Me and Charley

13. Something Special for Charley

I thought I was dreaming. I heard Grandpa downstairs talking with a couple of men whose voices I did not recognize. I began to waken and tapped my alarm clock. "The time is seven-ten a.m." I went to pee, got into my t-shirt and shorts and put my glasses on, and went to the head of the stairs. At the foot of the stairs were Grandpa and the men I'd heard him talking with, and several very large cardboard boxes of various shapes.

"Grandpa," I called down the stairs, "what's going on?"

"C'mon down, boy, I'll tell you."

Mom came up behind me, in her nightgown and bathrobe. She said, "Dad, I'll be down as soon as I get dressed."

"No rush, daughter." 

I trotted down the stairs and asked again, "Grandpa, what's all this?" 

He pulled a brochure out of his pocket and showed me pictures of a chair that folded down from the wall. It followed a track built on to the wall, to carry a person up or down the stairs. He said , "I figure that someday I might move in here, and by that time my knees might be too creaky for these stairs, so maybe I'd best do something about that."

"So you're gonna move in with us?"

"Maybe someday. For sure I'm not going anywhere until the lease runs out on my apartment next June."

"Aw Grandpa, that's almost a whole year away. So why are you doing this now?"

"Don't put off until tomorrow..." he started, and I finished, "what you can do today." Then it hit me. "You're doing this for Charley, aren't you?"

"Well, if Charley wants to use it, I won't object."

"Aw, Grandpa." I hugged him hard.

"Watch it, boy. You might knock me over," he said as he ran his hand through my hair. Mom came down the stairs just then and asked, "Dad, what in the world is all this?" Grandpa showed her the brochure and told her what he had told me, and had the same question I did, "Dad, that's almost a year away, why are you doing this now?"

I said, "It's for Charley, Mom."

Mom teared up and said, "Oh, Dad," as she hugged Grandpa tight. When she let go, Grandpa said, "Well, hadn't we best get out of the way and let these gentlemen get to work? How about some breakfast, daughter?"

The sound of hammers and saws coming from the deck met us as we got to the kitchen. We went out and found a couple of Amish men building a ramp down to the yard, and another digging out a path in the lawn from the foot of the ramp to our driveway, and a fourth doing the same from the ramp to our dock.

"Grandpa," I asked, "Why are they digging out those paths?"

"They'll fill them with concrete to make it easier for Charley to use his wheelchair."

Mom said, "Dad, isn't this too much?"

"Nonsense, daughter. You know as well as I that Charley means everything to his parents. I think this is the least we can do for them, after all they've done for us. And Trey, I want to do whatever it takes to keep him hanging out with you. He's been real good for you, just in the short time you've known him."

Mom said, "Dad, how long will they have the stairs tied up?"

Grandpa replied, "They say it'll be done by noon."

We returned to the kitchen and Grandpa sat at one end of the kitchen table and chitchatted with Mom as she got breakfast together. I sat at the other end and gazed at him in wonder as I realized he had pulled this project together in the midst of grieving over Grandma and seeing to her funeral and everything that followed. Breakfast was light and quick. As we finished, the phone rang. Mom went to answer it and said when she returned to the kitchen, "That was Charley, wanting to know if we need help with sheets and towels. I told him there's a lot going on and we won't get to that until this afternoon. And, I invited him and his parents to lunch. All this will be a nice surprise for them."