Life Insurance

The first time I drank a beer with my dad was at a hotel bar near O’Hare. We’d spent the afternoon at Wrigley, saved an empty seat for my grandpa, my mom’s dad, like we always said we would. I slurped lemonade, he ate hot dogs. The Cubs lost.

Dad invited me to the bar after Mom went to bed. He said she’d sleep better that way, that he had something he wanted to talk with me about. I was 25, and he’d never asked for anything like that, a father-son chat, one of those moments up there with playing ball, learning to shave, driving stick. Things I never did nor learned to do.

The bar was as most hotel bars are, department store art and dim lights, dark enough to hide if you wanted to. Dad pulled himself into a barstool, ordered two Buds without asking me what I wanted. He called them that, Buds, as if we were looking for friends, a couple guys to shoot the shit with, talk about the ball game. He didn’t talk for a while after they came, just worked on his beer in gulps, heavy things that left his greying mustache coated with foam. The next time he spoke was to order another round, but I was only halfway done with my first one. We went through this four times, me playing catch-up each one, the drunk’s equivalent of a child stumbling after his parent’s long strides, tripping over himself to keep up.

Dad didn’t respond when I asked him what he wanted to talk about. He blinked, turned toward me and paused for what might have been a second, might have been a minute. Time didn’t matter then; it had become hard to hold onto, slipped from hands moist with the condensation of a frosted pint glass. Out of nowhere he laughed, a hiccup of a thing. Or maybe he burped. Whatever he did, it jolted him back, reminded him of why we’d come here in the first place. He rested his elbows on the bar but didn’t put his weight on them, motioned me over with a wave of his fingers.

“Marriage advice,” he said.

Mine was two weeks out. I leaned in.

“A good life insurance policy,” he said. “Help your family take care of themselves once you’re gone.” He chugged his latest beer, set it on the counter and slid it to the bartender. “They’re on him,” he said, casting a hand toward me as if I were his caddy, maybe a porter, servant. He slid from his barstool and walked toward the elevator, shoulders rolled forward, feet lifted just enough to shuffle. He entered the elevator without turning around or saying goodnight.

“You want another?” the bartender asked. My glass was half-full. I chugged it in two gulps that burned my throat, expanded my chest in a way that made me think it would burst. The bartender took the empty and handed me the check. I settled up, stumbled into the doorframe, and threw up in a trash can around the corner.

###

It was raining the day my check for Dad’s life insurance policy arrived, thick drops that landed on the envelope in nickel-sized blotches. I stood under the garage overhang to open it, shield it from the weather. There was an emptiness to it, not even an accompanying letter. The closest to anything personal listed me as a beneficiary, him as the decedent. The check was for a little more than half of my salary. I drove it to the bank without saying anything to my wife, tucked it under my jacket to keep it safe. I wanted to deposit it in person, commemorate my dad. This is something he worked for, I’d tell them, but the guilt in depositing it stopped me at the door. I tried to put my finger on it but couldn’t. It felt dirty cashing in on his death, like it was an award I’d won.

The rain soaked my shoulders, pasted clumps of hair to the sides of my face. Through the glass of the door the teller’s face softened. She tilted her head and slid out of her seat, but I held up a hand to stop her, waved that I was okay. I deposited the check into the ATM.

On my way home, I brought a sixer of Bud, tall boys. After my daughter went to bed and the rain died down, I took it out to the stoop, chugged the whole damn lot of them.