “As you can see, I still have a very hard time talking about her.”
“What happened to her?” I asked gently, although I was sure I already knew what he would say.
“Well, she died. It was inevitable. She hadn’t been lucky, like me. She had fought the good fight and lost, and come to that hospital to wait for the end. One afternoon in late July, I went out to the common room to meet her at the usual time, but she wasn’t there. I didn’t even have time to take it in and understand before one of the nurses saw me and came over with the chaplain. He brought me into his office and told me she was gone, and handed me an envelope. She had left me the most beautiful letter, the Rosary Matt gave her, and a picture of herself, taken in better days. One of the things she said in that letter was that she expected me to get out there and live my life in a way that would make her proud to watch over me. God knows I’ve tried ever since.” He plucked a tissue from a box on the end table and blew his nose. “Diane was the only good thing about that wretched place. Once she was gone, I worked my arse off twice as hard, so I could go home and start living my life again. And y’know, even though she’d be furious with me for even having such a thought—I’d rather die than go back to one of those places. If I ever get cancer again—God forbid!—I want to stay at home. No chemotherapy. No hospice. No nurses with bright, sticky voices. Just my own bed and my own family, and maybe a little too much morphine to send me on my way at the appropriate moment.” He wiped his eyes again. “I’m sorry,” he repeated. “I didn’t mean to go all to pieces like that, but the very thought of Ronan stuck in one of those places—well, he’s like me, but even worse.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m only about halfway blue, but he’s blue right to the core. You just can’t put someone like that in a rehab hospital environment if there’s any other choice.”
“I wish he understood that.”
“He does, I’m sure, deep down inside, and furthermore, I don’t believe he’s angry with you. He’s angry about the situation he’s found himself in. How awful, to go from being on top of the world one minute, to waking up hurt and helpless in a hospital bed the next! Even I didn’t have it that bad. When my back gave out, I had already been horribly ill for a few months, so I didn’t have to come down from any height. I also had a damn good idea where I was going, and what situation I would find myself in after surgery. I didn’t like what was happening, but at least I knew, and I understood. At the moment, Ronan has no idea what hit him. I think anger is a pretty natural response to getting blindsided like that.”
“I think so, too, but it’s hard to be on the receiving end when you’re only trying to do what’s best.”
“I know. Do you think you could go back to him now?”
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea. His parting words to me were ‘don’t bother,’ after I told him I’d come back when he’d calmed down.”
“Sounds to me like he meant exactly the opposite, or more likely, ‘don’t go.’”
I shook my head. “If you could have heard him, Sean! I mean, I’ve seen him get a little hot under the collar a few times, but never as angry as this. I’m surprised the nurse didn’t come running, he was yelling that loud.”
“All the more reason for us to go in together. He wouldn’t dare act out like that in front of me.”
“Really? And what makes you so special, that he wouldn’t ream you, too?”
Sean’s brow furrowed, but he didn’t look at all angry, only thoughtful. I’d seen that look before, and more often than not, some profound notion or other came forth when he was ready to speak. Now, I guessed, would be no exception.
“Well, I don’t really know, exactly, but I think it may have something to do with the music.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Think about it. Who knows him best, Sarah? Who knows Ronan O’Farrell, the man, rather than Ronan O’Farrell, the legend?”
“You, I guess.”
“No! You really don’t get it, do you?”
“What?”
Sean smiled. “Let me be a little more specific, then. Who makes love with him? Who sees him over the breakfast table in the morning? Who has he poured his heart and soul out to in the past few months?”
“Me?”
“Yes, Sarah! You! You’re the only one who’s ever seen him fully naked, literally and figuratively. You know Ronan O’Farrell better than anyone ever has.”
“How would you know that?”
“Well, apart from what I just said, he’s also told me a few personal details here and there, including the fact that he was in a very pristine condition when you first decided to—”
“Sean!” I gasped, scandalized.
“No need to be embarrassed, a cara. At first I thought he had to be bullshitting me. I mean, I heard it all the time when I was an up-and-coming guitarist, about how good-looking he was. So good-looking that women would go to his concerts with their boyfriends and just feast on his beauty, while the guys enjoyed the music. Like everyone else, I always figured that Ronan O’Farrell got more ass than a toilet seat, and in my younger days, that bugged the hell out of me, even though I was never a one-night-stand kind of guy. So, I was really shocked to find out he was even more straitlaced than me in that department. I mean, on stage he—and don’t misunderstand me here—he exuded an energy that even made me feel hot for him, and I’m not attracted to men that way, and never have been. And bear in mind, I only ever got to see him on video, and even on a little TV screen he was that compelling.”
“I remember. I saw him play in person quite a few times, but I was one of the women who loved his music as well as his looks.”
“You were a rare one, then, and I think he’s been waiting for a rare one all his life.”
“Sean—”
“You mean, you can’t tell that he adores you?”
“If you had heard him a little while ago, you wouldn’t be able to tell, either.”
“We’re back to who knows him best as a real flesh-and-blood man. That’s why he allows himself to be that naked in front of you. I know it sounds fucked-up, but Sarah, he was yelling at you because he trusts you. Because you’re the only one who really knows him as a man, and loves him for that above the music. With me, he has a reputation to uphold. He wouldn’t dare crack in front of me at this stage of the game. Not Ronan O’Farell, the legend.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I think I see what you’re getting at, Sean, and it does sound incredibly fucked-up, but—I think you may be right.”
