by Stone, Mary
The light, sweet fragrance of butterfly gingers filled the air, further taking me back. The tiny white flowers were turned toward the light streaming from the open sky overhead. The courtyard was just like being outside, except the residents couldn’t wander away without going out the building’s only entrance, right by the front desk. It was the perfect setup. Mother was safe here.
I inhaled, savoring the aroma for a moment before knocking on the fourth door on the right. A small gold frame held the index card with my mother’s name on it, written in her own neat handwriting.
“Come in.” Her voice was soft, but there was no question the woman inside was my mother. Even decades since the last time we’d spoken, I recognized the perfect intonation with which she spoke each word. The sound grated on my last nerve.
I stepped into a small foyer, surprised by the size of the room. To my left, an open door revealed a large bathroom with a walk-in tub. There was a long counter to my right, and a kitchen sink, but no stove or other appliances to cook with. Instead of lower kitchen cabinets, drawers stretched the length of the wall. White sticky labels announced the contents of the drawers: IV bags, syringes, wet wipes, adult disposables, and anything else Mother needed. The only thing missing was her medication, which I was sure they kept locked away.
Above the counter hung an erase board calendar with Mother’s entire schedule laid out. August fifteenth was circled in red with “Happy Birthday, Dorothea!” written in purple dry erase marker. Today’s date.
The universe was sending me a message. I was meant to be here, even if my mother’s birthday had completely slipped my mind. Why else would I decide at the penultimate moment to change my plans and pay Mommy Dearest a visit?
But I cast those thoughts to the side. I was here for one purpose, and that wasn’t to explain the remarkable. I’d waited far too long for this moment, and whether my journey was spurred by the supernatural or my subconscious, I was at her bedside, ready to do what was needed.
Somehow, my mother had managed to make it to the ripe old age of seventy-one. Cake was scheduled for after lunch, along with a party in the cafeteria, according to the note scribbled on the board. The festivities were to start promptly at noon.
I glanced at my watch, delighted that I would have an hour with her before lunch was served.
It was far more time than I needed.
“Hello?” She was sitting on a hospital bed in the middle of the room, the television muted with the closed caption on.
“Hello.” I moved closer to her bedside, blessing her with a soft smile.
She tilted her head at the sound of my voice, frowning. “I’m sorry, young man, you must have the wrong room.”
“This is the right room.” I stepped forward but stopped short of reaching out for her hand.
Now wrinkled and covered with brown age spots, those hands had pinched me when I’d stepped out of line, her manicured nails digging into my soft toddler flesh with so much force the memory still angered me fifty years later. Her sweet smile and Southern charm had so easily disarmed everyone who’d met her, but I knew her for what she was.
A monster disguised as a doting mother.
“Do I know you?” Her voice trembled slightly as she squinted up at me.
“No, you don’t. But I’m here to visit with you.”
“That’s nice.” With shaking hands, she reached up to adjust her perfectly styled hair. “What’s the occasion?”
I frowned in confusion. Did she not realize the date? “It’s your birthday. August fifteenth.”
Her hand went to her heart as she recoiled, shaking her head. “No, that can’t be right. I’ve already had a birthday this year.”
I picked up a magazine from the nightstand beside her bed that was folded open with a pen clipped to the page she was working on. “I didn’t know you liked Sudoku.”
Wrinkling her nose, she scowled. “I do not. But I have to do puzzles.” She tapped the side of her head with her index finger. “My memory’s going.”
Ahh. Suddenly, it all made sense. The white board with every hour of the day planned out, the fact that Mother wasn’t even remotely alarmed by the appearance of a strange man in her room, and the fact that she didn’t even realize it was her birthday.
My throat clenched, and a deep ache spread through my chest. The pain came and went in the space of a heartbeat. Mother didn’t deserve my pity.
“What about the IV? Are you ill?”
“I feel fine. Maybe I’ll ask the nurse to take it out.” She held up her left hand, which was covered in medical tape. “Sometimes I forget and bump it on the bedrail.” Laughing, she shook her head. “I forget a lot of things.”
“It’s okay.”
Dorothea turned her attention to the bank of windows that took up the entire north wall of the room. Through the tinted glass, she had a gorgeous view of greenery. Directly outside her window was a small fruit-bearing tree with a white wooden bench beside it. Across from the bench, a waterfall cascaded into a small artificial pond. I was sure the placement was intentional. Centered in front of Mother’s room, it was surrounded by small trees and an assortment of wildflowers.
Going to the window, I leaned close to the glass to view the space next door. As I’d suspected, there was an identical pond with a waterfall, a tree, a bench, and native plants.
“The Chickasaw Plum makes delicious preserves. Have you had them before?”
I followed her gaze to the tree outside her window. “No, I haven’t.”
“That tree has been in my yard since I was a little girl. I used to sneak the fruit when my mother was busy with the baby.”
Baby?
“This tree?”
“Yes, silly. What tree do you think I’m talking about?”
“You grew up here?” I said, testing her sanity.
Dorothea opened her mouth, paused, and closed it, her upper lip quivering. “I don’t know.”
“Your garden is lovely.”
The care the facility took to ensure their patients’ lives were enriched at every turn would have filled me with delight, had I been paying for Mother’s stay. I toyed with the idea of prepaying my own retirement in this gorgeous place but cast the thought aside just as quickly as it had appeared. When I was through with Mother, I would never step foot in this cursed place again.
She was still gazing out the window when I sat down beside her. Her lips were parted, her eyes glazed. I let her be, in no hurry to end our meeting. There was still more than forty-five minutes until the nurse would be by to collect her for lunch and a birthday celebration I was sure she’d already forgotten about.
I cleared my throat, drawing her attention back to me.
Her smile was dreamy, her hazel eyes glossy and unfocused. “Why, hello. Are you the new nurse?” She held up her hand, turning it to the side so the medical tape was facing me. “Can you take this out? I keep forgetting it’s there and bumping it on the railing. I forget a lot of things.”
The infusion pump made a low whirring sound, the readout announcing the medicine it was injecting into the clear tube that led to the IV port in her hand. RCV. Rituximab, cyclophosphamide, and vincristine. A combination chemo drug usually paired with a dose of prednisone by mouth.
“You have non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma?”
She nodded, her eyes welling with tears. An instant later, the tears were gone and a scowl had returned to her face. “I know you.”
Her voice had changed—more commanding, less fragile than moments earlier.
My breath caught in my throat. “You do?”
“What happened to your face, Lenny?”
The childhood nickname threw me. My mother had always called me Lawrence, sneering each syllable as if every letter filled her with disgust. She’d stopped calling me Lenny right after my father died. I was only four when it happened, but that day was burned into my memory. The day my mother stopped loving me and her once soft and loving hands had become weapons.
“I�
��m not Lenny.” It was true. Lenny had withered away until he was nothing more than a memory. I wasn’t even Lawrence anymore. Both were long dead—one killed by the loss of his mother’s love, the other by necessity.
She wagged her finger at me, her thin lips spreading into a smile, before frowning again. “Don’t you remember me, Lenny? It’s Mommy? Don’t you know who your mommy is?”
I swallowed against the lump that rose in my throat. The wrinkled shell of the woman disappeared, replaced by the vibrant brunette who had given birth at the tender age of fifteen, yet was the most amazing, doting mother a young boy could ask for. I had adored her for as long as I could remember. Only after she crushed my soul, time and time again, did I finally admit to myself that the woman I’d known as my mother had died with my father.
Until now.
Her hand reached out to me, as soft as it had been on my fourth birthday when she’d stroked my cheek and reassured me that everything was going to be okay. Her touch took me back, my own tiny voice echoing in my head. I closed my eyes, willing it away, but I couldn’t fight the memory that had haunted me for over fifty years.
“I didn’t mean to let Buddy out.” Tears streamed down my face as I turned my gaze up to my father, ashamed that I’d left the door open once again.
Father shrugged into his coat as our eyes met.
“I’m so sorry, Daddy.”
He crouched down until we were eye level, tweaking my nose as he always did. “Don’t worry about it, sport. I’ll find Buddy and bring him home. Then we’ll have cake.”
“What if he gets hit by a car?” My lower lip trembled, and I burst into fresh tears.
Kneeling as my father had, my mother tucked a lock of hair behind my ear. My hair was the same as hers. A deep chestnut brown with a little curl at the end if I went too long between haircuts. Her hair was long and wavy, framing her perfect heart-shaped face. Mother gathered me into her arms, rocking me against her chest as my father went to the door with Buddy’s leash in his hand. The door closed, and I pulled from my mother’s grasp, running to the window to press my face against the glass.
“Buddy!” My father yelled as he headed down the sidewalk. His attention caught on something across the street, and he froze, standing on tiptoes to get a better view.
My heart soared with hope as he took off running, holding his hat down so it didn’t fly off in the frigid winter wind. He was out of sight for a moment, before his hat came back into view, and he stepped into the street, a ball of fluff in his arms. Buddy!
My mother and I gasped in unison at the same time that the sound of screeching tires filled the air. Her hand fell onto my shoulder as we watched, helpless, as a dark car slid across the slick pavement. Skidding sideways, the car barreled toward him, completely out of the driver’s control.
My father turned, Buddy in his arms. His mouth dropped open, but he didn’t have time to shout before the car slammed into him.
Mother screamed, pushing me aside so hard I stumbled and fell backward onto the floor.
She jumped over me, running to the door, screaming my father’s name at the top of her lungs.
I blinked, shaking away the memory. With a trembling hand, I wiped away the tears that had soaked my cheeks.
Mother watched me, her frail hand still holding mine. Her long, thick hair was thinning and silver. Once full waves were stringy, the hair breaking off at odd lengths around her head. Her eyes were dull, where they’d once been a vibrant blue.
I tried to envision her as she’d been moments before my father had left the house in search of Buddy. Nurturing and tender, with the patience of a saint.
But a piece of my mother had died there on the pavement with Father and Buddy. When she returned to the house, long after the coroner’s van had left, I’d been crying for what felt like hours, standing in front of the window as the entire scene played out in front of my four-year-old eyes.
Mother stormed into the house, the red gone from lips that were twisted with rage. Grabbing me by my collar, she backhanded me.
My ears popped, and my teeth clacked together. I’d never been struck before, so I stood there, dumbfounded.
“You did this!” she shrieked as she hit me over and over, before collapsing to the floor.
I went to her then, trying to heal her pain with kisses, as she had for me so many times.
Wiping tears from her face, she turned away from me as she pushed me away.
I stumbled backwards, my own face drenched in tears, sniffling. “Mommy?”
“Don’t.” She hissed the word, snapping as she spun to face me. Where her eyes had once held devotion and adoration for the boy she’d often called her greatest gift, there was only hate and anger.
It was the last birthday I’d ever celebrated.
The abuse had started then, stopping only when—at twelve—I’d accepted there was nothing I could do to earn back her love. By the time I was fifteen, and husband number five had come into our lives, we were little more than roommates. I was relieved when he brought up boarding school. It was my ticket out of the house and away from the demon that had taken over my mother’s body.
What a blessing for Mother that she didn’t remember.
“It’s in your eyes.” She stroked my hand lovingly as she had when my father was still alive. “You always had the most beautiful eyes, Lenny. They never seemed to be the same color. Changing with your moods, from one vibrant shade to another. It doesn’t matter what body you come to me in, a mother knows her son’s eyes.”
The last sentence had me reeling, but she turned away again, staring out the window. I moved to stand in front of her, leaning in so we were eye to eye. “Mother?”
She started humming, never flinching, even when I stepped between her and the window. The lucid moment was gone. She was lost inside herself again.
I’d come to this place to end her life, but fate had already done that for me. If Mother were herself, she’d be angry at the injustice of it all. She had already died once. Her final death would be an act of mercy instead of the retribution I’d come to dish out.
“I always loved you, Mother. I’m sorry it took dementia for you to love me again.”
She blinked, and I held my breath. Don’t let her ask me who I am again, I begged the universe. I couldn’t handle seeing her that way.
“I always loved you, Lenny. There’s nothing you can do that will change that. Your father and I will always, always love you more than anyone in the whole world.” If only her words were true.
Yes, her mind was completely gone. The only just thing was to put her out of her misery.
“I’ll be right back.” I patted her hand, unwinding my fingers from hers. The loss of her tender touch set off an ache in my chest that was so painful, I struggled to breathe. I glanced over my shoulder at her, and she was gazing out the window again, her cheeks wet with tears.
Despite my altered fingerprints, I pulled a pair of gloves from my pocket before I opened the drawer that held syringes. Choosing one that held ten milliliters, I capped it with an eighteen-gauge needle. Filling the syringe with air, I held it at my side, out of sight.
Mother, still lost in her mind somewhere, stared out the window as if I wasn’t there.
I injected the air into the port near the top of her IV line, and capped the needle, dropping it into my pocket. Leaning over her bed, I caressed her cheek, as she’d done to me so many times before my father’s death.
Her eyes turned to me, and a smile spread across her lips. “Lenny. You came.”
I didn’t understand why her words hurt so much. I clutched at my chest, sure my heart would soon escape from my ribs.
“Yes, I did, Mother. Happy birthday.” I kissed her cheek, and without a backward glance, I stepped away.
“I’m so glad you came. Goodbye, Lenny.”
Could she feel it? I wondered. Feel death approaching her inch by inch.
In the hallway, I sucked in a deep, cleansing breath before striding
down the hall, my hands sweating inside the gloves.
Stopping next to the guest book, I picked up the pen. I wrote my mother’s name in the resident column and smiled as I signed “Lawrence Kingsley” to its right.
Strolling out the front door, I stepped over the threshold as an alarm sounded and chaos ensued.
“Mrs. Hayhurst’s in cardiac arrest!” the nurse shouted loudly, panic making her voice crack. “I need a crash cart, now!”
Interesting.
I would have thought the bitch would have a DNR, but I supposed Mother was selfish, even to the very end.
The front door snapped closed behind me, bringing blessed silence.
I’d done the right thing. She’d died with her eyes on nature, the beauty of the Florida flora shepherding her into the next life.
As I drove away, I took in the scenery. Ah…Florida. It was hard not to wonder how Gabe had ever left behind this coastal paradise. There was so much beauty, and the weather was always warm.
I shrugged. It was a question for another day, for the day I found him. Until then, I had so much to do before it was Gabe’s turn to face his fate. And he would, just like my mother.
Too bad for him, he hadn’t earned the mercy my mother had. There would be no swift death for Gabe. His suffering wouldn’t end when he begged me to kill him.
Only when I made the killing cut would he be cleansed of his sins against me.
Only then would he be free.
The End
To be continued…
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