by Dyrk Ashton
“Dr. Williams, good morning.”
Dr. Williams reads from the file in her hand, “Fiona Megan Patterson,” then looks up at her, “is everything all right here at the hospital?”
Fi isn’t sure what to say. Truth is, they treat her extremely well, the patients have the best care she can imagine and she loves working here—so she tells Dr. Williams that.
“Good!” Dr. Williams exclaims, appearing to be relieved—and even more on edge than Fi. “I mean, good. Excellent. Because I have your peer evaluation here, and you have rave reviews. The staff, and the patients who have the wherewithal to respond, simply love you.”
“Oh,” Fi says tentatively. “Thank you. That’s... great.”
Dr. Williams glances around and steps a little closer, lowering her voice. “And you are working wonders with Peter. He’s a very interesting case, as you know. Does he seem alright to you? Any change in his behavior?”
“Um... No. Not to speak of.”
Dr. Williams breathes with obvious relief. “Okay. Well, keep me apprised, will you please?”
“Sure, absolutely.”
“Thank you, Fi. For everything you do here.”
“You’re very welcome. Thank you for the job.”
Dr. Williams seems confused. “No... thank you, again. You know, this evaluation means a pretty significant increase in your internship stipend.”
“Wow, that’s great.”
Dr. Williams smiles nervously, then straightens and strides out of the room.
Fi watches her go. That was weird. A relief, ultimately, but weird. Dr. William’s rarely talks to her, let alone gives her praise. Maybe Billy’s friend Salazar was telling the truth.
Fi surveys the room then smiles as her eyes settle on a particularly withered old man sitting hunched in a wheelchair in a soft block of light from the windows. A heavy-set woman in brightly flower-patterned scrubs is kneeling in front of him, spooning something to his mouth from a bowl on a standing tray.
The woman sees her approach. “Fi, darlin’, thank God.” She wipes dribbled oatmeal from the old man’s chin, then stands with some effort.
“Hi Mary,” Fi greets her. “Is he giving you any trouble?”
“Trouble?” Mary scoffs. “You a comedian now? If he only would. It’d be better than doing absolutely nothin’, which is absolutely what he’s always doin’. He hasn’t eaten since yesterday morning, though. Dr. Williams has had me trying to get him to eat something all day.”
“Dr. Williams?”
Mary nods. “Mm-hmm. She seems to have taken a special interest in his welfare lately. But now he’s all yours. I’m goin’ home to my bathtub.” She hands Fi the towel and spoon. “Work your magic.” She pulls a napkin out of a pocket in her scrubs and wipes beads of sweat from her brow. “Whew!”
“Hot flashes again?” Fi asks.
Mary fans her face with her hands. “Every time. I don’t know if it’s the getting up and down or if it’s just him. The man gets me positively rosy.”
Fi grins. “I think he has that effect on a lot of people.”
Mary sees the bag in Fi’s hand. “I see you brought the good stuff. You know I tried to give him figs last week. Wouldn’t touch ‘em. I had three different nurses try ‘em on him. Kind of an experiment. Nothin’ doin’.”
“Really? He wouldn’t eat any?” Fi sets the spoon on the tray and moves it out of the way.
“Not a bite. It’s you girl. You got the Peter touch.”
Fi raises an eyebrow. Mary realizes what she’s said and chuckles. “‘Peter touch.’ Oh my. Well, have fun honey.”
“Thanks, Mary. Enjoy the rest of your Sunday.”
Mary murmurs, “Mm-hmm” and walks away, chuckling and shaking her head. “‘Peter touch’... my my...”
Fi kneels in front of Peter’s wheelchair. He isn’t wearing the standard hospital gown or approved white bathrobe like the rest of the patients. He won’t have it. He doesn’t fight if you dress him that way, but if you leave him alone for even a minute you’ll come back and find him naked. The only clothes he’ll keep on are the same ratty nightcap, mangy pink slippers and threadbare baby-blue robe he was found in. Fi studies his face. There’s apparently nothing wrong with his sight but his eyes are cloudy and dull, so much so that the color is impossible to discern.
“Peter?” she asks softly. No response. He reacts to things sometimes but doesn’t actually interact, and never really communicates. Other than flowers and figs, the one thing that usually gets a rise out of him, if you could call it that, is a clear night sky. Billy stopped in to check on him one night a couple of months ago. Peter was lying in his bed, staring out the window and mumbling what Billy thought was gibberish. It took him awhile to realize that Peter might be looking at the stars.
Billy told Fi about it, and when she had her next night shift, which is only one day every other week, she asked for permission to take Peter to the roof. Dr. Williams was hesitant but told her to go for it as long as she put a blanket on him to keep him warm. Fi took a book and a little reading light to keep herself occupied. Peter stared into the sky for hours, mumbling to himself. The words made no sense to her, but every once in awhile she thought she heard something she recognized as an actual name of a star or constellation. Dr. Williams took this as a good sign, so she and the other doctors decided that Fi should take him out whenever she had a night shift and the weather was amenable. Each time, Peter reacts the same way. He becomes tranquil, motionless except for the slow turn of his head and the movement of his lips. After their stints on the roof he’s especially calm the rest of the night and the whole next day.
Uncle Edgar has a passing interest in Peter since Fi talks about him a lot, so she told him about the stars. Edgar thought about it for a minute, then said, “Maybe he was once a scientist, an astronomer or astrophysicist.”
“That would be cool,” she mused.
“Or, perhaps he was a seafaring explorer who navigated by sextant, or a wise king in an ivory tower who gazed at the heavens through a telescope of crystal and gold.
Fi smirked, “Now you’re just making fun.”
“Am I?” It’s hard to tell with Edgar, even after all her years with him, when he’s joking and when he’s deadly serious. “I’m not so young myself, you know.”
“Oh, I know.”
Edgar ignored the jab. “What I’m trying to say is, at Peter’s advanced age, the night skies might represent for him something that remains constant. While his life has whirled by, everything changing around him at breakneck speed, perhaps the stars are his connection to eternity, timeless and forever. Maybe the heavens are all he has left.”
“He’s got flowers and figs,” Fi added.
“Yes he does, dear,” Edgar said with a smile, “and he’s got you.”
Edgar sometimes surprises her by saying things like that, out of the blue. Profound things. Profound to her, anyway. He has a way of making her feel like she matters. And the truth is, she doesn’t feel that way very often.
“Peter, it’s Fi,” she tries again.
A furrow flits across his brow, but it looks like that’s all she’s going to get out of him. She was really hoping to see that rare smile today. She studies him for any sign of recognition. His full head of white hair is plastered to his scalp under his cap, as always, and hangs below his shoulders. He’s got wide-set eyes beneath a broad brow, high cheekbones and a strong jawline—Fi can tell, even though his chin is mostly hidden by a white beard that scraggles down to the middle of his chest. He has an intelligent face, she thinks, and something about his features makes her believe he had to be quite handsome in his day. Now, he just looks old. Old, sad, and lost.
He can’t weigh more than a hundred pounds, though his measurements say he’s six feet tall. His shoulders may once have been broad, but now they’re drooped and emaciated. His legs and arms are skin and bone, the flesh mottled purple and yellow. His joints are swollen, as is common among the aged, accentuated by his th
inness, making his knuckles, knees and elbows especially knobby. His fingernails are yellowed, but not ragged, and of a length that reminds Fi of the nails on Zeke’s right hand, which he keeps overly long for playing his guitar, except that Peter’s are like that on both hands. He gets terribly irritated if anyone tries to cut them, or his hair, but neither seem to get any longer. He doesn’t scratch, pinch or claw like some patients do, and his hair isn’t matted, greasy or smelly, so the staff just leaves him be.
The oddest thing about Peter is the way he smells. All the staff who work with him agree that he doesn’t smell like an old man. That musty sour odor the elderly often have. All the other patients in the facility smell like that, some more than others, but not Peter. He doesn’t even have bad breath. He never perspires visibly, which isn’t uncommon for old folks, but he does have a faint scent of sweat, though not the bad kind. Other than that, what else he smells like is where everybody disagrees. Mary says its cucumbers, Clary sage and baby powder. Billy swears it’s pumpkin pie and doughnuts. Zeke claims it’s patchouli, ylang-ylang and myrrh. Fi has no idea what ylang-ylang and myrrh smell like, but she is not a fan of patchouli. Makes her think of old hippies.
Fi and the others are well aware these scents are all known aphrodisiacs. This information is even in Peter’s file, though the doctors (except for Dr. Williams, for some reason), scoff when they read it. To Fi, Peter smells of flowers. Rose, jasmine, lavender—but she also gets a hint of licorice. The truth is, she gets a little flushed herself when Peter’s close, sometimes. If she’s brutally honest with herself, she can kind of understand why Dr. Williams had succumbed—but just kind of. She’d never do anything about it, that’s just freaky. Still, she can’t help imagining how attractive he must have been in his prime.
“Peter, I brought you something,” she says, retrieving the orchids from the bag. She pulls the green paper down from around them, reaches to place them in his hand—and Peter suddenly grabs her by the wrist. The orchids go flying.
Fi gasps, “Peter!” He’s never done anything like this before!
Slowly, he pulls her forearm to his face. Fi is amazed at the firmness of his grip. For a second she worries that he might bite her. His teeth may be yellowed and stained but he has all of them, and according to the staff dentist they’re perfectly healthy. But instead of chomping on her arm, he sniffs it.
His cloudy eyes narrow as he inhales deeply. Then he begins to shake. His temples throb, veins pop out on his forehead—and he’s gripping her harder.
“Peter, please.” As shocked as she is, she tries to keep her voice down so as not to draw attention. She glances around, sees Billy watching them with concern. She shakes her head and holds her free hand out to indicate that everything’s okay. Billy rises from his chair and walks toward them anyway.
Now Fi’s hand is turning purple. His eyes, she notices. They look almost... red. “Peter, please,” she whispers forcefully. “You’re hurting me.”
He inhales sharply and releases her. She jerks her arm back, rubs her wrist, but doesn’t move away. He mumbles something. It actually sounds like “sorry.”
“Peter?”
He rarely looks at anyone. His eyes just kind of wander in your general direction, if you can get his attention at all. But they settle on her now—and there are tears. He speaks below a whisper, but this time there’s no mistaking the words. “S-s-sorry. S-so, sorry...”
Fi is astounded. He begins to sob. “No, Peter, it’s okay. It’s alright.” Tears stream down his cheeks.
Billy arrives, the young nurse he was conversing with right behind him. Even a few of the other employees and some patients are looking their way.
“It’s okay everybody,” Fi reassures, waving them off. Billy doesn’t go, but he doesn’t come any closer. She collects the spilled flowers into Peter’s lap. “Peter, look, I brought figs.” She takes his shaking hand, sets a fig on his palm. His sobbing subsides. Without looking at it he lifts it to his face, smells it, and slowly pushes the whole thing in his mouth.
“There, see?” she comforts. “Everything’s all right.”
Billy touches her on the shoulder. “What the hell? Are you alright?”
“I’m fine. He’s fine.” She stands, shakes off the shock. “Did you hear that? He spoke. To me. He said he was sorry.”
“No he didn’t,” Billy says, incredulously. Then he sees the look on her face. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
“Wow. Maybe his little tryst last night with Dr. Williams is bringing him out of his shell.” Billy thinks for a moment, keeping his eyes on Peter, then says, “Better put it in your notes for the day, I guess.”
Fi’s distracted, gazing at Peter. “I will, believe me,” she answers, then looks to Billy. “The talking part, not the grabbing. Okay?”
Billy grins. He does love secrets. “Okay. I’ll be right over here if you need me, Fi-fi.” He walks away, taking the young nurse with him.
Fi watches Peter eat another fig. What could have possibly made him do that? What was he thinking? She looks at her arm and it occurs to her—this isn’t the first time someone’s grabbed her today. She smells her wrist, but there’s only the trace of soap she used to wash it earlier.
Peter’s now calm as can be, holding the orchids against his cheek, fig seeds spilling into his chin whiskers as he chews away.
* * *
In reclaiming the old YMCA, the hospital completely renovated the Olympic-size pool in the basement. Now it’s only chest deep, sectioned off with buoyed ropes and stainless steel rails. At one end, a lifeguard-slash-medic watches over a small group of the more ambulatory patients who walk in circles in the water, guided by a therapist.
Fi tries not to make too big of a splash as she jumps in at the opposite end. She fingers the controls on the hydraulic lift at the edge. Peter, in swimsuit and life vest, sits strapped in a cushioned chair, which swivels gently out over the water then lowers until he’s in up to his belly. Fi unstraps him and gently slides him into her arms. Some of the patients hate the chair and need to be carried in, but Peter doesn’t mind. Or he hates it. There’s really no way to tell.
She places his arms over a foam floating device then walks him back and forth across the pool a dozen times, encouraging him to use his legs as much as possible. Any of the other patients would be moaning and exhausted but Fi is breathing harder than he is.
She urges him back to the lift. Keeping one hand on his arm, she adjusts the seat straps then turns to find him with his head tilted back, looking up. She follows his eyes. All she sees are banks of bright, low-glare luminaires attached to the concrete ceiling.
“What do you see up there?” she asks.
Peter stands straight up, supporting himself with his hands on the floaty.
“Peter?”
He suddenly stiffens, slipping out of her grasp, and topples backward with a splash.
“Shit!” Fi exclaims, shoving the floaty out of the way and scrambling to him.
Thanks to his life vest he only goes under for a second before she grabs him up and holds him in her arms. He sputters but seems unharmed. Fi glances at the lifeguard, who hasn’t noticed. Thank God!
“Peter, what has gotten into you today?”
He starts to giggle.
“What the...?”
He splashes in the water, still gazing at the ceiling. Then the light that falls on him dims, a night shroud rippling with pink, purple and green. Fi looks up again and blinks forcibly at what she sees.
A stormy night sky with pulsing auroras of color. Shooting stars streak by. Lava flows from a volcano erupting in the distance, throwing up steam as it pours into the sea. Fi clenches with fear—she’s having a seizure! Right here in the pool, with Peter! I should have never have come to work today! I should have stayed home! Peter! Stricken with fear, she looks back down.
In her arms, on his back in reddish waves, is a frolicking baby boy. His eyes twinkle and swirl from sky blue to stormy gray, then
golden brown and emerald green. He looks at her and smiles.
Fi squeezes her eyes shut, shakes her head vigorously.
When she opens them she’s still standing in the pool, and lying in her arms is just Peter, the old man, his eyes only cloudy gray.
Everything is fine. No seizure. No convulsions. She’s incredibly relieved. But how is this possible?!
Peter ceases to splash and giggle, though he still stares at the ceiling, as if he can see right through it.
* * *
The whole incident at the pool felt more like déjà vu than a hallucination. Fi knows she’s seen that baby before, those shooting stars, that red ocean. She just can’t place it.
Then it hits her. It’s from a dream! A recurring one! She had it during her seizure last night, then dreamed it again later. She grabs her head, rubs her temples. But it’s just a dream! She’s got this inexplicable feeling, though, that it’s not her dream. And what just happened at the pool, with Peter? That was no dream, and she definitely didn’t have an episode.
I am going crazy! She’s always considered herself a neurotic mess, on the edge of losing it altogether most of the time. A “basket case,” she used to say, but her uncle corrected her in his Edgarian way. According to him—and she’s never been able to prove him wrong—the term doesn’t come from asylums having inmates weave baskets for therapy, as many people believe. It originated with World War II military jargon for a soldier so badly wounded that he had to be carried around in a basket. That didn’t make her feel any better, of course.
“Ahh!” she shouts, jumping up from the toilet in one of the stalls in the women’s restroom. She wasn’t relieving herself, but after what happened in the pool with Peter she really didn’t want to run into Billy or Zeke or anyone else, so she spent her break hiding here.
She lurches out of the stall, hunches over the sink—and notices a woman janitor near the door with a mop, giving her a curious look.
“Uh...” Fi says. “Hi.”
The woman backs out without a word.