Frank is sitting behind the wheel of his 1964 Chevy Apache. The window is down so he can feel the cool, fall air even though he’s not moving. He’s just sitting. His left elbow is propped on the window ledge. He pulls his pipe from his lips with the other hand, tilts his head up and sideways a bit and blows the sweet aroma of smoke toward the outside world.

From the parking lot he watches as people come and go from the entrance to the hospital. An elderly man walks with a shuffle and carries a bouquet of flowers. A young couple with four small children in tow hurry across the painted lines in the crosswalk. A lady, he assumes in her forties, is pushing an older woman in a wheelchair whom he assumes is her mother.

Where are they all going? Who is it inside that they are here to see?

To Frank this world is full enough of trouble as it is without having to be here at this godforsaken place. He hates hospitals and not without good reason. As a boy his grandparents both died in their own beds at home. But, these days, it seems like everyone comes here to die. His parents both died here. He lost his wife here. Now Frank is worried that the old Dark Angel is about to claim his son-in-law in Room 435.

Just this last spring Frank thought that life was as good as it could be. He’s a farmer. How could anyone not like spring? He takes another draw on his pipe and his mind goes back to the early calves that were born in late February. A dozen good heifers and two bulls, now steers. He would be taking them to the sale barn in a few weeks. The heifers, he thought, would be good breeding stock.

There was frost on the ground the morning he pulled on his overalls and canvas jacket. He likes the feel of a cold morning just before daylight. Belle, his Jersey milk cow, shuffles in her stall as he slides the barn door open. He doesn’t have to round her up because she comes inside from her pen out back when she hears the back screen door slam against the porch.

Life is supposed to work in an unspoken rhythm in Frank’s world. White faced calves nudging up under their mamas and bucking the udder for more milk. Fields that yield to the plow and produce the corn and tobacco and the vegetable garden that feeds his family. Hay in the early summer. Meat hanging in the smokehouse. Grandkids spending a lazy afternoon with a cane pole and bobber in the pond.

Frank tells himself that he is sitting out in the parking lot so he can finish his smoke, but he knows that’s not the real reason.

He hears a voice from just outside his window.

“Daddy. What are you doing just sitting out here in the parking lot?”

Stella cups her hand over his forearm resting on the window. She’s a redhead with blue eyes and a boat load of freckles. Frank turns. He sees the thin face and sharp nose and for a moment he sees his wife, Regina, when they were young. Stella is the spitting image of the girl he married over forty years ago.

“I don’t like going in that dang hospital. Too many bad memories, I guess.”

“I know Tom would like to see you.”

“And I want to see him, but I don’t know what to say when things are like they are.”

“You don’t have to say anything. Come on. We’ll walk inside together.”

Frank steps out and bangs his pipe on the side of the truck to empty the ashes.

“Naw. You go on inside. I won’t be far behind you.”

He remembers his daddy tapping his pipe on almost anything nearby. Tractor tire. Fence post. Barn door. Sometimes just the palm of his hand.

“How come you do that?” he’d ask his daddy.

“Cause that’s how my daddy did it.”

Frank was a child of maybe 10 or so when his grandpa died. He remembers standing by the old fireplace where his grandpa kept his pipes on a wooden table. Pipe tobacco he made from his own crop, kept in a jar by the lamp.

It was the week after the funeral and Frank was staying with his granny. He was mostly sulking, and Granny could tell.

“Why don’t you pick out one of your grandpa’s pipes and keep it. I think he’d like for you to have one”

The boy picked them all up one by one, turning them around in his hands. He looked over his shoulder for approval.

“That’s a good one.” she said.

Little Frank came over and sat in his granny’s lap.

“How come Grandpa is gone?”

“Well, that’s a fine question. But I’m afraid I don’t have much of an answer ‘cept I trust the Good Lord to know what He’s doing.”

“You mean, God took him away from us?”

“Not exactly. It’s more like I believe that his leaving us is just the way the world is meant to work. It’s like sunshine and rain. There’s beautiful days when the world seems like everything is just fine. Then there’s stormy days when it feels like the whole world might just get washed away. I don’t complain about the rain ‘cause I know it’s needed. I don’t hold too tight to the sunshine because I know more clouds are coming. We need both to keep living.”

“Well, I don’t think it’s fair.”

“Fair! You’re just feeling the cold rain right now ‘cause your grandpa is gone. Don’t you worry. The sun is gonna shine again real soon.”

Frank stepped back from the truck and looked up at the sky. Dark clouds were moving in from the west. Seems fitting for what his family is about to face.

It’s a sinking feeling when someone you care about lies at death’s door. Tom is as good of a man as he could have hoped for in a son-in-law. Hard worker. Frank has seen that in the tobacco field at cutting time. He’s good to those two boys and gives them a hundred percent of himself. Most of all he’s really good to Stella. Frank just doesn’t respect him as man, he loves him as a son.

Frank tugs at his overalls and brushes off his knees and leans into his gate as he heads for the front door. He still has no idea what he might say that would make anything better or lighten the mood. He just knows he has to go in there and be counted.

When the elevator door opens, Stella is facing him. He feels his gut churn but then notices she is smiling.

“You’ve got to get up there right now. The Doctor came by, and he says that Tom is gonna be okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Come see for yourself.”

A ray of sunshine swept through the lobby windows. Frank could see it when he got on the elevator.

As the doors closed, he smiled.