by Matt Richtel
“And that’s the story of how you got your neurologist,” I tell Grandma.
“I don’t understand what you’re saying.”
“As the kids say: I have commitment issues.”
“Oh.”
She’s silent for a second and says: “If you stay in one place, with one person, you will age no less quickly.”
I laugh. “Where do you come up with this stuff?”
“What?”
“Never mind, guru.” I lean in close. “Lane, I wish you’d tell me your secrets.”
“I’ll tell you a secret.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“Remember to burp the baby.”
She’s looking at the coffee table. A copy of Family Circle magazine shows a picture of a mom holding a baby over her shoulder.
“I don’t have a baby yet, Grandma.”
She shrugs and picks up the magazine.
I fidget and find myself conspicuously avoiding the glance of an eighty-something woman lovingly cradling the hand of her oxygenated husband who suffers a nasty case of wildly overgrown ear hair.
I extract my phone. There are six missed calls—from the retirement home. Vince must be frantic and pissed. But he hasn’t left a message.
I call Pauline. “Mystery man,” she answers.
“What?”
“So what’s in your mystery package?”
“Mystery instructions.”
She doesn’t respond for a second.
“Pauline?”
“Hold on.”
She puts her hand over the phone but I can still hear her coughing to the extent it sounds like she might be sick.
“Upset stomach,” she says when she’s finished. “Late night followed by quintuple espresso. I’ve got to cut down my caffeine intake.”
Or her stress.
“Have you ever considered slowing down, maybe just in the middle of the night?”
“Right back at you. Now tell me about the package.”
I describe how I opened the thumb drive, and the instructions I found. I glance at the clock on my phone. It’s noon. I’ve got three hours before the mystery meeting.
“Sounds cloak and dagger. Are you going to wear a trench coat?” Pauline asks.
True to her word, Pauline has tried to remain light, fun, and flirty. She says she’s not going to change her approach to the world just because I don’t want to date.
“Something very strange is going on,” I say.
“With the memory stick?”
I hesitate. I’d love her help figuring out what’s going on but right now she presents as many complications and entanglements as she does resources and insights.
“It’s already been a long day. I don’t know, just strange,” I finally say.
“So are you going to go to the meeting?”
I look at Grandma. Does the thumb drive have anything to do with the attack in the park, and Grandma’s recent ramblings? Or is it coincidental, unrelated, some kind of joke?
“Wearing a trench coat and matching socks.”
“Socks and dagger,” she says. “Can I come?”
I tell her that I’d prefer to go alone.
“Be careful. Socks aren’t much defense against sharp objects,” she says. After a pause, she adds, “I’d love to see you later.”
I’m silent.
“I should go,” she says.
“Wait. Could you spare me another minute?”
“What’s up?” She suddenly sounds rushed.
“Tell me about Chuck. Your investor.”
There is a moment of silence, then she says: “What makes you ask?”
“He seemed interesting when we met last night. I’m just curious about him.”
Another pause.
“I think he’s curious about you, too.”
“Meaning?”
“I think he thinks you’re cute. You’re his type.”
I’m not sure if she means that he likes my journalistic temperament or, perhaps, that he’s gay. Now that I think about it, it had crossed my mind.
“You should work that angle,” she continues. “Maybe you can get him up to sixty-five dollars per blog post. You’ll be a rich man by the year 2075.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Look, Nat, can we talk about this later today, or tonight? I’m staying in the city.”
Pauline has a gorgeous house in Marin, overlooking the water. But she keeps a three-story loft downtown, near the ballpark.
“Come by tonight and we’ll make good on the drinks we missed, and I’ll tell you about Chuck.”
Before I can tell her that’s not going to happen, she adds, “I really gotta go. I’m on Internet time.”
She hangs up.
From my backpack, I pull out my laptop. I find a weak signal in the waiting room. I call up a browser and I search for “Adrianna.” It is a fool’s errand. There are several million of references.
Is Adrianna a resident of Magnolia Manor? That makes no sense in that Vince seemed baffled that Grandma had mentioned the name Adrianna.
From my pocket, I pull one of the shell casings I found on the ground outside my flat after this morning’s drive-by shooting. The brass housing looks to measure less than an inch in length, the width of a ring finger.
Into Google, I type: “identify shell casing.” I get countless hits—about collections of artillery shells, lamps made from old casings, and on and on—but not the clearinghouse site I’d imagined would let me precisely identify my bullet, or the gun that fired it.
“All that surfing can rewire your brain,” a voice says.
I look up to see Dr. Laramer.
“You’re looking well, Mrs. Idle,” he says to my companion on my right.
I close my laptop.
“Hello, Doc,” I say. He wears blue scrubs and flip-flops. “Is it casual footware Friday?”
“It’s Thursday,” Grandma says.
She’s right.
He looks at her and cocks his head.
“Interesting,” he mutters.
Chapter 15
“What?” I ask.
He ignores me and walks to the outer office door. He turns the latch and locks it. Except for us, the reception area is empty.
“Trying to keep us in, or somebody out?” I ask.
“I like a peaceful lunch hour but I’m making an exception for a family friend.” It’s not clear if he intends a slight.
The three of us walk down a corridor to his private office.
“What’s so interesting, Dr. Laramer?”
“Call me Pete, please. Let’s talk in my office.”
His confines celebrate his success.
Framed on his wall are numerous credentials, including his Neurology Board certificate denoting his specialty in memory and recall disorders, and a letter from the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The last time we’d visited, he’d told me he’d received a patent for developing techniques for using real-time imaging technology to explore the brain’s memory centers. He’s like an old-time cartographer, but instead of hiking into the interior of a continent, he’s mapping the subterranean layers of the brain to follow the flow of neurochemicals.
Adjectives that describe Dr. Pete Laramer: smart and ambitious. Not neat. Haphazard papers and files sully his desk. I’m that messy. I could be a fancy doctor.
Facing out from the desk stands a framed photograph of Kristina and three daughters who appear poised to share her beauty.
He’s my height but paunchier, a late-thirties white guy with gray-speckled temples. His eyes are bloodshot; between them and the scrubs, I infer he’s been on night call at the hospital. He looks otherwise devoid of any medical condition, which I find slightly disappointing.
“What strikes you about Lane?” I ask.
“She seems fit. Tracking. It’s good.”
“Really? It seems to me like she’s slipped off a cliff.”
Fewer than six months ago she’d have been, if not in
her prime, sufficiently lucid. Brains don’t fail this precipitously.
I situate Grandma on a chocolate-leather couch. As I do so, I explain she is agitated and acting frightened. Grandma interjects. “You’re the doctor who studies my head.”
“That’s an interesting way to put it.” He glances at me as if to say: See, she’s on the ball.
He asks me to elaborate on what she’s been saying. “Has it been nonsensical rambling or is she repeating herself and focusing on a particular idea?”
I explain that Grandma talked about a man in blue and the dentist. She’s been upset since we nearly got shot in the park.
“Physically, she’s fine,” I say.
“Stop,” he says, with some alarm.
“Pardon.”
“She was shot?”
“Almost.”
“Christ,” he says, suddenly animated. “Are you serious?”
“It was probably some random attack. But I’d love to know what she remembers about it.”
He pauses, apparently lost in thought. “It’s not every day that one of my patients gets shot at.”
He stands.
“Can you wait outside while I examine her?”
“I’d rather stay.”
“She’s liable to look to you for comfort or approval. I need to get a clear sense of her mental state.”
I hesitate, and then stand up. I put a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll be right outside, Grandma.”
Dr. Laramer walks to his window, which is letting in gray light. He peers outside, closes the shade, then turns and walks back in our direction. He turns on a bright overhead light. I leave the pair of them alone.
I stand in the hallway. My cell phone signal is poor, but I try to call my parents. No luck getting through.
Then I hear a shout come from inside the office. More like an expression of shock, or surprise. It’s not coming from Grandma. But Pete.
I open the door. Pete and Grandma sit on the couch. She’s withdrawn to the edge of it. He leans away from her with his palm pressed against his chin. A yellow Nerf ball sits between them.
“What happened?” I ask, moving quickly to Grandma. I bring her close to me. She seems to relax.
“She punched me in the jaw,” he says.
“What?”
Grandma’s right hand is balled into a tight fist.
“I’m sorry. I’m sure she didn’t mean . . .”
“I leaned in close to test her visual acuity and she let me have it,” he interrupts me. “Not bad strength. Terrific punch, actually. Stings like a bee.”
“Chop,” I say.
“What?”
“Was probably a chop, not a punch. She was a blue belt,” I say. “She studied years ago.”
“She’s definitely agitated,” he says. Then turns to her: “You often roundhouse the help?”
“I’m sorry,” Grandma says. “I’m only supposed to use my training for defense.”
He shakes his head and, finally, laughs. “I’ve had agitated patients spit at me, and vomit. Once I was shoved by a bouncer. Never karate chopped.”
“Pete, what did you say to upset her?”
He shrugs. “I asked her how she was feeling, the year, who is president, whether she is comfortable, the usual stuff.”
“Are you friends with Adrianna?” Grandma asks him.
He looks at me, raises his eyebrows. “Who is Adrianna?” he asks me.
I shrug. “Grandma Lane, who is Adrianna?”
She cocks her head to the side, momentarily frozen in thought, like an overly taxed computer processor. Before she can continue, Pete picks up the Nerf ball. He tosses it in a gentle arc just to the right of Grandma. She raises an arm and swats it to the ground.
“Interesting,” he says.
“What are you doing?” I ask, just shy of irritated that he’s interrupted the conversational flow.
“Testing her spontaneous physical reactions. As you can see, they’re very much intact.”
“So.”
“Whatever her mental state, she’s alert and reactive and plenty physically able. It’s as I thought when I first saw you in the waiting room: the patient presents in terrific physical shape.”
The patient.
“Okay,” I say, trying to piece together what this all means. I turn back to Grandma.
“Who is Adrianna?”
“Years ago, doctors came to your house,” she says.
“Nat, has your grandmother experienced any recent traumas?”
“The shooting at the park.”
“I thought you said the symptoms predate that. Did she get into an argument, or have a problem at her retirement home? Has she been on field trips, or anything else that could have put her in a vulnerable or frightened position?”
I consider it. Nothing comes to mind other than her allusion to the dentist.
“Why do you ask?”
“People get mistreated and it makes them agitated. The retirement-home experience can be . . . impersonal.”
We fall silent. He closes his eyes, and I can’t tell if he’s lost in contemplation or tired.
“Pete, what is going on with her?”
He clears his throat. “I’m sure it’s no surprise. But I’m sorry to say that she’s exhibiting the classic signs of dementia.”
I shake my head. “When we came in you said she seemed fine.”
“Well, it could be worse.”
Pete starts what I imagine is his stock speech to family members of dementia sufferers. He tells me that Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, affecting more than four million Americans. The disease results in memory loss, personality changes, cognitive dysfunction, then physical dependence. I know this stuff, and I wave him along.
He reminds me there are four stages: predementia, and then early, moderate, and advanced versions. Common complications include dementia coupled with Parkinson’s; vascular dementia, which largely afflicts African Americans; and frontotemporal dementia, which presents with major mood affect.
“She’s probably in an early or moderate stage,” he says. “The good news is, this is very common, and we have some sense of how to treat it, though our treatments are primitive or, rather, of modest efficacy.”
He’s starting to wind down his presentation, just as I’m feeling a rising sense of ire mixed with disbelief.
“Bullshit,” I say with some force, seeming to surprise him, and myself.
What I realize I’m thinking is that Grandma’s symptoms don’t seem common at all. If my own memory of neurological disorders serves even a little, these symptoms don’t add up. Ordinarily, a sharp mental descent would be accompanied by a loss in physical agility and alertness. More significantly, it makes no sense to me that her mental decline has been so precipitous. I’m bothered with myself that I haven’t been paying closer attention in the last month or two.
“When did you see Lane last?” I ask.
“Pardon?”
“When was her last visit here—three, four months ago?”
He walks to his desk. He picks up a green folder, opens and studies the chart inside. “Three,” he says, then corrects himself. “Sorry, four.”
“It just doesn’t make sense to me that as recently as four months ago she was doing relatively well, making sense, and conversation.”
“Suggesting what?” he asks.
“Something odd is going on. This doesn’t seem typical to me at all.”
“Respectfully, Nat, the Internet is not the best place to get medical information,” he says. “Dementia and memory loss can be very hard for family members to accept.”
He maintains eye contact with me, which makes me think he either doesn’t realize he’s being condescending or doesn’t mind it. I break our gaze, almost imperceptibly bowing my head.
“What do you suggest?”
“Let’s get her on some Aricept,” he says. He pauses. “She lives where?” he asks.
“Magnolia Manor.”
&n
bsp; He nods. “Can you give her a break from there for a few days? Can she get some time to change her environment? She could use the stimulation of activity. She certainly seems curious and physically able.” He turns to her. “Don’t you Lane?”
“I don’t know anything about that,” she responds.
I decide it’s not the time to tell doc I’m already on the change-of-venue case.
I’m not sure he’s offering us better advice than I could’ve gotten on the Internet. He’s prescribing pills and a change to her environment. Still, at least now I have justification for keeping Lane with me. Doctor’s orders.
Pete looks at his watch. He says he should get to his next appointment. In parting, he tells me he’d like to see my grandmother again in a week.
“But call me tomorrow and give me an update.” He hands me a card with his cell phone number.
At a modest dining room in the basement, I ask Grandma what kind of sandwich she wants. Before she can answer, a woman behind the counter wearing her pink dyed hair in a tight bun informs me that she doesn’t have sandwiches but, rather, panini or flatbread.
“Can’t I just call it a sandwich?” I ask. “She was born before the advance of the panini.”
“Don’t talk about me when I’m standing right here,” Grandma says.
I order a flatbread with tuna for Grandma and, for me, panini with chicken and pesto sauce—the chief difference between these items and sandwiches being price. Sixteen dollars later, I help Grandma into the car. We have ninety minutes to kill before our meeting with the mystery stick sender. In the meantime, I want to drive Grandma by her dentist—at least to follow up on yesterday’s missed appointment. Maybe she saw a man in blue when we were sitting in the parking lot outside. Maybe I’m pulling at wild strings.
I snap in Grandma’s seat belt and start the car. As I start to pull away, I see a car inching around the corner behind us. It’s a Prius. Like the one from the park.
Chapter 16
“Flume,” Grandma says.
“What?”
“It’s a narrow opening,” she says. “I used to be an English teacher and sometimes I use big words even though it can be impolite.”
