A Slight Change of Plan

by Dee Ernst

  “Well,” she said at last.

  “I know.”

  “It looks like I’ve been wrong all these years. It’s not the drink that makes you stupid after all. It’s just a recurring thing, like a virus.”

  “Why is Jake being back with me stupid? No, I mean it. I really need a good argument right now.”

  “Look, you know I want the two of you to live happily ever after. But I’m afraid if you pick up where you left off, he’s the man who betrayed your trust, and you’re the woman who spent years fantasizing about getting back with him.”

  “Not years,” I muttered. “Well, maybe, but not a lot of years.”

  “So it seems like this has to become more about the present. And the future. Are you willing to try to build something from scratch?”

  “If I thought we could end up in the same place, yes.”

  “The same place? You mean two sex-crazed college kids planning the next fifty years of their life? You’re living in the past again.” She grabbed both of my hands and shook them. “Look at me,” she ordered. I lifted my eyes from my empty plate.

  “What do you want, Kate? From a relationship with Jake?”

  I sat and thought for a moment. “I want to be with somebody who knows me, so I don’t have to work so damn hard to live my life. Tom was a constant effort for me, and we still never got off the ground. Sure, I can try another man, and maybe after a few months things will work out. Or not, and I’ll have to start again. I’m not sure I have the energy for all that. But Jake, he already knows me. Yes, I know, thirty years is a long time, and I know we’ve both changed, but the truth is, the spark is still there. And I’m not talking about sex. I’m talking about the connection we used to have, where we got each other’s jokes and wanted the same things in life. Last night, I’d look over at him and know exactly what he was thinking. We were in our own secret, special club. I can’t be wrong to want that again.” I took a deep breath. “By the way, he broke up with the girlfriend.”

  “Then go for it.”

  “This is not just the vodka talking.”

  “I know. I can tell. If you think you’ve got a chance, Kate, you need to try, or you’ll spend the next thirty years kicking yourself in the ass.” She sighed. “I want you to try. And I’m really rooting for the two of you to make it work.”

  “So I’ll go for it.”

  “You should. But maybe instead of picking up where you left off, you might try going back to square one. Maybe you could be two people who met on a website for the very first time and have to start from scratch.”

  “That might be a good idea.”

  “It is. I may be the little sister, but sometimes I get things right.”

  I didn’t have a lot of time to think about Jake, because the next morning Laura called to tell me that our mother had fallen, was in the hospital, and had been there for the past five days.

  “Five days? Why did it take so long for someone to call you?”

  She had been crying. “Because when the ambulance picked her up, they took her to a smaller hospital, one she’s never been to before, instead of the big county ER where they have all her records. She had hit her head and was so out of it, she couldn’t give them my phone number. It’s taken her this long to realize where she’s been and what’s happened to her.”

  My heart dropped into my bowels and I felt sick. “Out of it?”

  “Yes. I haven’t even spoken to her yet. I just got off the phone with the social worker. They will not let her go home. They don’t think she’s capable of living alone any longer.”

  “I’ll be right over.”

  I drove the twenty minutes in a daze. If Mom couldn’t live alone any longer, then we’d have to find her a nursing home up here. Her being half a day’s drive away wasn’t going to work anymore.

  I ran through the front door. Laura was in her living room, her broken leg propped up on an ottoman, on the phone.

  “Mom, yes, I know,” she was saying.

  I could barely hear my mother’s voice on the other end of the line; I could just get a slight, rasping sound.

  “Yes, Mom. But that’s not what the doctor said, is it?”

  Laura’s eyes were welled up with tears, and she kept taking long, deep breaths.

  “But, Mom, you can’t do that anymore. They won’t let you.”

  Laura shook her head at me, rolled her eyes, and made her “She’s killing me” face, something she hadn’t done since we were kids. I almost laughed.

  “Mom, Kate is here now. Do you want to talk to her?”

  Obviously, no.

  “But, Mom, I told you. My leg is broken. I can’t drive down.”

  Laura tightened her grip on the phone as she listened. “Mom, I have to hang up now. Kate and I have to figure this out. I’ll call you tonight.” And without hearing Mom’s answer, she hung up.

  “What the hell are we going to do?” she asked.

  “We need to find her a place up here.”

  “True, but she has no money left, so that may be a little hard.”

  I was shocked. “What do you mean, no money left?” Back when I knew what was going on in my mother’s life, there had been my father’s insurance money and a veteran’s benefit that had been put together into a very tidy nest egg for Mom. “Where did it go?”

  “Down the toilet with the rest of the economy. She had it all in stocks and things. She lost it all in ’08 along with everybody else.”

  “Is her house worth anything?”

  Laura wiped her nose with the hem of her T-shirt. “Maybe. If we could sell it. Her little development down there just opened a new section, and the new units are going for over two hundred thousand, but her place is almost twenty years old and, let me tell you, all original décor. Who’d buy it?”

  I got up, went to the bathroom, brought back a box of tissues, and watched silently as Laura blew her nose and cleared her throat a few times.

  “Where’s Bobby?”

  “Golfing. He doesn’t want her here. We don’t have the room.”

  “Of course you don’t. And you can’t very well take care of her; you’re on crutches. I’ll go down and get her. She’ll stay with me till we figure something else out.”

  Laura made a noise. “With you?”

  I took a deep breath. “My basement is perfect. She won’t have any steps. There’s a big bathroom, and it’s a warm, sunny space. I’ll get a double bed down there, and a dresser, maybe set up a small fridge and microwave. Sam and Alisa can help me, I’m sure. She’ll have a whole floor to herself. I’ll send down food on Boone’s back. We’ll never have to see each other. It will be perfect.”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Laura, what else are we going to do? We’ve avoided thinking about this for years, but we can’t pretend anymore. Mom has to be up here, and the most logical place is with me. So. I’ll do a little shopping today, get my son to move some boxes, and get this ball rolling. When are they releasing her?”

  “Monday. But they want her to spend at least three or four days in rehab, so she can get her strength back. There was no concussion, nothing physically wrong with her, except that she’s old and needs somebody to look after her.” Laura sighed. “This is going to be very interesting.”

  “Oh, yeah.” I got up, went over, and gave her a kiss. “It’ll be fine, really.”

  Oh my goodness. What had I gotten myself into now?

  Alisa and I spent Sunday shopping, while Sam cleared out the rest of the boxes in the basement. Some of it was my stuff, some of it was his, but it was all put away in floor-to-ceiling shelves we had put up in the garage. I had two extra dressers from the old house that had belonged to Regan, along with some stray tables that had been scattered around that I had pushed into a corner and surrounded by boxes, so it was nice to discover them once Sam had cleared things out.

  Monday a double bed was delivered, along with a love seat and recliner. I put together a kitchen cabinet thing, stocked it with a mi
crowave and toaster oven, and put it next to the minifridge Regan found on sale at Home Depot.

  It was a very good thing I didn’t have to worry about scheduling any “private time” with a pesky boyfriend. I never would have gotten it all done. Besides, the lingering anger gave me a boost of adrenaline that really helped.

  That afternoon Regan came over and helped me hang drapes to cover the sliding glass doors in Mom’s new space. The patio off the basement was partially covered by the deck above, but plenty of sunlight managed to get through. Regan is very good at using the electric drill, and doesn’t mind that I hate to use the level and always eyeball things, usually resulting in having to reposition the same piece of hardware four times.

  She was all business until lunch. Then…

  “How’s Tom?”

  She was being social, trying on the “We’re adults and can be just friends” hat, instead of the “I’m your daughter and I can’t believe you’re dating” hat.

  “We broke up. Well, not we. He broke it off. I pretty much just sat there in disbelief.”

  “What a creep. You deserve so much better. Sorry.”

  “Me too.”

  “Are you going back on that dating site, or are you going to take a breather?”

  “I think I’m going to go out to dinner with my old friend Jake.”

  We were out on the deck, eating chicken salad sandwiches on pita bread. She swallowed before speaking.

  “And how, exactly, did that come about?”

  “I met him for a drink, and then I ran into him at Gabe’s last week when I was there. Jake and Gabe have known each other since the shop opened. Quite a coincidence.”

  She looked at me, looked down, and then stared off at my potted palm. “This was the guy who was the love of your life?”

  “My much younger life, yes.”

  “Oh. Because Edward asked about you.”

  I felt a little tingle of excitement. “Asked about me how?”

  “If you were seeing anyone. I didn’t think to mention Tom. Maybe I’m psychic. What should I tell him?”

  “The truth. That I’m going out to dinner with an old friend.”

  A pause. “Um, Mom, why is there a pot plant growing around your palm tree?”

  I followed her gaze. Sure enough, there it was, about eight inches high. “Oh, that’s Cheryl’s. She planted them right when I moved in.”

  “But that is a pot plant, right?”

  I cleared my throat. “Yes, it is. I should probably harvest it before it gets any taller. Don’t want the DEA copter to spot it on a flyby.”

  “Harvest? You’re going to harvest it?”

  “Regan, look at me. Are you shocked? You smoke. Or you used to. All three of you used to. I know because I could smell it on you. And I recognized the smell because I went to college in the seventies, when we all smoked. And I inhaled. All the time.”

  She shook her head. “Is that what you are going to do with it? Smoke it? That’s just so high school.”

  “Lately, it seems like everything in my life is high school. But I don’t think I’ll be doing any smoking, really. I’m just so proud of myself for being able to grow it. Usually I have a black thumb.”

  “Well, the tomatoes look good.”

  “They’re cherry tomatoes. And look, green peppers.”

  “And more pot. Honestly, Mom, you’re not going to turn into one of those hippie-dippy types, are you?”

  “No, honey, that ship has sailed. I can’t even remember the words to ‘Truckin’.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind.”

  Wednesday I went down to Newark, had another exhausting, brain-bending day, and came home to a message from Jake asking when would be a good time for us to get together. He put a phone number in his e-mail, so rather than try to explain the situation with my mother via the written word, I called him.

  “Jake, it’s Kate.”

  “I’m so glad you called. I’ve had a lousy day. Say something to cheer me up.”

  “The Mets didn’t lose last night?”

  He laughed. “I’m a Yankees fan, but that was pretty good. How about dinner this weekend?”

  So I told him about Mom.

  “I know that things had never been easy between you when you were younger, and it sounds like it’s gotten a lot worse,” he said at last. “You’re a good woman, Kate,”

  “Maybe. Or I could just be a crazy woman. The thing is, I don’t think leaving her alone at night is a good idea, at least not right away. So I was thinking about Sunday. Not dinner, but lunch. Maybe a picnic thing? Some green grass, find a lake somewhere? What do you think?”

  “I think it sounds terrific. Call me again, though, on Saturday. If things get weird with your mom, we’ll do it another time.”

  I didn’t want to do it another time, but I appreciated the fact that he was being sensitive, so I said good night and tried to mentally prepare myself for driving down to Cape May the next morning and seeing my mother again.

  For your information, there is no way to mentally prepare yourself for something like that. You just spend the night staring at the ceiling. And then you get up the next morning, drink too much coffee, and have to stop six times on the Garden State Parkway to pee.

  But something happened that took away some of the doom of the morning. Just before I left, I got a phone call.

  “Kate, it’s Edward. Regan told me about the situation with your mother. I’m so sorry. This sounds like it’s going to be a difficult stretch for you.”

  “Yes, it is, Edward.”

  “Listen, would you like me to drive down with you?”

  I stared at the phone. “What?”

  “It’s a long drive, yes? Sometimes having someone in the car makes the time go faster.”

  “Edward, what an extraordinary offer. Thank you so much. But I’ll be fine, really.”

  “Well, all right then. But please, if there’s anything I can do, don’t hesitate to ask.”

  “I won’t. Thanks again.” I hung up. I kept my smile all the way to Exit 82.

  I had not seen my mother in eight years, although Laura had often shown me pictures. I was totally unprepared for Rose in the flesh. She was very thin, her thick gray hair pulled back tight against her scalp, and her face was pale and lined. She looked so much older than I’d expected that my jaw dropped open. I closed it slowly and walked into her room.

  She was sitting beside the bed in a chair, her hands, clawlike, on the armrests, her eyes fixed on the television. Her jaw was still as strong as I remembered, even if the flesh around it was sagging.

  “Hey, Mom.”

  She turned to look at me. Her eyes narrowed. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  I forced a smile. “Good to see you, too, Mom. Didn’t Laura call and tell you what’s been happening? I’m here to take you home with me until we can figure out what comes next.”

  She snorted. “Going home with you? I don’t think so.”

  I threw my purse on the bed. “Well, Mom, I’m sorry, but you don’t have a choice.”

  Just then a very pleasant-looking woman breezed in. “Hello, Rose,” she said. “I see your daughter is here. How lovely. We just have a few papers to sign, and off you can go.”

  My mother looked back at the television. “I’m not going home with her,” she said, with some finality.

  The woman turned to me and held out her hand. “I’m Gretchen Mars, the social worker here,” she said as we shook hands. “Your mother has been quite a delight.”

  I grinned. “Yeah, that’s Mom, all right. A delight.”

  Mom shot me a look. Gretchen shrugged. “Some of our residents adjust better than others,” she conceded, “but considering the fact that your mother never wanted to be here in the first place, I think she did quite well.”

  “I didn’t want to be here,” Mom said, very loudly, “because there was no need. I just fell. People fall all the time. It was that quack in the hospital who sent me he
re, instead of sending me home where I belong, trying to get more money. Sure, I know Medicare pays for it, but that’s no reason to put healthy people in places like this.”

  “Now, Rose,” Gretchen said, “if you remember, the first few days you were here, you were very weak and could barely walk across the room.”

  “Why should I start walking marathons now? I get around my house just fine. You people and your obsession with exercise is insane. Old people sit; we don’t sprint.”

  “You also had a few problems with remembering where you were,” Gretchen said gently.

  “That’s what happens to a person when you put them in a strange place,” Mom growled. “If you had let me go home, I’d have been fine.”

  “When I spoke to your daughter,” Gretchen continued, foolishly thinking that she was speaking to a person you could actually argue with using logic, “she said you had been forgetting things for quite a while.”

  Mom shrugged. “Of course she’d say that. She hates me. Has for years. Just look at her; she’s radiating evil as we speak.”

  Radiating evil?

  “I meant your other daughter, Laura,” Gretchen went on gamely. “Even Laura said you’d been having some problems.”

  Mom turned and fixed a cold eye on Gretchen. “Laura would never say anything against me.”

  Gretchen smiled brightly. “No one is against you, Rose. We all want what’s best for you.” She handed Mom a clipboard and pen. “Just sign at the bottom, and we can get you out of here.”

  Mom took the clipboard and stared at it. “I’m not signing anything without my lawyer looking at it first.” She reached over to set it on the bed, then resumed her television watching.

  Gretchen looked at me. “Somebody needs to sign the release,” she explained. “It just says we’re no longer responsible for her care.”

  I grabbed the clipboard and scribbled along the bottom.

  Mom cackled. “There you go, putting your name to something that you haven’t even read. I thought you were supposed to be so smart.”

  Gretchen grabbed the form gratefully. “It’s a standard release, Rose. Saying that we are no longer responsible for your well-being, and that you will be going to a residence deemed safe and well monitored.”