by Wendy Webb
Both Dominic and I dissolved into embarrassed laughter at the look of sheer delight on Jason’s face.
“Hey,” Jason said. “Speaking of the island, I have a huge favor to ask of you.”
“Sure,” I said. “What is it?”
His look of delight morphed into a chagrined cringe.
“After this storm passes, Gil and I need to go over to Colette to look at a property we’re toying with buying,” Jason said. “We’re supposed to be meeting with the Realtor. I thought maybe we could have lunch there afterward, just the two of us.”
I nodded, not quite understanding what he was getting at.
“I know it’s a lot to ask,” he went on, “but is there any chance you could sit with Alice while we’re gone?”
“Oh!” I said, raising my eyebrows. “Absolutely.”
“Are you sure?” Jason asked.
I shrugged. “I’m happy to do it. No problem at all.”
Jason took my hands. “Thank you so much. I hired a woman here in town to be our sort of . . . I don’t want to say respite care person, but . . .” His words trailed off, and he shook his head.
“Alice didn’t like her when we did a trial run yesterday. She kept wandering off, looking for me.”
I winced. “That’s not good.”
“No,” Jason said. “We’re going to try again with her. Jocelyn is her name. She’s completely lovely, so I don’t know why Alice didn’t take a shine to her. But I just don’t feel right about leaving for that length of time when she’s not comfortable with her caregiver.”
“Of course,” I said.
“She likes you, though,” he said, looking from me to Dominic and back again. “Both of you. She feels safe with you. I don’t know. Maybe because you’re staying down the hall from us, you feel like family to her. I’m thinking that her need to find me, to go looking for me, will be lessened if she’s with you. I just feel so . . .”
He sighed and looked up at me, his eyes searching. I tried to give him what he needed to hang on to right then.
“No need to explain. You and Gil absolutely need some time to yourselves. You have to take it.”
“Caregiving can suck the life out of you, man,” Dominic broke in. “Brynn is right. A lunch here, a dinner there. It’s not so much to ask of us, but it’s vital for you. For your spirit. It’s what you need to recharge along the way so you can help Alice in the long term. Brynn and I were just talking about a similar thing.”
He caught my eye and smiled, shyly, I thought.
Jason exhaled loudly. “Oh, you’re a godsend. Both of you.”
He went on. “So, I was thinking you might want to watch a couple of movies in our suite with her while we’re gone? Would that be okay? Alice is at home there. We’ve got that big flat-screen TV above the fireplace. We’ll light a fire since the weather is so crummy. We’ll get some lunch and snacks and wine for you.”
“That’s not necessa—” I started.
“Oh, it’s necessa, missy.” Jason smiled. “It’s the least we can do.”
“I’ll join you, if you’d like,” Dominic said to me. “We’ll make it a party.”
All at once, my room, which had been bathed in gloom because of the darkness of the storm outside, felt like it was filled with light.
“So, ten thirty? Our place?” Jason confirmed.
“I’ll be there,” I said.
When Jason had gone, Dominic turned to me. “I have a few things to take care of this morning. Knock on my door when you’re on your way down to Jason and Gil’s suite, and we’ll make an afternoon of it.”
I nodded at him, and he grinned as he shut the door behind him.
So, ten thirty it was. I had a little more than two hours. Enough time for a long bath with a good book. I grabbed the copy of The Illustrated Man that I had bought at Beth’s a couple of days prior and headed down to the tub room, hoping the lady from number five would leave me in peace this time.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
At ten thirty, fresh from my bath, in a pair of skinny jeans, a white T-shirt, and a necklace with blue, white, and green glass beads dangling around my neck, I stepped out of my door to find Dominic leaning against the wall next to his.
He was wearing a black V-neck T-shirt and gray sweatpants, comfy slippers on his feet. He hadn’t shaved, and his usual neat goatee was morphing into a full beard. He shrugged, smiling. “Too casual? I’ve been attending to some things this morning and didn’t have it in me to, you know, give it the full treatment.”
I grinned at him. “The full treatment?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Oh, I give it the treatment, lady, when I’m going out. A man’s gotta bring it. But, I figured, we’re staying in, so . . .”
“I think you look great,” I said.
“You clean up pretty nicely yourself,” he said, fingering my necklace and letting his hand stray to my cheek.
At the end of the hallway, Jason opened his door. “Hi, you two. Alice, look who’s here.” His words were a little too enthusiastic. But I understood.
We hurried down to their suite, all smiles. Alice was curled up in an armchair by the blazing fire, an afghan thrown over her legs.
“Hi, Alice!” I said to her.
“Brynn, in the Yellow Lady,” she said to me, then turned her eyes to Dominic. “And the big man. My knight.”
Dominic laughed at this. “I guess you could call me that.” He crossed the room and bowed, holding out his hand. She slipped hers into it, and he brought it to his lips. “Lady Alice. How are you this fine day?” Alice giggled, and a blush rose to her cheeks.
Jason and I shared a smile behind Dominic’s back, and Jason made a heart sign with his thumbs and forefingers over his own heart, beaming at me.
Gil emerged from the bedroom. He took in the scene of Dominic and Alice and exhaled.
“Let’s make sure to take our rain shells, hon,” he said to Jason. “I have a feeling this isn’t going to let up anytime soon.”
Alice trembled. “Are you going somewhere?”
Jason crossed the room and sat on the ottoman across from Alice’s chair. “Remember, honey? Gil and I have to go across to the island to take care of some business. We thought the weather was too bad to bring you along.”
She blinked at him.
“Remember? You’re staying here. We’ll be back in a couple of hours.”
“I’m staying here?”
“Yes!” Jason said, a little too brightly. “That’s why Dominic and Brynn are here. They’re going to spend the afternoon with you, until we get back. We didn’t want you to be all by yourself.”
“Dominic and Brynn,” Alice repeated.
“That’s right, honey. You three will have a little lunch. Watch a movie together. Maybe you’ll want to take a nap after that. You’ll be safe with them.”
Alice smiled at me. “I know that.”
“Okay!” Jason said and kissed Alice on the cheek. “We’re off.”
Jason and Gil grabbed their jackets off the hooks by the door.
“This is for you,” Jason said, pointing to a big plate of hors d’oeuvres—cheeses, meats, veggies, dips, crackers—on the kitchen counter. Two bottles of wine sat in an ice bucket, with three glasses nearby. I hadn’t noticed it when we came in.
“Jason, you didn’t have to do this,” I said.
“Of course, silly,” he said. “If you feel you want some lunch downstairs, just put it on my tab. Alice likes the tuna melt.”
“Oh!” Alice piped up. “It’s wonderful. They put avocado on it.”
Interesting, I thought, what her mind remembered and what it didn’t. I wondered if there was a science to it, or if it was just random, different for each person, depending on which brain cells were going to sleep.
After they had gone, Dominic poured both of us a glass of wine and cocked his head in Alice’s direction, a questioning look on his face. I shrugged. Jason had given her a glass or two at happy hour, so I guessed it wouldn’t h
urt. I joined him in the kitchen and brought the tray of hors d’oeuvres and some napkins into the living room where Alice was sitting, and set it on the ottoman that stood between the couch and the love seats.
Dominic handed Alice her glass, and we all clinked together. “To a lovely afternoon,” he said, his voice smooth. And comforting, I thought.
Jason had suggested we watch movies, but I just felt like talking. I thought Alice did, too, by the way she leaned toward me, her eyes expectant.
“Alice,” I began. “Tell me about your daughters. Their names are Jane and Rebecca, right?”
She beamed. “That’s right. Jane and Rebecca. Jason says they’re both mothers now themselves, although I can’t quite believe that because I’m too young to have grandchildren.” She smiled at this. “Rebecca has a few kids. Four? Jane has just one, I think.” She was staring off then, as if trying to get a look at her family in her mind’s eye.
She didn’t have to search her memory for their faces. I spied a photo on the coffee table. It looked like Jason, Alice, their daughters, sons-in-law, and a whole gaggle of kids. I pushed myself to my feet and stepped over to it, picking up the frame. I held it out to her.
“This is your family, right?”
She took the frame and studied the photo within it. Her brow furrowed. “Well, that’s me. And that’s Jason. But I don’t know who these women are. Or the men. Or the children. Are you sure they’re my family?”
I knelt next to her. “This is your daughter Rebecca,” I said, pointing to the woman I had met a few days prior. “And this is your daughter Jane.”
She scowled at the photo. “They’re so old! They’re adults! My kids are small. But it looks like a beautiful family, doesn’t it?”
“That’s right, Alice. You’ve raised a beautiful family. Your girls have husbands and children of their own now.”
Alice held my gaze for a moment and then looked back to the photo. She pointed to one of her grandsons.
“He will die young,” she said. “Cancer. Jane won’t be able to handle it. I won’t be here to help her.”
I took a breath in and shot a look at Dominic, who shook his head quickly.
“Lady Alice,” he said, slowly taking the photograph from her hands and putting it facedown on the table. “Tell us about how you and Jason met.”
Alice beamed. “We were high school sweethearts. It’s always been Jason and Alice, for as long as I can remember. He asked me to a dance when we were juniors in high school. I wore a pink chiffon dress. He wore a pink tie with his suit, matching. And that was it. There was nobody else for me. He was so handsome.”
“I’ll bet you were a beauty back in the day,” I said to her. “You still are.”
She put a hand to her cheek. “I don’t know about that.” She smiled then, her eyes focusing on that night in the past.
“Jason wasn’t a very good dancer at first.” She giggled. “You should have seen him! Maybe you did. Maybe you were there. I’m not sure. He was so gangly! All legs and arms. But then he became quite good at it.”
Dominic smiled at this. “Do you like to dance, Lady Alice?”
“I love it. When our girls were young and Jason came home from work, we’d put on records and we would have a dance party, right in our living room,” she said. “Every night. We’d play everything, from big band oldies to Elvis to sixties rock. Even into the seventies!”
“Who was in charge of choosing the music, you or Jason?” Dominic led her.
“Usually I chose. I liked to have something on the stereo when he came home. I’d be in the kitchen finishing dinner, and I’d go out into the living room, and he’d be dancing with the girls, everyone singing along with the songs. In the summertime, we’d go outside, and the neighbors would join in.”
“It sounds wonderful,” I said.
“It was,” Alice said.
“Who were some of your favorite singers back then?” Dominic smiled at me, and my eyes shone back.
“Jason loved Aretha Franklin—we both did—so, we’d play her a lot. We’d dance with those kids. Everybody laughing. We wore them out!”
“I love me some Queen of Soul, too,” Dominic said. “I never danced at home with my mother to her music, though. That’s something special you gave your kids.”
Alice was in another world then, another time. She was gazing back to those nights in their living room, humming a familiar tune. Dominic fiddled with his phone for a moment, and soon an Aretha Franklin song began to play. He stood up and held out his hand to her.
He twirled her around, and they swayed to the music that was in Alice’s memory and playing in the room, and both of their faces truly lit up with joy.
My heart melted at the sweetness of it and ached at the sadness. What kind of breathtaking man was this?
She collapsed back into her chair in laughter. “Those girls would dance all night if we let them.”
“And did you, sometimes?” Dominic asked, grinning.
“Oh, heavens no. That was just a short, fun time to welcome Daddy home before dinner.” She smiled, looking at both of us, her eyes brimming with tears. She brushed them away with her hand. “Where’s Jason? Isn’t he supposed to be home by now?”
“He’ll be back in about an hour, Alice,” I said. “He’s on the way home.”
She smiled and settled into her chair. “He’s on the way home. So, he’s not far.” She looked at Dominic, then me. “Jason is the love of my life, you know.”
“Did you ever date anyone else?” I asked her. “You’re so beautiful, Alice, I’m sure you had lots of men buzzing around, wanting to take you out.”
She shook her head. “No, I didn’t see the point,” she said, more lucid than she’d been all afternoon. “You’re lucky if you get one great love in this life. I had mine for thirty-plus years. After it was over, there was no other man who could possibly compare. I have my kids. That was enough. They still need their mom.”
“And your grandkids, too, right?”
She furrowed her brow at me and pushed herself out of her chair. “I really need to get home,” she said. “How long have we been talking? My kids are going to be home soon, and I need to meet the bus.”
Dominic and I exchanged a glance. I wasn’t sure how to respond to this. But he jumped in.
“Jason’s going to meet the girls at the bus today, Alice,” he said, his voice low.
She looked at him, a vacancy in her eyes I hadn’t seen before. “That’s silly. Jason’s at work.”
Dominic shook his head. “Not today. Today he’s coming home early, and he said he’d meet the girls at the bus because you came here to visit with us.”
She slumped back down into her chair. Her eyes were darting this way and that.
“And who are you?”
“We’re your friends,” Dominic said, handing her a piece of cheese on a cracker. “I’m Dominic. And this is Brynn.”
She popped the cheese and cracker into her mouth and chewed thoughtfully.
“Brynn,” Alice said, searching my face to find something familiar. I could see her working for it, straining to reach back into her mind. “My protector.”
“That’s right.” I smiled at her. “And I’m always just down the hall in—” I was going to say “the Yellow Lady,” but didn’t get a chance. Alice turned toward the door, her eyes becoming glassy and unfocused.
Then she snapped her head around to look at me. Her pupils had all but disappeared. Only a cloudy blue remained. “You’re in number five.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Neither of us pressed Alice to explain that remark. Frankly, I didn’t want to know what was behind it. Instead, we turned on a movie, and Alice dozed, leaning on Dominic’s chest.
“Time for a nap?” he said to me in a whisper.
I nodded. “Seems like a good idea.”
He gently roused her. She smiled sleepily at him and let him lead her up the stairs.
“This is where I stay,” I heard her say a
s he opened the door and helped her inside. “Jason doesn’t sleep with me anymore. We have separate bedrooms.”
I picked up my wineglass with shaking hands and took a sip. And then another. A few moments passed, and Dominic emerged from Alice’s room, quietly closing the door behind him.
“That was weird,” I said to him as he slid down next to me on the couch.
“What was weird?”
“All of it, I guess,” I said, not quite knowing what more to say.
“You haven’t spent a lot of time around people with Alzheimer’s,” he said. “It’s actually quite typical, all of that back and forth in time. It’s like they’re living it all at once—past and present. Even future sometimes. That linear time construct? It dissolves for them.”
That sent a shiver through me, but I wasn’t sure why. “What do you mean, exactly?”
“When she was talking about having to go home to meet her kids at the bus, I’m not sure that she wasn’t really back there. Part of her. Her spirit, maybe, was actually back there living that moment again.”
I just looked at him. I had no idea how to respond to that.
He chuckled. “Okay, I guess that was a little woo-woo for a rainy afternoon. I’ve often wondered about it, though. It’s like, who’s the one with an impaired mind? Us, or them? Maybe they’re the ones seeing clearly. Not us.”
“Speaking of that . . .” I wasn’t sure how to continue.
I wasn’t so much concerned with Alice reliving, or living, her past. I hadn’t told him, or anyone, about my somewhat strange encounters with her.
“You’re going to think I’m crazy,” I said to him finally.
He smirked. “I just told you I believe Alice was back there, thirty years ago, actually living that moment while at the same time she was right here with us, and I’m going to think you’re crazy?”
I couldn’t help smiling back at his devilish grin.
“You’ve got something on your mind, woman,” he said. “Out with it.”
I fidgeted, wondering just how much to say. “It’s like she knows things she shouldn’t.”
He frowned at me and leaned forward. “What do you mean? I don’t follow you.”
