I was trimming my fingernails before they got out of hand when my father comes in the bedroom door without knocking.  Remember, he asked, in the residential care facility?  He settled on the bed.  This was no dream.  That was different, I said.  The nurse insisted that she do it, something about diabetes.  Father's fingers worked the ears of the cat on his lap.  His nails were wide, elliptical, the size and shape of a waterbug, though less brown than yellow, as if for his whole life he'd been a smoker of more than the occasional cigar.  It was Kitty, the calico of my childhood.  I could tell from the patchwork coloring.  I miss you, Father said.

How so unlike him! I thought.  He, who was no more expressive than the silica in cement, even before Parkinson's.  What did you do with my father? I wanted to ask.  But a question of more urgency was, How long will you be here?  I'd been trimming my nails because someone else was coming, someone I wasn’t ready to introduce my father to.  I weighed both questions.  So tell me, I said, finally.  The fishing's good, he said.  Real good.  Like that one opening weekend near Wawa, with Fred.  Remember?  How it poured cats and dogs the whole time.  But we caught our limit, didn't we?  Ten rainbows!  His fingers splayed STOP! in the air. 

Kitty took to the floor with a thunk.