The bedside phone rang at 5:30 AM. I didn’t have to guess who it was. My father had died the nurse told me. I thanked her, told my lovely wife, got a hug, shed a tear and went downstairs to make a list of what needed to be done. By 7:15 I was dressed and at the 7/11 buying coffee. “No papers today Mister K?” Rami asked. “No papers today,” I replied somberly. For the past 5 months, I had stopped daily and bought a coffee for me and the Daily News and The Record for my Dad.
Caring for my Dad had meant I arrive at the Rehabilitation Center shortly after breakfast, make sure he was washed and dressed and then wheel him outside for a cigarette. We’d smoke, read the papers and occasionally talk. I had begun shaving him but refused to shave under his nose. “If you don’t like the mustache, you’ll have to get yourself up and shave it off,” I’d say. He never mentioned it until one morning out of the blue he said “Do you think this mustache looks like Ronald Coleman’s?” I thought for a moment and replied “Ronald Coleman had a thin mustache like Errol Flynn, yours is thicker”. He was silent for a long time and then said “Your mother always liked Ronald Coleman.” My Mom had past away 4 years before.
At the Center that morning I said goodbye to my Dad’s lifeless body and asked to use the office phone. I called Tom B of B Funeral Home and requested the exact same arrangements my Dad had made for my Mom be made for him. I asked Tom if he could have my Dad’s mustache trimmed to look like Ronald Coleman. Tom promised to have his cosmetician do that.
The next morning I stopped at Dad’s house and picked out a blue suit, white shirt, red tie and shoes. At the funeral home, Tom asked if I wanted to see the job they had done on Dad’s mustache. I went downstairs and met Patricia who very proudly showed me a picture of Ronald Coleman she had pulled from the Internet. Sure enough, there was a thin mustache. She then pulled back the sheet covering my father and I saw – Ronald Coleman. Not Ronald Coleman’s mustache but Ronald Coleman’s face. To Patricia I said “Great work,” to myself I said “Aunt Betty is going to kill me!” Aunt Betty didn’t kill me. At the viewing, when I related the story she laughed until she cried and hugging me close whispered “Your Mom’ll love it.”
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On a park bench outside a large Circus tent from which sounds of laughter and a band could be heard, she sat and waited. Her long auburn hair flowed over the collar of her yellow summer dress. He approached slowly, shyly, his long thin body dressed in a military uniform. “I missed you, Eydie,” he said as he leaned over and took her hands in his. She stood up and on tiptoes kissed him on the lips. “You look just like Ronald Coleman,” she said as they strolled arm in arm toward the tent and the laughter. “Yeah, it’s a gift from K.”
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