Getting Old Can Hurt You

by Rita Lakin

  The old lady finally managed to leave the parking space. Marilyn maneuvered her way in.

  Tori mumbled. ‘When I think of how much work it was to get this pass, just so we wouldn’t have to wait in line!’

  ‘Fix your hair. We’ve arrived.’

  Tori fairly leapt out of the car, pointing. ‘Let’s haul ass, dammit. What are you doing?’ She couldn’t believe what she was seeing as Marilyn took the time to lock her car door.

  Tori shrieked. ‘Someone’s gonna steal it here?’

  Tori drummed her finger on the plain pine table in the visiting room. Marilyn sat several seats away from her. ‘What’s taking so long?’

  Marilyn commented. ‘It’s a good thing you’re only fifteen and not sixty. You might have had a heart attack by now. Try to relax.’

  ‘Why don’t you sit closer?’

  ‘I told you, I’m pretending I’m not here.’

  Tori glanced around the other tables, where visitors spoke quietly with their convict relatives. The huge room smelled heavily of air freshener, the cheap kind they used in old toilets. There were no windows. Just dreary beige walls and beige tables and beige chairs.

  Every time the door opened, Tori looked up expecting Mom, only to be disappointed. She glanced away again as this latest female was brought in. Wishing she hadn’t had to leave her brand-new iPhone at the door. She giggled. Of course Marilyn wanted to know how she could afford a new phone. Tori told her exactly where the money came from that paid for the phone and all the other new goodies, like that brand-new computer and fancy new backpack.

  Marilyn hissed at her. ‘Psst, there she is.’

  Tori looked again at the same woman weaving her way in. She was horrified; it was as if she no longer recognized her mother. Skeleton-thin, patches of gray hair in among the baldness. Bent over, looking down at the floor, fists clenched. Clothes that barely hung on her emaciated body. She looked ages older than her fifty-two.

  Tori caught the eye of Dix, the prison guard she usually saw on these visits. Big and bulky like many of them were. Mean-looking. But he was always nice to her. Giving her the latest info on how her mother was doing. Mom had never been as bad as this. She felt instant guilt. Lately her visits had become less and less important to her. The guard nodded, understanding her shock; he knew how sad it was.

  Moving at her very slow pace, Dix gently brought Helen Steiner to the table and helped seat her directly across from Tori. The woman kept her fists clenched and in her lap. Tori saw that Marilyn glanced away, unable to deal with how much their mother had aged.

  ‘Hi, Mr Dix,’ Tori greeted him. ‘It’s been a while. Nice to see you.’

  Dix, concerned, said to the sisters, ‘Nice to see you, too. Mom’s kind of under the weather these days.’

  Marilyn whispered angrily. ‘She looks drugged and drunk.’

  ‘Nah, you’re imagining it.’ He winked at them. ‘Sometimes these places have more supplies than your local bar and drugstore.’ He grinned. ‘Just messin’ with ya. You know, like you see in them old-time movies.’

  He said to Helen, whose head was still down, ‘Now, don’t you get too excited, Mama, your girls are real glad to see you. So you have yourself a fun day.’

  He winked and walked off.

  Tori’s eyes glistened. Her poor mom. She looked half dead.

  A wispy little voice was heard. ‘Is he gone, the stale cracker?’

  Tori bent her head toward her mother. ‘Mom? You mean your guard? He left the room.’

  With that, the woman perked right up and cackled. ‘Hate that cracker. Tricky Dix always wants to get into my whitey-tighties.’

  Both daughters stared, startled.

  Helen pretended embarrassment. ‘Oops, he’s the one wearing the whitey-tighties, or is it tighty-whities? I mean my pantaloons.’

  Marilyn whirled her finger alongside her head, indicating: Mom was batty.

  Tori looked straight at her mother. ‘Do you know who I am?’

  She grinned. ‘Would I ever forget my baby? You were my “get up every morning Glory”. ’Member I used to say that to you when you was an itty-bitty little thing? Morning Glory, up and at ’em.’

  Her mom was hallucinating. She was in prison; her grandmother Ida was the one to wake her in the mornings. Before she left us. ‘Yeah, sure I remember. But Mama, I want to be called Tori.’

  Helen reached over, whispering. ‘No, you’re my Gloria.’ She giggled and said softly, but dramatically: ‘You ready for your close-up, baby girl?’ She pointed toward Marilyn. ‘But who’s that one over there?’

  ‘It’s Marilyn, Mom, your oldest daughter.’

  ‘Oh, her. ’Member all those husbands? I liked the baseball player. The Blonde Bombshell never could keep a man.’

  Marilyn shrugged. Tori shrugged back at her. She knew her mother was talking nonsense about her. As if she was that famous movie star.

  Tori paused. ‘You lost a lot of weight.’

  Helen cackled again. ‘Easy-peasy way to die. Oopsie-doopsie, I mean diet.’

  She placed her still-clenched hands on the table. ‘So how’s them religious folks? Still dragging you to that phony-baloney TV minister? Got his God learnin’s from his bible, Religion for Dummies?’

  Both girls looked up sharply.

  ‘So what’s goin’ on with Gerty-dirty and Maxel-axel?’

  ‘They’re just fine,’ Tori whispered, choking on her lie. Then, unable to stop herself, ‘Gertrude died—’

  Helen interrupted. ‘I knew it!’ She broke into song, ‘Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead.’

  The sisters were speechless.

  Helen placed her finger to her lips. ‘Gotta watch what ya say round here. Secret, everything’s a secret. Specially round Tricky Dix, ya know.’

  ‘Yeah, I’ll be careful.’ Humoring her. Tori started slowly, ‘Mom, I need to go away.’

  ‘You’re ready. At last. You betcha, you get the hell out of Dallas. Wait, was that … Dodge?’

  ‘Mom, I really need your advice.’

  Marilyn shrugged again, a waste of time, asking a nutcase for advice.

  Helen whispered, ‘Go find Dad Dah. Your mamma’s done living, so get you to Dad Dah.’

  ‘You mean Dad? Are you talking about Dad?’

  Marilyn couldn’t stand it anymore. ‘Why are you listening to this lunatic?’

  Helen tossed Marilyn a nasty glance then turned to Tori and grinned. ‘You always was my special late baby, born in a special way and a special time. You, always the smart one.’

  Marilyn had enough. ‘Yeah, Mom, you should talk about smart. Rob a bank and end up in here. Destroy everyone’s lives.’ She turned her back on her mother.

  Helen reached across the table, pushing with her closed fists, forcing Tori’s hands open. She indicated that Tori should lay her hands under hers. Tori did so. And, with incredible speed, the woman shoved something into her daughter’s hands. Just as quickly, Tori immediately slid the crinkled paper down into her skirt pocket. ‘It’s a picture,’ Helen whispered.

  Helen upended her hands, now empty, ‘Get thee out of here. Find Hah Hah and Lie Lie and Dad Dah.’ She whispered, very softly, ‘Go where the flamingos fly; shhh. The walls have ears.’ Following that, she pounded on the table, singing loudly, ‘Here Comes the Bride.’

  Causing a disturbance that made other convicts in the room respond noisily, banging on their tables, singing the wedding song along with her. Which brought Dix hurrying back. He helped Helen out of her chair.

  ‘I’m sleepy, Dix-ee. I need my nap.’ She leaned into him, as if suddenly feeble.

  The guard addressed the daughters, ‘I need to take her back now. Sorry.’

  ‘Bye, Momma,’ Tori called out after her.

  Her mother tossed her a sprightly, cheerful bye-bye wave, with her hand behind her back.

  As they waited on the exit line, Marilyn commented, ‘Well, that was a waste of time. Our mother is a mad woman. Dumb as a dodo bird.’

  Tori
smiled. ‘I’d call it sly as a fox.’ She managed a swift glimpse at the photo in her pocket, quickly glancing at the writing on the back.

  ‘Come on, all that oopsie-poopsie and “Here Comes the Bride”? If that wasn’t loony, then what was it all about?’

  ‘It was all about me finding Dad.’

  ‘What on earth are you talking about?’

  ‘Our dad! The dad I never met. Isn’t that cool?’

  Marilyn gasped. ‘You know damn well Dad died years ago in that flood. The day you were born. Are you nuts, too?’

  ‘No, he didn’t. Mom just told me. He’s alive! And I know where he is.’

  As they passed Dix, shepherding the visitors out, he winked and gave them a jolly salute. ‘Bye, ladies,’ and to Tori, ‘Hope to see you again, real soon, good lookin’.’

  Tori’s mind was on the photo waiting for her in her skirt pocket. She didn’t notice Dix pick up his cell phone. Nor did she hear him say to someone, ‘Hey, Docks, You’re not going to believe what I just heard. Take out the old shotguns and give ’em a spit and a polish. After all these years …’

  PART THREE

  The Puzzling Present

  TEN

  The Washing-Machine Gang

  Here we are once again, after quite a long time, piled into the cramped laundry room alongside the elevator on my floor. Sophie is first in line to do her dirty laundry in the one ancient, creaky washer. Bella will be next, once Sophie shifts the clean wet things into the single dryer. We have to help Sophie because her legs are getting worse. She describes herself in a world of pain, and was depending on her cane much more.

  Evvie, Ida and I form a line and take turns helping her shove her clothes into the dilapidated machine. Evvie laughs. ‘I think it’s funny, our still having hush-hush meetings in the washing-machine room. Especially since it hardly fits two people in at a time. And that we could easily meet in one another’s apartments. When did we start using it as our room for secret meetings?’

  ‘I don’t remember,’ Bella says in her meek little voice. ‘Anyway, I hardly remember anything anymore.’

  Evvie adds, ‘It must have been on a case we solved a long time ago.’

  Bella jumps in. ‘Yes. And we didn’t want anyone hearing us talking. I think we were hiding from Hy. We’re always hiding from Hy.’

  Sophie chimes in with her complaint. ‘Especially since we can hardly breathe in here with the detergents and bleach and other awful damaging chemical fumes. And when will we ever get new machines? These things are dying on us.’

  Evvie sighs. ‘I bring it up in every board meeting and it always gets ignored.’

  I wait for Ida to contribute her major kvetch about all the other things wrong with this space. No air. No room to turn around. Dim lighting. Damp. But the new, unimproved Ida is not herself these days.

  ‘Ow!’ Sophie screams. ‘These damn legs.’ She smacks her cane in protest, whacking the pockmarked wall, peeling away after so many years of steam.

  ‘So sit down if it hurts so much.’ Evvie indicates the one small rickety chair with its spindly thin arms.

  ‘I can’t sit down, because then I won’t be able to get up. My knees don’t work anymore.’

  The washer goes into soak mode and the sucking noise makes us squirm. Sophie shouts to be heard. ‘My life is hell. I’m afraid to sit down anywhere. What if I’m stuck on that seat forever?’

  Bella tries to be helpful. ‘Remember what the physical therapist suggested. Nose over toes. Nose over toes. Bend that far down and you can get up. Maybe.’

  ‘Or fall on my head.’

  ‘I thought you went to the neurologist yesterday.’ This from Evvie.

  ‘For more useless tests and X-ray results. Thank goodness for the little bit Medicaid pays. Yeah, that doc was some big help.’

  Bella, not getting the sarcasm, vigorously shakes her head. ‘No, he wasn’t a help. Tell them. Tell them what that momser said.’

  Sophie imitates the doctor’s sarcastic tone. ‘Nothing wrong with your legs. They’re just old. Like you are. So live with it.’

  Evvie says, ‘Another biting letter to the AMA soon to be ignored.’

  I frown. There are many doctors in Florida who have no sympathy with anyone aging. Wait until they get old.

  I knock on the small, pitted table that holds our waiting clothes baskets. ‘Okay, our meeting should come to order.’ And the washer groans into wash cycle.

  All eyes immediately flash over to Ida. This meeting is about her.

  Evvie advises, ‘Talk fast. When it goes into spin, we won’t be able to hear ourselves think.’

  First, we all help the worried Sophie into the one chair and everyone looks to me, forever assumed to be the person in charge.

  ‘Ida, what’s happening? Have you found out anything? Did Tori tell you anything?’

  Ida stands straighter, arms hugging, as if for comfort. ‘I don’t see much of her. She stays up late working on her computer. When she wants to talk on her phone, she locks herself into the bathroom. In the mornings, she’s up early, grabs one of her power bars and she’s out the door. Gone for hours. I have no idea where she goes, or how she gets around. I ask her where she’s been and she says “out”. I ask where, out? She says “about”.

  ‘She always takes her computer and backpack. Yesterday she forgot it, or had someplace to go where she shouldn’t bring it, who knows?’

  Evvie says slyly, leading her on, ‘And what did you do when you saw the backpack left behind?’

  Ida cries out. ‘Yes, I did just what you think I’d do. I paced my apartment back and forth, back and forth again, fighting with my conscience.’

  Bella giggles. ‘Your conscience lost.’

  ‘I double-locked the front door in case she came back for it. I spied on my own grandchild. I’m so ashamed.’ Ida’s face reflects her feelings; circles around her eyes from lack of sleep, cheeks drawn in, skin sallow.

  ‘And? And? Tell us already. What did you find out?’ Sophie wagging her cane around as if it were a fly swatter.

  Ida snuffles. ‘There was a lot of money in a pouch. I was afraid to count it in case she came back fast. But I could tell there was a couple of hundred dollar bills!’

  ‘Interesting,’ says Evvie.

  ‘Some more grungy clothes. She obviously didn’t spend money on anything decent to wear. I also found an old map of Fort Lauderdale. Her cell phone was in there, which made me think she’d be back soon. It must have been new, because I’ve seen this kind advertised on TV and they are expensive. Of course I didn’t know how to see what calls she made. And there’s a postcard I sent her years ago. It was a picture of the beach and I’d written “Wish you were here”.’ She sighs. ‘How flippant I was.

  ‘Then I heard her at the door. Working the double locks. I shoved everything back in and prayed I did it in the same order she left it.’

  Evvie says, ‘Good thinking.’

  Bella tugs at Ida’s gray pleated skirt. ‘So, all right already, what happened?’

  ‘I ran into the kitchen and grabbed some pots and things from the fridge, so she’d think I was cooking.’

  Bella is delighted. ‘That was so smart.’ Bella is fond of that expression.

  ‘Not that smart. If she’d paid attention, none of the items I pulled out made any sense. Peanut butter and two frying pans? But all she was interested in was her backpack. She looked at me suspiciously and I nearly died of fright.’

  ‘Well,’ I comment, ‘it doesn’t tell us too much. Either she was fond of your postcard or it was in there because of your address. The map doesn’t help us if it’s just her being a tourist. And why a map when the kids of today use the GPS on their phones to find places.’

  Ida shrugs. ‘One more thing. I’ve seen her clutching something she looks at sometimes. It wasn’t in the backpack. She hides it somewhere. I could tell it’s a photo.’

  ‘Can you describe it?’

  ‘I only got a quick look. I was afraid she’d
see me.’

  ‘Try to remember anything you can about it.’

  Ida thinks. ‘The photo is small, a black and white.’

  ‘What else?’

  She thinks. ‘I only had seconds but I had the impression it was something taken at night, with very little light showing. Or maybe with a flash that didn’t work. Wait! I remember something. It had some faded ink words on the back that I couldn’t read.’

  ‘Well done. That might help us one of these days.’

  Suddenly, I’m aware of Ida crying. Not listening to me. ‘Ida, what?’

  Running her hands through her wash basket, twisting items in her fingers, ‘I was remembering my little girl. My daughter, Helen. Always the dreamer. And when she married Fred Steiner, they were like two babes in the woods. No sense of reality, either of them. They went to the movies a lot. Saturday cheap matinées. They lived fantasy lives. They nicknamed themselves Helen Hayes and Fred Astaire, and believed life was a movie story promising happy endings. They even named their children after movie stars.’ The sobs seem to catch in her throat. ‘I failed her. And my beautiful grandchildren. I failed them all. God is punishing me for what I did to my family.’

  Karumph! The washer goes into a whirling dervish of spin cycle and we all jump. And the mood is gone. Ida snaps out of her reverie.

  We take turns with our washing and drying, exchanging gossip, useless observations and lots of frivolous maybes. Trying to take Ida’s mind off her problem grandchild. Then, a brief interrupted moment of drama, when Bella realizes she’s dropped a bright red blouse into a white wash, its colors instantly bled. Better that kind of bleeding than what’s in my mysteries, and real life.

  Laundry is done. With baskets of clean clothes, we head for the door. I’m about to turn out the light when I hear, ‘Ouch! Help! Don’t leave me. I knew this would happen! I’m stuck in this darn chair!’

  We turn and face Sophie and indeed she is wedged in. While she whines, Evvie grabs one arm, I take the other, and we pull her out.