“My mother won’t know. She’ll be at Brookside. Soon she won’t have much of a memory of this or anything else,” Amy said, indicating the room with its piles upon piles of junk.
“Alzheimer’s?” Parker asked.
Amy nodded.
Parker turned around and walked into the hallway. She looked up at the ceiling. “Doesn’t appear to be any structural damage, but I’ll need to take a closer look when I start work.”
Amy slowly toured the house she grew up in with Parker as her guide. There were three bedrooms. Her parents’ room and hers. The third was used as a guest bedroom. Parker looked in the master bedroom. This room was only slightly larger than the other two bedrooms. There was even more stuff piled up to the ceiling. The room had a path to the bed where a spot had been cleared large enough to accommodate a small person.
This is where my mother slept? Amy’s mind shrieked. What the hell had happened to her? She wasn’t like this when Amy left home. They had a lot of stuff, but nothing like this. Perhaps her mother had always been a bit of a hoarder, but her father kept it in check with his yearly removal of “shit that no longer has a purpose.” But after he died, her mother abandoned any self control she had. And this was the end result.
“Huh,” Parker grunted as she looked around.
“Another fire hazard, not even a smoke alarm as a precaution. Does this house have any smoke alarms?” Steph asked.
“I don’t know,” Amy said sadly. “I haven’t been here in a very, very long time. I had no idea any of this was happening.”
They checked out the spare bedroom next—it was filled with more stacks of newspapers… and forty-seven vacuum cleaners. Amy counted. It was an honest-to-god collection of broken vacuum cleaners dating back from what looked like the 1940s. Parker closed the door without comment.
“I’m thinking the next bedroom was yours?” Parker asked.
Amy nodded grimly.
“Still haven’t found a smoke alarm. That has to be fixed first thing,” Steph said. She looked around like she was deciding the best smoke detector placements.
Parker opened the door to Amy’s childhood bedroom and it was like stepping back in time.
“What on earth?” Amy said under her breath.
Her room was exactly how she’d left it. Her laundry was folded and set on the edge of her bed. This was her room exactly as it appeared the day she packed her suitcase and left for New York.
“Is this how you left it?” Parker asked, studying her.
“Exactly. This house is scaring me.”
“You’re not the only one,” Steph said with a small laugh.
“Oh, my god, look at that poster of Michael Jackson. I loved Thriller,” Parker said.
“Me, too,” Amy said sheepishly.
Parker strode further into the room, turned in a circle and looked at the posters on the other walls. “Ghostbusters. The Breakfast Club. Iconic movies.” She turned to Amy and deadpanned, “Who you gonna call?”
Steph and Amy replied at the same time, “Ghostbusters!”
Amy joined in with their laughter. It felt good to laugh and let go of some of the building tension.
“I don’t know if I could see my younger self like this,” Steph said.
“Got any skeletons you don’t want anyone to see?” Parker asked.
“I don’t think so,” Amy said. She couldn’t even remember what it felt like to be the teenaged girl that lived in this room. She looked at the walls, the knickknacks on top of her dresser, the hair clips and hair spray. She opened the top dresser drawer where several scrunchie socks sat forlorn and lonely. She looked at the clothes on the bed. They were the castoffs she didn’t bother taking with her to New York. This room, this house, had never felt like home. Of course, she’d been in New York since she was nineteen and it still didn’t feel like home either.
“How about we leave your mausoleum of teen spirit alone for now,” Parker said.
“I think that’s a brilliant idea,” Amy said, gratefully.
“Yeah, it’s kind of creeping me out. No offense,” Steph said.
“None taken.”
Parker walked down the hallway back toward the kitchen—what was left of it. They followed.
“Can I use your stick?” Parker asked Steph.
“Sure,” Steph said, handing it over.
Parker used it to poke around the ceiling and supporting beams of the entryway to the kitchen. There was some give. “Have to replace all this and maybe some of the hallway beams if they’ve been compromised.”
Amy felt her heart beat increase. This was way more than she could handle.
Parker seemed to sense her panic. “No worries, Amy. I can fix all this. It’s what I do.”
Any looked back toward the living room. “What about…?
“I can rent a Dumpster.”
Steph jumped in, “You know, Rosa and I can help out.”
“You guys don’t have to. She’s my mother and I am now responsible for her mess.”
Parker studied her. “Amy, you’re going to need help. This is not a one-woman show here.”
There was a knock on the open door. “Can I come in?” Mrs. Fitzsimmons asked. She was dressed in active wear—yoga pants and a dry wick shirt. It made her appear younger than her eighty-some-odd years.
Amy hesitated to invite Mrs. Fitzsimmons inside. She was embarrassed by her mother’s hoarding and didn’t want more people to witness what the house had become.
Mrs. Fitzsimmons took Amy’s silence as permission and she stepped inside. When she saw the living room, the look on her face told Amy she didn’t know about the hoarding either.
Mrs. Fitzsimmons put her hand to her mouth then drew it away, saying softly, “I am so sorry, Amy. I had no idea it was this bad. She never invited me in after your father died. She’d come for tea at my house and I’d bring her cookies or the occasional casserole but she came out on the front stoop to take it. I didn’t think too much about it. As we get older keeping up a house gets harder.” She lifted the flap to a box and peered inside. “I have a girl come in every two weeks to do my floors and bathrooms. I did suggest to your mother about hiring her, too, but she declined and said she did all her own cleaning. I let it go at that.” She reached inside the box and picked up a cat toy. It was a little stuffed mouse wearing a Santa Claus hat. She put the toy back in the box and closed the flaps again. “I should’ve made more of an effort.”
“It’s all right, Mrs. Fitzsimmons. This isn’t your fault. It’s mine,” Amy said.
Mrs. Fitzsimmons looked like she was about to cry. “She didn’t even have a cat.”
“Let’s go outside,” Steph said. “Get some fresh air and make a plan.”
“Good idea,” Amy said even though she had no idea what sort of plan she should make. Outside, the sunlight and blue sky calmed her. Away from the house she could almost pretend the nightmare within didn’t exist.
Steph dug a notepad and pencil out of her pocket, licked the pencil tip, and said, “I find making a list in order of importance helps. So, here we go. First, Parker arranges for a Dumpster.”
“A big Dumpster,” Parker said.
“A big Dumpster,” Steph said. “Then we do the removal part to include the inside…” she paused, “stuff.”
“Maybe I could pick out some photos and knick knacks for your mother to keep. I’ve heard that sentimental mementoes can help jog memories for a woman with your mother’s affliction,” Mrs. Fitzsimmons said.
“I don’t know how you’d do that with all the stuff stacked and jumbled. Without going through it, I couldn’t even guess what she’d want to keep,” Amy said.
Mrs. Fitzsimmons touched her arm. “Amy, I’ll help.”
Amy was just about to say, “No, you don’t have to,” but when she saw Mrs. Fitzsimmons’s face, she nodded. “Thank you.”
“It’ll give me something to do. When you get to be my age, doing something new is always welcome.”
“I’l
l bring a portable swamp cooler and some fans. It’s going to get hot in there. Can we run an extension cord from your house to Amy’s?” Parker asked.
“Of course,” Mrs. Fitzsimmons said.
Steph jotted that down. “Next on the list, Amy gets her mother settled. Susan will help you with that,” Steph said.
“Susan?” Amy asked.
“Dr. Everett,” Steph said.
“Oh. I didn’t know you knew Dr. Everett.”
“All us lesbians know each other,” Parker said. “We have a group on Facebook.”
Amy studied Parker’s serious expression. “Really?” she asked.
“She’s joking,” Steph said. “But there is an element of truth to it. This is a small town. You’ll probably know all of us by the end of the week.”
Amy digested this tidbit of news. It seemed she had found a circle of friends without even trying. It made her feel almost hopeful.
“When do we start?” Mrs. Fitzsimmons asked, rubbing her hands together like she couldn’t wait to get started.
“I’ll have the Dumpster delivered later today,” Parker said. She turned to Amy and asked, “Is tomorrow morning okay for me to start?”
Amy nodded. “Sure.”
“See you then.”
Amy watched Parker stride away and hop into her van. Tomorrow couldn’t come soon enough, she thought.
Chapter Four
Amy walked down the hall of the hospital with Dr. Everett. Amy realized that everything said about hospitals was true. They smelled of things gone very physically wrong with a strong undercurrent of antiseptic. That mixture was an odor peculiar to hospitals and was something her nose would never forget.
“You okay?” Susan asked.
“Uh, yeah. I’ve just never been inside a hospital before.”
“You’re kidding?”
“No, I’m not kidding,” Amy said as she sidestepped a woman on a gurney who stared at her with uncomprehending eyes.
“You’ve lived a charmed life.”
“Until now.”
“Yes, well, things have improved since last night. Your mother is calm, which is good. She seems to comprehend some of what’s happened, but she is slipping a lot. How long has it been since you’ve seen her?”
Amy licked her lips. They were dry. She always got chapped lips whenever she travelled. She chalked it up to stress. “It’s been …” She stopped and thought. “Five, no, six years?”
“This kind of disease happens rapidly. After that stretch of time, she might not recognize you at first. Maybe not for a while.”
“Or ever?”
“That’s the worst case scenario.”
They arrived at her mother’s room. Susan rested her hand on the door handle. “Are you ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
Susan opened the door and entered first. Amy shadowed her into the room. The TV was blaring. Amy looked for the remote.
The TV blinked off. When Amy looked up, she found her mother staring at her with the remote in her hand.
“Hi,” Amy said. She couldn’t tell if her mother recognized her or not.
Mary turned her attention to Susan. “I suppose you’re here to stick me with more needles and steal my blood. Why so much blood?” she asked.
“We can tell a lot about you by your blood work. We do it to everyone,” Susan answered.
“I want mine back.” Mary studied Amy. “Who are you? Another one of the blood suckers?”
“No. It’s me, Amy. Your daughter, remember? I live in New York but I’ve come home to help you.”
“Help me do what? I can tell you what you can help me with, Jean, by getting me out of this place without losing any more blood.” She glared at Susan.
“Mrs. Warner, this is Amy. Jean was your sister. She’s gone now,” Susan said gently.
“Where’d she go? Did you take her?” she asked, jabbing a gnarled finger at Amy.
“No, she passed away. Remember she got real sick? You took care of her,” Amy said. How many times in the following days would she be asking her mother if she remembered? Remember must be the key word for Alzheimer’s patients.
“You’re lying. Why would you do that to me, Jeannie?” Mary suddenly laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Amy asked.
“Jeannie, Jeannie, eats zucchini,” Mary chortled.
Amy looked to Susan for help, but she only shrugged her shoulders.
Mary said, “Remember that, Jeannie? That old nursery rhyme? Peter, Peter, pumpkin eater. I told you he had a sister named Jeannie, Jeannie eats zucchini.” She laughed heartily. “You used to get so mad at me when I called you that.”
“Maybe I should come back later,” Amy said to Susan.
“See?” Mary said. “She’s still mad at me about it.”
Amy patted her mother’s hand. “I’m not mad. I think it’s funny. I’ll come back tomorrow, okay?
“You won’t forget?”
“I won’t. I’ll be here tomorrow. I promise,” Amy said. She leaned over and kissed her mother’s forehead.
“You’re a good sister, Jean.” Mary closed her eyes and seemed to drift to sleep.
Amy and Susan left the room. Outside, Amy said, “That was awful. My own mother doesn’t recognize me.” She willed herself not to cry. “I should’ve come home sooner.”
“It wouldn’t have made a difference. Amy, she’s stage four. Don’t give up yet. She may recognize you tomorrow.”
“She thinks I’m her dead sister, Jean.” They began the trek down the hallway to the nurses’ station. “Why is it that she remembers Jeannie eats zucchini, but not me, her own daughter?”
“I don’t have the answer to that, I’m sorry. I tell you what. Find something in her house that reminds her of you—a photo, a sentimental knickknack—and bring it with you tomorrow. Oftentimes an object or photograph will jog their memories. You have to remember, your mother is dehydrated and some of the dementia is from poor eating habits. We find that a lot in elderly patients.”
“So she might get better? Maybe she has dementia and not Alzheimer’s?” Amy knew she was grasping at straws.
“No, it means that once we get her healthy and put her on medication that we can slow the disease and buy her more time.”
“I wish I would’ve spent more time with her before this happened.”
“We all experience that kind of recrimination when it comes to parents, but what we forget is that part of growing up and getting out on your own is the natural cycle of life. It’s something we should be doing. Most parents realize this. You can’t get back those years. What are you, about forty?”
Amy said, “Close. Forty-two.”
“That’s about the time you stop focusing so much on yourself. You begin to notice that your parents are truly aging and then we return to the nest and spend time with them. Alzheimer’s or other illnesses cut that time short. As with all things, though, we don’t realize it until it’s too late. You’ve got some time left with her and she will have lucid periods. It’s her short-term memory that is affected. She might recognize you as a child at first and slowly move forward as you spend time with her. Or you might walk in one day and she’ll know you.”
“I hope that happens,” Amy said. “I want her to know I’m here to help her.”
“She probably won’t understand that, but you’ll know it. That will make things easier.”
“It’ll assuage my guilt anyway.”
“Don’t beat yourself up over this. It is what it is,” Susan said.
“It is what it is.” Amy mulled this over. “Is that a Lifehack kind of inspirational thing?”
“It’s the Hells Angels credo.”
“Oh.” Amy tried to imagine Dr. Susan Everett as a motorcycle mama. She couldn’t picture it.
“Have you made any arrangements at Brookside? I’ve alerted them that we have a patient who needs placement.”
“I’m going there next,” Amy said.
“If you want
, I can meet you there in a little while. Introduce you to everyone, show you the ropes?”
Amy nodded. “That would be great.”
“Good. I can be there in half an hour.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
Amy watched Susan walk down the hall. How was she ever going to do this? She didn’t think she was capable. It was too big. A nurse rolled a woman by on a gurney. Her arms were tied down and she was moaning. Oh, god, I have to get out of here, Amy thought. She walked as fast as she could for the exit without actually running.
***
Once outside in the May sunshine, Amy felt better. There was a light breeze and the cherry trees were in full bloom. Baskets of petunias hung from the black, old-timey light posts on both sides of the street. The town looked quaint and innocent. She wished for the innocence of her own high school days when her whole life stood in front of her. She got in her car. She needed to return it to the rental agency and check out her mother’s car to see if it still worked.
Steph had given her instructions on how to get to Brookside. Amy had been away longer than she’d lived here. She didn’t remember much of anything about what street was where. She drove from the hospital to Brookside in a sort of fugue state. She was going to have to do this. She was putting her mother in a home. Her mother’s one and only child was going to dump her on complete strangers when she was at her worst, when she needed her family most. But Amy didn’t know what else to do.
Amy found a parking spot in an alarmingly crowded lot. Turning the car off, she stared at the front of the ranch style “community” condos for the limited ability people. The center building had spider arms of more housing.
It was a brick building with white pillars and a long porch that wrapped around the front. Amy could see gardens with gravel paths where the patients were assisted by men and women in white scrubs. On the porch, others sat rocking in immaculate white chairs with blue and white striped seat cushions. They, too, had attendants nearby.
Amy gripped the steeling wheel and was barely able to keep herself from reversing the car, taking off, and never looking back. Putting her mother in a home was something she never thought she would have to deal with. She could only think of one thing worse—her father’s death. At least his death was quick. He didn’t linger. One minute he was talking to her and her mother in the kitchen, the next he was stone cold dead on the floor from a massive heart attack. She remembered standing next to her mother and how they’d stared at each other, frozen in time, and when they returned to the moment it was already too late. Her mother knelt down and put her hand on his chest. He’d stopped breathing. She brushed his hair back and straightened out his shirt. She kissed his forehead.
Heart to Heart Page 4