by E. E. Holmes
“—Yeah, yeah, alright. But couldn’t you at least bring her down to Newbury Street and buy her some—”
“—If you think I’m going to tell that girl how to dress, you are out of your—”
“—Fine, it was just a suggestion. I’m going to work on those depositions.”
I heard a chair scrape the floor and footsteps stomping down the hallway as Noah headed to his office. When I heard his door close, I arranged my face into an impassive expression and walked down into the kitchen.
“Good morning, Karen.”
“There you are! I was debating whether or not to go check for a pulse,” Karen said as I shuffled over to the table.
“Sorry. I guess I was really tired.”
“Don’t apologize! I remember when I used to be able to sleep like that! I miss it. Nowadays I can’t force myself to sleep past 8AM, no matter how badly I want to. My guilty conscience always drags me out of bed.” Karen walked over toward the cabinets and then stopped. She spun around and eyed me critically. “Are we okay? You and me?”
I returned her gaze for a moment. A part of me wanted to say, “No,” but I bit it back. I wasn’t angry with her anymore, not really. She’d only made the assumption that everyone else had made, including the police. Everyone except me.
“Yeah, we’re okay.”
“Good.” Karen opened a cabinet and eyed the contents with a sheepish expression. “It would seem your choices for breakfast are Lucky Charms or Fiber Bran.”
I had to laugh. “Who eats the Lucky Charms?”
“Well, I may not be able to sleep like a teenager, but I can eat junk food with the best of them,” Karen admitted.
“And the Fiber Bran?”
“Noah is attempting to reform me. A futile effort, but I let him try anyway. Would you like to be reformed, too?” She waved the stern-looking box at me in mock temptation.
“Lucky Charms it is,” I replied. “I’ll eat anything as long as it comes with a side of coffee.”
“Industrial strength,” Karen promised.
As I sat down to eat, my mind wandered to a question I’d had the night before; was I going to be introduced to my grandfather today? I hadn’t really expected to see him last night; I’d arrived so late that I figured he would already be asleep. But now that the morning had come, my curiosity about him was peaked again. Come to think of it, I didn’t remember Karen even pointing out his room.
“So, where’s my grandfather?”
“What?” Karen looked up swiftly from her Wall Street Journal.
“I thought he lived with you. My mom always said that he was with you in Boston.”
“Oh.” Karen put her paper down and surveyed me over the top of her reading glasses. “I think you misunderstood. Your grandfather doesn’t live in the house with us. He’s in a permanent care facility outside of the city. How much did your mother tell you about your grandfather’s… condition?”
“Not a lot, actually. When I was little I would ask questions about our family, before I understood that she didn’t like to talk about it. She’d told me that he had dementia and couldn’t remember things anymore, and that was why she wouldn’t take me to see him when I asked.”
Karen just nodded. I felt a little pang of guilt as I realized it must be hard for her to talk about it too. Still, it didn’t stop me from pressing the subject.
“So, do you see him often then?” I asked as I brought my empty bowl to the sink.
“Certainly, I do, as often as I can—which isn’t saying much, I guess, with work being what it is. I really should be a better daughter. But as your mom said, his mind is gone—he can’t even remember who I am, so I try not to beat myself up over it.”
“Is he close by?”
“Yes, relatively. He’s in Winchester, about half an hour from here.” She paused and then added, “He was a good man. He loved his girls, and I know that he would have loved you too. I’m sorry that you never got to know him.”
The sudden shift to the past tense unnerved me a bit, but I continued anyway. “Would it… I mean, if it’s okay with you, could you maybe take me to see him?”
“Jess, I really don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Look, if you’re too busy, I can just call a cab or—”
“—No, it’s not that!” Karen snapped. “It’s not a question of how busy I am! It’s just a very stressful and emotional experience to see someone in that condition.” She gave a little involuntary shudder. “I wouldn’t feel right taking you just after your mom … well, I just don’t think this is a good time.”
“Look, I’m sorry if I upset you, but don’t you think that’s my decision? He’s my grandfather and I’ve never met him. I have every right to—”
“—You haven’t upset me,” Karen said. “I just wasn’t prepared to … let’s get you settled here and off to school and everything first, okay? We can talk about it again when you’re back for Christmas break.”
I shrugged, deciding to let it go for the time being. Karen was lying, though. She was upset, I could tell. Her formerly calm face was flushed with emotion and she couldn’t seem to refocus on her newspaper. Frustrated, I made my way back to my room to start unpacking, resolved to figure out how to see my grandfather on my own.
As it turned out, I didn’t need to. Later that afternoon, Karen appeared at my bedroom door and informed me that she would take me to see my grandfather later that week, if I still wanted to go. I agreed immediately, though I was surprised by the offer. I think she felt guilty about her initial response to my request. When the morning of our visit dawned, however, there was no doubt about it; she was a ball of nerves.
I noticed it the moment I came down the stairs on Friday. Her usually cheerful greeting sounded subdued and muffled, as though she’d been crying. When she turned around to hand me my bowl of cereal, my suspicions were confirmed. Not even Karen’s usually flawless make-up could entirely obscure the red puffiness around her eyes and at the tip of her nose. The sight gave rise to an immediate wave of guilt, and I felt like shit for bringing the whole thing up.
“We’ll get going right after breakfast,” Karen told me, in a brave attempt at her usual lighthearted tone.
“Karen? Are you okay?”
“Fine, Jess, totally fine. Just a little cold, that’s all. Or maybe allergies, I’m not sure.” She shrugged airily. “Do you want to stop for coffee on the way? I think I’m gonna need a little pick-me-up.”
“Sure.” I took the cue and quickly dropped it. If she wanted to tell me why she was upset, great. If not, it was her business. I thought I could understand, though. She hadn’t physically lost her dad, as I had my mom, but he was gone just the same. In some ways, I could see how that could be worse than if he had actually died.
I waited in the car while Karen ran into Starbucks and emerged a few minutes later with a pair of frothy lattes. We drank them in silence, following the highway out of the city and into the quieter northern suburbs. Karen always listened to talk radio, a nod to her political vigilance. I couldn’t really tolerate the rightwing sentiments, but I let the sanctimonious voice of the host drone on, harmonizing with the smooth hum of the car’s engine. It was an oddly lulling sound. As we pulled off the interstate and onto a quiet tree-lined street, Karen spoke.
“So just remember, Jess, his mind is pretty much gone. He recognizes me occasionally, but not often. And naturally he won’t know who you are because he’s never met you. I told him about you, of course, but I don’t think he remembers any of that. And sometimes …” she paused here, as though searching carefully for the right words. “Sometimes he says things that don’t make any sense. So just try to remember that he’s not mentally sound anymore.”
I swallowed hard, as some of Karen’s nervousness started to rub off on me. We rounded the bend and arrived in front of a white Victorian with gingerbread trim and a wooden sign on the gate that read, “Winchester House for the Aged.” A wide porch wrapped around the outside of the
house, dotted with empty rocking chairs. One glance at those forlorn chairs and I found myself having to fight a sudden and alarming urge to cry.
§
The house had clearly once been a private residence converted for its new purpose. The shape of the house had a distinctly turn of the century feel, but the renovations were clear. Telltale modernity reared its ugly head in sharp contrast to the original features; insulated windows stared blankly from fluted window frames, and window air-conditioning units protruded like so many blemishes. Reinforced metal handrails and handicap ramps added the final touch of indignity.
Inside, the high-ceilinged entryway housed a sort of reception desk. A nurse was seated there.
“Good morning, Mrs. Hunt. You’re here early this week.” She slid a clipboard toward Karen, who clearly knew the protocol and signed in.
“Yes, I brought my niece up from New York to see her grandfather.” Karen inclined her head toward me.
“Oh, how nice! Well he’ll be very glad to see you both, I’m sure. Let me check the schedule to see if he’s in his room.” The nurse smiled brightly and turned her back on us to use the telephone.
I looked around while we waited. The entryway opened into a fireplaced sitting room. Sunlight streamed through the white lacy curtains. A number of small tables and armchairs were set up around the room in cozy, inviting arrangements. The room was so quiet and still that at first glance I thought it was empty. However, as I let my eyes wander more slowly over the room, I realized that wasn’t the case.
There were five residents scattered about the room, all completely motionless. An ancient shriveled woman in a blue fleece nightgown was propped in a wheelchair by the window, presumably to admire the view, though she seemed wholly unaware of the existence of any outside world at all. Two old men were hunched over a chessboard; whose turn it was—anybody’s guess—for they just kept staring at the board in a puzzled way, as though unsure of its purpose or relation to them. Two white flossy heads perched on bony shoulders were visible over the back of a pink sofa, facing a silent television set with the closed captioning flashing across the bottom; it would seem that no amount of raising the volume would make the program audible. No, I was right the first time. The room was empty. God, someone please shoot me before I get that old.
“Jess? We can go upstairs now. The nurse says that Dad is in his room.” Karen pointed toward the entryway staircase. I followed her upstairs.
The staircase looked like a family portrait gallery for a family that had never known youth. We passed photo after photo of elderly people, donors to the home and its programs. Every single frame bore a gold name plate bearing the donors’ names and, grimly, their birth and death dates. I could barely repress a shiver but kept reading them. It was like walking through a wall-papered, gilt-framed graveyard.
At the top of the stairs we entered the very first room on the left. It was a surprisingly bright and cheerful room, with tall windows that faced the morning sunshine, which fell across the floor in an orderly geometric pattern. Frilly white curtains hung in the windows and the two beds were covered with bright patchwork quilts. There were suggestions of illness of course; a wheelchair, an industrial-looking shower, several hospital monitors and IV stands. But the overall feel was of one’s own home, not of an institution. I had a sudden rush of affection toward Karen for finding a place like this for her father.
“That’s him over there,” Karen murmured in my ear, pointing to a plush green armchair facing the window. It was the kind of chair I’d always envisioned a jolly old grandfather would sit in, with slippered feet and a head ribboned about with pipe smoke, an image no doubt conjured from literary sources. The man who occupied the chair bore little resemblance to the grandfather I had imagined for myself.
He was staring out the window, not blankly, as the woman downstairs had done, but with palpable expectation. He was startlingly gaunt, with hollow cheeks beneath severe cheekbones that seemed determined to break the surface. His posture was lifted off, leaning toward the window and clutching the arms of his chair with white-knuckled intensity. His hair was white and flyaway, and he was wrapped from the waist down in an afghan. Sitting so, he gave the impression of a seeded dandelion in a pot, stretching toward the sunlight. He seemed completely unaware that anyone had entered the room.
Karen led me across the room, a gentle pull at my elbow. We sat together on a matching green sofa facing the chair. Up close, I could see that my grandfather’s lips, terribly chapped and dry, were moving very quickly in some sort of silent stream of words.
“He usually does that. I’ve never actually been able to figure out if he is really saying anything. He hardly ever speaks aloud anymore,” Karen whispered to me. Then she turned toward her father and said in a loud clear voice, “Dad, I’ve brought someone to visit you.”
I watched my grandfather closely. Something stirred in his eyes and he twitched his head a bit. I realized that on some level, he had acknowledged we were there.
“Dad? Dad, I want you to meet someone. This is Jessica,” she paused and threw me an apologetic look. “I mean Jess. This is Jess. This is Elizabeth’s daughter. This is your granddaughter.”
“Um, hi, Grandpa. It’s nice to meet you finally,” I said. It felt so silly to even try to communicate with him.
I thought he might have adjusted the angle of his head ever so slightly, as though in response to the sound of my voice. I opened my mouth to speak again, but I didn’t know what else to say, so I snapped it shut.
Karen stood up. “I’ll leave you two to get acquainted.” She tip-toed quickly out. Her voice had that muffled sound again, a betrayal of too much emotion.
I sat with my grandfather for a very long, very silent minute. I felt more comfortable just looking at him now that Karen had left the room. I watched the subtle, steady movement of his mouth. I leaned in closer, trying to see if I could understand what he was saying, but it was impossible; he was either speaking too quickly or the movements were not forming words at all.
“I really wanted to meet you. Sorry it took so long,” I said finally.
Again, the slight cock of the head.
“Mom didn’t speak of you very often because it made her sad, but I know that she loved you very much.”
I had the strangest impression that he was listening. His mouth was hardly moving anymore, and there was something cognizant in his eyes. Encouraged, I went on. “Mom told me that it wouldn’t be any use to come and visit you. She said that you wouldn’t even know we were here, and so she didn’t want to put me through it. Karen told me the same thing. But you do know I’m here, don’t you?”
It wasn’t really a question. He knew I was there, I was sure of it now. His hands looked as though they had loosened their desperate clutch on the armrests, the knuckles not quite so white and taut.
“Mom died. I know Karen told you. I just want you to know that she loved you very much and she just had a hard time seeing you like this. She wouldn’t want you to think that she had forgotten about you.” It was more than I had ever intended to say to him, particularly seeing as he was in some sort of vegetative state. I couldn’t even say for sure that my mom had felt that way; after all she never told me as much, not in so many words. But I found that, with him unable to respond, I could say what I wanted to without worrying about his reaction. I don’t know. It was like praying, or confession, or something. At least I imagined it was, never having set foot inside a church. Feeling a sudden flood of pity for the poor old man, I reached out and covered his spidery old hand with mine.
What happened next happened so fast, I couldn’t react.
It was as though I had flicked some invisible switch. His hand flipped and jerked suddenly upward and clamped mine in an iron grip; I wouldn’t have believed someone so old and frail could grasp so tightly. He pulled me with such force that I flew off the sofa and was suddenly on my knees before him. His face, so carefully trained on nothingness a moment before, was staring at me with
a desperation I could not fathom. His eyes were still cloudy, but something was awake behind the veil, and that something terrified me.
“Send me back!” he cried, with a voice hoarse and cracked from disuse. His other hand clutched for mine, claw-like, and grasped it just as tightly.
I could say nothing; I couldn’t move, such was my shock at the sudden awakening of the unwakeable. He pulled at me again, so that my face was inches from his.
“I’ve seen it, Elizabeth! I’ve seen it! Send me back! I want to go back!” His voice broke and shuddered as he shook me in his hands. He was staring at me with such intensity and desperation that I couldn’t breathe.
“I’m … not … Elizabeth!” I managed to choke out.
“Send me back, do you hear me? I’ve seen it! I’ve seen it!” His voice rose to a tortured shriek and he shook me harder, his hands crushing mine. I tried to scramble to my feet but he held me down.
“I can’t send… I don’t know what you’re talking about! I’m not Elizabeth! Let go of me!” I gasped.
At that moment the door burst open and Karen flew across the room. She threw herself between us and wrenched my grandfather’s hands away. I cried out in pain as I was flung to the floor, sliding into the wall where the back of my head cracked into the windowsill. For a moment everything in front of my eyes disappeared in a bright flash of blindness, and I had to shake my head to regain my vision. When my eyes refocused, Karen shimmered into view, cradling my grandfather in a comforting embrace. The old man was crying inconsolably on her shoulder.
“It’s okay, Dad. It’s okay,” Karen cooed, stroking his withered old cheek.
His eyes were turned again to the window, looking far beyond anything visible to the living eye, and his mouth was moving rapidly again between his sobs, in a silent mantra I could now recognize.
I’ve seen it. Send me back.
When his sobs had quieted, Karen carefully extricated herself from him and knelt beside me on the floor.