Recovery

by Michael Baron

  Mom continued to watch the twirling ring for several additional seconds. When she finally looked up, she seemed more melancholy than angry. “Your father asked me to marry him.”

  “Well, yeah, I kind of assumed that. Isn’t that the way it usually was back when you two were dating? I guess you could have asked him, but didn’t that kind of thing create a scandal?”

  Anger seemed to flare up in Mom’s eyes again for a moment, but it dissipated quickly, replaced by consternation. “That’s not . . . never . . . never mind.”

  Warren had no idea what his mother was trying to say to him. He knew his inability to understand her frustrated her, but when he’d tried to explore these conversations further in the past, he’d only managed to upset her more. The anger concerned him, though. Given the vast amount of spare time he had these days, he’d been doing some reading, both books and online, about what he was seeing in her condition. He knew it was possible that her rage might become a common thing, and he wasn’t sure how well he’d be able to handle that. He couldn’t think of a single time when his mother had gone off on him, even when he’d done incredibly stupid things as a kid. His friends regularly complained about enduring lectures and tongue-lashings. He’d never had to deal with that, and he appreciated it.

  Her face had become more placid now, almost as though she were using some kind of stress-relief technique. Warren had attempted to get her to try meditation a few years ago, having heard that it could help with mental acuity, but she wouldn’t even consider it. Whatever she was doing now was certainly relaxing her, though. Maybe Jan or one of the other nurses had taught it to her. It seemed to take years from her.

  “He’s worried that he fumbled it. He doesn’t have a ring. I don’t care about a ring – at least right now. I just wanted him to ask me.”

  Mom’s talking about Dad was hardly new. A good third of every conversation they’d had since Dad died had centered on him in some way. Stories about their courtship, about their early married days, about the adventures they had after Warren moved out of the house, which always made him feel a little jealous even though he’d moved on to his own adventures. The difference here was that she was talking about this event as though it had just happened, as though she were telling a girlfriend about it on the phone.

  This was a new wrinkle, and one with which Warren had some trouble contending. Did he engage her in this talk, pretending that they’d transported sixty years into the past (in which case, did he need to identify who she thought he was in this scenario)? Did he attempt to snap her out of it, which might be harmful on a number of levels? Did he simply sit here and let her keep talking, assuming that she’d step out of the past at some point? This last option was becoming more attractive as the moments passed.

  Warren had never known his parents when they were in the blush of adulthood. They were in their early forties when they had him, having already been married for more than twenty years. There were photographs and reminiscences, of course, and these gave this period some semblance of substance for Warren. In the five years since Dad died, Mom had painted in the background even more, giving voice to the great joys and deep heartaches of those years with the enthusiasm of a professional biographer. She’d become so enmeshed in the details of a story that Warren sometimes thought he could put on his shoes, take a quick stroll through the neighborhood, chat up the guy that lived next door for a while, and come back to find his mother still recounting the same tale. He never wanted to do anything of the sort, though. The stories gave form to his family history. They answered questions he didn’t realize he should have asked. They made the long past that existed before he entered their world come alive for him.

  He missed it when his mother’s recounting became far less voluble. It should have been a sign to him that something was happening to her mind when her storytelling became less florid. If he’d noticed it faster, could the doctors have been more effective in stemming her decline? The drugs they were trying now showed no impact, but they might have been more effective if physicians had started the treatment earlier.

  The silence had extended for several minutes now. Warren had stopped watching his mother as he drifted into his own thoughts. When he looked at her now, though, he saw that she was staring behind him. At first, he thought she was looking at the photograph on the wall, but then he remembered that the picture was over his other shoulder. He turned to see what had captured her attention, but found nothing there.

  When he turned back, her eyes were locked on his. This startled him, as though he hadn’t realized she was in the room with him, and he flinched. The motion seemed to generate some spark within his mother and the scowl with which she greeted him returned.

  Then, just as quickly, it fell. This time, though, she didn’t seem to relax. Instead, she seemed to sag. Without a word, she stood, patted him gently on the cheek, and walked away from him. As Warren watched, she removed her housecoat, climbed into bed, and pulled the sheets around her.

  Was that it? Was that the extent of their visit for the day? Should he leave? If he did, would she even remember that he’d been there?

  For the second time in the last fifteen minutes, Warren felt stuck. Leaving seemed wrong, but staying seemed silly. He was still pondering this when he heard a knock at the door. Faced with an easy decision at last, he opened it to find Jan on the other side.

  “Hey,” she said as she entered the room. “I need to check Antoinette’s blood pressure.”

  “Checking her blood pressure requires touching her, right?”

  Jan wrinkled her nose. “That or Vulcan mind meld.”

  “Yeah, you might want to go with the latter.”

  Jan put down the supplies she’d carried into the room. “Problem?”

  Warren plopped onto the couch where his mother had sat only minutes earlier. “She’s been a little unpredictable since I got here. If you try to take her blood pressure, she might be as cooperative as usual. Or she might have your left hand for a snack.”

  Jan sat on the arm of the chair across from him, exhibiting more concern than he would have liked her to exhibit at that moment. “Where is she?”

  “She went back to bed a few minutes ago. I assume she’s sleeping, because I haven’t heard her move.”

  “And you’re staying here?”

  Warren chuckled softly and looked upward toward Jan’s eyes. “Pretend that you aren’t thinking that I have absolutely nothing else to do with my life, okay?”

  “What I was thinking was that you were the world’s greatest son.” Jan slid into the chair. She was wearing a blue, knee-length skirt and Warren couldn’t help but notice her calves as she sat.

  “Sitting here while she sleeps is nothing. Watching game shows with her for two hours? That’s true selflessness.”

  “Or a case of having nothing else to do with your life.”

  Warren was surprised that Jan would tease him this way. Of course, he’d essentially invited her to do so. “Or that,” he said, grinning.

  Jan tossed her head in the direction of his mother’s room. “She’s having mood swings?”

  “Today her mood was all over the place. There haven’t been many days like this. Yet.”

  Jan touched her fingertips together. “We should probably get some more tests.”

  “Isn’t that a little bit like testing the ocean for wetness?”

  Jan pressed her lips together, then brought her steepled fingers to her mouth. “Do you think this is rattling her?”

  Warren leaned into the sofa, rubbing his left temple. “Less and less, I think. Which of course means it’s rattling me more and more.”

  Jan leaned toward him, and for a moment Warren thought she was going to hug him. Instead, she just looked at him for a long beat. This had the potential to become uncomfortable, but before they reached that point, Jan put her hands on her knees, which he also couldn’t help noticing, and stood from the chair.

  “I’m going to h
ave to take my chances and get that blood pressure reading.”

  “Can I have you sign a waiver first?”

  “The facility has us covered.” She took a step toward Mom’s bedroom and then turned back to him. “We can talk about this anytime you want, you know. Unfortunately, I have quite a bit of experience with it.”

  “Thanks. I’m going to take you up on that.”

  Jan started moving toward the bedroom again. “That’s good.”

  Warren watched Jan go through the doorway and listened to her gentle voice as she coaxed his mother into offering up her arm. A minute later, she was waving good-bye to him.

  Alone, and with far more time on his hands than he should have, Warren turned on the Game Show Network.

  Spinning

  Spinning is a novel about a guy who thinks he has everything going for him who comes to realize that he might have been setting his sights on the wrong goals. Dylan Hunter’s entire world turns upside down when Diane, an old lover, returns to his life with her young daughter (no, she’s not his). That, however, isn’t close to the biggest change he’s going to face. In this scene, Dylan comes to realize how serious he has become about both Diane and her daughter Spring.

  Diane was unlike any woman I had ever known. After a week of thinking about telling her I loved her, I even pulled her picture out of my drawer at work and practiced. The picture looked good on my desk. As if it were a copy of Playboy, I had been sneaking peeks at it during the day. I decided to leave the picture on my desk.

  If I were going to tell Diane I loved her, though, I didn’t just want to blurt it out during or after sex. I wanted it to be special. Diane loved old movies, so I decided to tell her I loved her on the top of the Empire State Building. I’d pretend to be Cary Grant in that movie. To make sure she arrived, I planned to hold her hand until we reached the observation deck.

  We didn’t get there.

  Although I had envisioned a quiet and romantic moment alone with Diane, she said that we had to take Spring because Spring would want to see the view. I decided to stay with my plan, but fate stepped in again. The elevator to the observation deck was closed for repairs and wouldn’t open again until the next morning. Diane and Spring shrugged off the disappointment, but I skulked. “This is getting all screwed up,” I said.

  Diane offered me a patient smile. “It’s no big deal. We’ll come back some other time.”

  I stopped her by a water cooler and took her hands. She eyed me with curiosity, but didn’t say anything.

  “Diane, do you know that movie, A Night to Remember?”

  “Yeah,”

  “That’s why I brought you and Spring here.”

  “Because of A Night to Remember?”

  “Knowing how you like old movies, I wanted to be romantic and tell you…” For a moment, my eyes drifted. This was as personal as I had ever gotten with someone.

  Diane made a sour face. “A Night to Remember?”

  “Yeah,”

  “That’s the movie about the Titanic…with the iceberg?”

  “I meant the one with Cary Grant.”

  “That’s An Affair to Remember.”

  “Yeah, that’s the one.”

  Spring tugged at Diane’s coat. “I don’t feel so good.”

  I continued. “I wanted to take you to the top of the world, like in the movies….”

  Spring tugged harder.“Mommy, I really don’t feel good.”

  Diane knelt down next to her.

  “I think I might throw up,” Spring said.

  Diane looked up at me. “I’d better get her to a bathroom.”

  I just laughed and shook my head. Diane gave me an apologetic expression and took Spring away. By the time they came back, Spring seemed okay, but the moment had been lost for me.

  “Sorry about that,” Diane said. “Sometimes, it’s too much juice. Other times, I think it’s just too much adult conversation. She was okay by the time we got to the bathroom. What were you saying?”

  “Nothing that can’t wait.” I was bummed about the missed romantic opportunity, but I forced myself to get over it and wait for another shot.

  Anything

  I’ve always wanted to play with a “what if” story and finally got my chance with Anything. Anything is a novel about a man who learns about a traumatic event in his fiancée’s past and finds a way to travel back in time to reverse the damage – only to discover that doing so has wiped out any trace of their relationship. In this scene, Ken has just come back from his time journey to discover what he has wrought.

  I stepped out into a strange new world. Only it wasn’t strange and it wasn’t new. Taxis dipped in and out of traffic as cars maneuvered to avoid buses picking up passengers. Drivers honked as they zoomed in death races to capture parking spots.

  The uneasy feeling I’d had since returning to Stephon’s had began to subside. I hadn’t done irreparable damage to the time-space continuum. There were no antigravity cars here or pedestrians zooming through the air with jetpacks. Dolphins hadn’t become the new master race. This looked and smelled and sounded just like the Washington I knew.

  I looked up at a White House helicopter overhead, so I didn’t see the rollerblader until he banged off my arm. The gawky teenager went into a split-legged landing like a fledgling ballet dancer. His pimply face twisted into a feral snarl. “Why don’t you look where you’re going, dude?” he said sharply.

  “Why don’t you rollerblade in a park? And don’t call me dude, dude.” If he had been halfway polite, I would have helped him up. Instead I left him wallowing in a pool of his own obscenity as he struggled to stand. There was someplace else I needed to be.

  For further assurance, I reached my hand into my pocket and pulled out my wallet, flipping through the compartments. My Platinum Visa and American Express cards were there. My name and address were the same on my Virginia driver’s license. So was my photo – I refused to contemplate the implications if that had changed. I definitely seemed to be the same Ken Timian who walked into Stephon’s shop some indeterminable time ago. I relaxed a little bit more.

  I really wanted to hear Melissa’s voice. I could be home soon enough, but at that very moment, the thing that was most important to me was checking in with her, just to hear what she sounded like. I wondered if her voice would be a little different coming from a body that hadn’t had to carry a huge secret around for the past eighteen years.

  I pulled out my phone and my number. One ring (so it hasn’t been disconnected). Two rings (a stranger hasn’t answered). Three. Four. Then a loud click. “Hi, this is Ken. I can’t take your call now. Leave your name, number, and a brief message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

  I assumed Melissa was out running errands. We certainly had enough of them to do this close to the wedding. I took a deep breath and held the phone against my forehead.

  My Audi was where I’d parked it, and when I reached the car, I discovered yet another indication that the world was very much the same. The supernatural powers of the Washington parking cops were still as strong as ever. The red EXPIRED tab had flared only three minutes before, yet already a ticket lay under my windshield wiper. This was a $25 tariff that I wouldn’t even think of complaining about.

  Traffic on the way to Arlington was light for a late spring Saturday. I lowered the power windows as I crossed Memorial Bridge, smiling at the joggers and bicyclists on both sidewalks. The farther I got from Stephon’s the more real everything felt to me.

  Jeez, I pulled this off. I kicked that horrible woman’s ass and I’ll still have plenty of time to make Melissa a great dinner. I hope she still likes Fettuccine Alfredo.

  As I turned into the parking lot, luck blessed me again as a packed minivan backed out of a space near the apartment house door. I waved at the boisterous tots in the back of the van and they waved back. I didn’t even think twice about whether the doorman would recognize me, and his friendly nod undersc
ored that I had nothing to worry about.

  The mailman was just leaving as I entered the building. My mailbox key fit perfectly, revealing the usual flyers for pizza and oil changes, a couple of bills, and assorted solicitations. As I closed the mailbox door, my eye went to the white address label stuck to the front. KEN TIMIAN – APT. 12D. It would say, “Ken and Melissa Timian” soon. I was a little surprised that Melissa wanted to take my last name after we got married, but almost any guy will acknowledge that this is what he hopes for.

  I glanced through the envelopes in my hand. I sighed longingly at the notion of changing history to eliminate whoever invented junk mail. Then the light bulb finally went on in my head.

  KEN TIMIAN – APT. 12D.

  Our mailbox said KEN TIMIAN AND MELISSA ARGENT.

  The phone machine said, “Hi, this is Ken.”

  Our answering machine said, “Hi, this is Ken and Melissa.”

  Oh, my god.

  I ran toward the elevator. With a sidestep worthy of an NFL wide receiver, I evaded the maintenance man coming out of the opening doors. He screamed at me in Spanish as I slammed the button for the twelfth floor.

  At the seventh floor, the car stopped. Doors rattled open, revealing a curly haired woman in a short skirt. Get in, I willed her. Get in or get out of my way. I need to get to my apartment. I need to know that Melissa is still here.

  Two more stops and we were finally on the twelfth floor. A left from the elevator, a right down the next corridor, and I was at Apartment 12D.

  The plastic sticker on the door bore my name only. It was getting a little hard to pretend.

  Maybe we didn’t move in together yet. Maybe the new Melissa is more independent than the old one was – if that’s humanly possible. Maybe she didn’t want to move in with me until we were married. Maybe we’ve already found that great house that we’re going to live in together.