Seeing Things (34 page)
Authors: Patti Hill
“How did you get inside the gate?”
“Are these granite countertops?” Ruby asked.
Betty all but trumpeted from the bathroom, “Come see the tub! Do I smell gardenias?”
Ruth wrapped her arms around me. “Ruby could sweet-talk a tiger out of his stripes.” She held me at arm's length. “A jail is a jail no matter how fancy they try to make it. Come on, Birdie. Pick your poison, IHOP or Village Inn? We're going all out.”
“The senior breakfast at Denny's is nothing to sneeze at, reasonably priced and generously portioned. They serve it twenty-four hours a day,” offered Ruby.
Ruth squeezed my shoulders where a bruise from my run-in with the doorjamb blossomed. “You're choice, Birdie.”
“Who's driving?” I said, more cautious than curious.
“You're worried about ending up in a ditch, and I don't blame you,” Betty said. “We hired a taxi, so we better be quick with a decision.”
The Bats stood waiting, purses in hand and sensible shoes laced. “Denny's makes a scramble I'm quite fond of.” I said.
OPINIONS REGARDING ASSISTED LIVING flew around the table. Margie said, “I couldn't walk into a cafeteria three times a day never knowing who I'd run into. It's tough enough going to church where I know lots of people. I thought Jolene Hogart was Mary Beth Campbell last Sunday. I kept saying her name:
âMary Beth,
do you think the pastor knows what's happening in the mission circles?' âOh,
Mary Beth,
I loved that casserole you brought to Sew ân' Chat last month. Could I get the recipe from you?' Only then did Jolene tell me who she was. I was mortified. I'm afraid I'd stay in that pretty little cottage until I turned to dust.”
âMary Beth,
do you think the pastor knows what's happening in the mission circles?' âOh,
Mary Beth,
I loved that casserole you brought to Sew ân' Chat last month. Could I get the recipe from you?' Only then did Jolene tell me who she was. I was mortified. I'm afraid I'd stay in that pretty little cottage until I turned to dust.”
“Not if the Bats had anything to do with it,” Ruby said.
I leaned back as Betty chimed in. “I'm darn tired of cleaning house. Do those places include housekeeping?”
“I didn't even ask.”
“It wouldn't hurt my feelings to quit cooking either, what with my doctor telling me to avoid salt and fat and refined sugar. Tell me, why would anyone bother eating without salt? Was the food as good as they'd promised, Birdie?”
“I couldn't tell you. I ate popcorn in the cottage.”
Betty plowed on. “How's the lighting? Most new places skimp something awful on lighting. Come to think of it, my apartment isn't so hot. I keep a flashlight in my pocket all day. I never know when I'll need extra light to see something.”
“I went to bed before it got dark, but the television remote has illuminated buttons.”
Betty slumped back into the booth. “You aren't much help.”
“You'd have to drag me into a place like that kicking and screaming,” Ruby said, leaning over her plate. Already drips of maple syrup spotted her bosom. “I've lived in my house for forty years. It's not the Taj Mahal, but I know where everything is. The back burner on the left side runs hotter than it should. There's a crack in the basement floor I step over without even thinking. And all of my medications are lined up like soldiers in the medicine cabinet. Roger writes on each bottle with puff paint. It's all there, including my old, lumpy mattress. You may think I'm a turtle, but I'm staying put. I can't see the dust anymore, so why move?”
Margie set down her fork and folded her hands in her lap. “My kids think I should move in with them.”
A busboy cleared an adjoining table. Stoneware and glass clanked loudly.
“You're going to have to speak up, if you want to be heard!” Betty said over the din.
Margie expelled a breath and leaned closer to Betty. “My kids want me to move to St. Louis and live in their basement. They've made it into an apartment.”
“A basement can be awfully dark,” Ruth said.
“It's one of those walk-out kind. I'm considering it. Without my darling, I get awfully lonesome.” She tapped the plate with her fork. “Either that, or I'm getting a dogâone of those lapdogs, something I can curl up with on a cold winter's night.”
“I'd trade my husband for a dog in a heartbeat,” Betty said. “If he tells me to
look at that
one more time, I'm not responsible for my actions. We pulled into the driveway yesterday. He says, âLook at that, will you?' âLook at
what?'
âThat!' We've been married for fifty-three years. For twenty of those years, I've been a degenerate. And he can't remember that?”
look at that
one more time, I'm not responsible for my actions. We pulled into the driveway yesterday. He says, âLook at that, will you?' âLook at
what?'
âThat!' We've been married for fifty-three years. For twenty of those years, I've been a degenerate. And he can't remember that?”
“I'd take his forgetting as a compliment. You must manage pretty well for him to forget you're not fully sighted,” Ruth said without one trace of resentment. Ruth is a good woman.
“You're too nice, Ruth.” Betty swiped the air. “I'm going to flatten the side of his head with my iron skillet the next time he tells me to look at something.”
“I see the two of you nestling in the pew in front of me,” Margie said. “I don't believe a word of it.”
The waitress came to divvy up the checks. Had I caught a glimpse of the tattoo on her arm earlier, I may have suggested another restaurant. Wait until she's my age. That tarantula's going to fold like an accordion and swing wildly with every gesture. As the Bats studied their checks with magnifying glasses, I swallowed hard and blurted what I'd wanted to tell them for weeks.
“I have Charles Bonnet Syndrome.”
“For heaven's sake, why didn't you tell us before? We love that kind of stuff,” Ruby said.
“You let me yammer on and on about my clowns without piping up? Come on, Birdie, spill the beans.”
Ruth patted my hand. “I'm sure she had her reasons.”
A chatty Huck Finn? There's one reason. “Some of my visions are a little . . . out of the ordinary.”
“Nothing will embarrass us, but if you see Brad Pitt naked, we're going to have to ask for details.”
“Ruby!”
“What? I'm nearly blind and shriveling up like a prune, but I ain't dead yet.”
“Go on, Birdie. No one will interrupt you.”
“Feel free to interrupt me anytime. This isn't the easiest thing in the world to say.” I waited, hoping one of the Bats would detour the conversation to talk about laxatives or the price of prescription drugs. Conversations buzzed all around us. The cooks yelled to one another in the kitchen. The cash register rattled as it printed a receipt. The Bats sat silently.
I told them about the purple flowers and the mountainside.
“I don't see purple anymore. Everyone at Sew 'n' Chat
oohed
and
ahhed
over a purple suit Lynn Perrizo had made for her son's wedding. It looked like charcoal to me.”
oohed
and
ahhed
over a purple suit Lynn Perrizo had made for her son's wedding. It looked like charcoal to me.”
“I've been noticing I don't see yellowâ”
“Ladies, Birdie has more to say,” Ruth interjected.
“You're right, Ruth. I'm sorry. Birdie, the floor is all yours.”
“My grandson, Fletcher, eats on his own most nights. Since coming to Denver, I've made a point of eating with him. His tastes are . . . how do I explain? His tastes are exotic. He fancies a dim sum restaurant on Glaser Street that makes a spicy shu mai.”
“The Snappy Dragon? Are you seeing dragons? That would scare me half to death.”
I told them about listening to
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
while eating shu mai with spicy mango sauce. “You can bet I woke up with some kind of heartburn. And when I did, Huckleberry Finn was sitting on the recliner at the end of the bed.”
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
while eating shu mai with spicy mango sauce. “You can bet I woke up with some kind of heartburn. And when I did, Huckleberry Finn was sitting on the recliner at the end of the bed.”
“But he's just a made-up character.”
“He looked as real as you do. And dirty? That boy needed a bath.”
“Why didn't you tell us this before? The fact that your brain conjured up a fictional character makes me believe you're a very creative person. I'm sure if we got on the Internet, we'd find other examples of Charles Bonnet Syndrome involving characters from books. I'd give anything to meet Jo from
Little Women
.”
Little Women
.”
“What about Scarlett O'Hara from
Gone with the Wind?
She wasn't anything like the movie.”
Gone with the Wind?
She wasn't anything like the movie.”
“What are you thinking? What about Peter or Mary or, would it be blasphemy to hallucinate Jesus?” asked Ruby.
The Bats thought on the question.
“There's more,” I said. “At the end of his visit, Huck winked at me.”
“I would have fainted dead away if Cary Grant had winked at me.”
Margie spoke breathlessly. “He was communicating with you, wasn't he?”
“That's what I thought, so the next time he showed up, I encouraged him to talk.”
“But he didn't, did he?”
“Not until his third visit.”
The Bats went silent. I told them how Huck had paced the room, talking about the loss of his friend. I thrummed my fingers on the table. “Say something, girls.”
“Well . . .” Ruby started.
“This is highly unusual.”
“Have you mentioned this to your doctor?”
“Maybe we should pray.”
I LAY ACROSS THE bed of the cottage, still in my clothes, smelling now of burned coffee and grease from the diner. Cars droned by, even at that late hour. My fingers played with the stitched billows of the comforter as I remembered the silence of the Bats. Clearly, one night or a thousand nights in an assisted-living complex wouldn't help my problem: I talked to a literary character, and he talked back to me. Huckleberry Finn. A rogue boy. Mark Twain's alter ego. A quick thinker. Goodwilled. Devoted to his friend. Completely imaginary.
And yet his blood had pulsed under my touch.
Chapter 36
One good thing about being a not-so-little old lady with a booted foot and poor eyesight: The taxi driver took pity on me. He carried my suitcase to the front door and left without putting his hand out for a tip, or if he did, I missed it. The sleepless night had left me muddleheaded with bags under my eyes that rivaled seat cushions. Even I felt sorry for me.
I zipped my suitcase closed and slid it under the bed, only to stand there motionless. Fletcher wouldn't be home for hours. I inventoried the possibilities. Read. File my toenails. Wash my bras. Visit Ruth. Nap. Call Emory. Watch TV. Sit under the maple tree to let the shadow and light dance on my face. The bed repelled me, so many hours had I spent lying there useless to the world. The room and the bed, both were reminders of my decline into madness.
Then again, I could just dig a deep hole and crawl in.
Everything I knew about myself had shifted. My playful encounters with Huck now smacked of delusional tendencies or worse. Hadn't I nearly killed my grandson with my irresponsibility? Somewhere between the newel post of my stairs and the floor, I'd become a burden. An inconvenience. A rotting piece of flesh. Worthless.
The door to the garage banged open. Heels tapped across the hardwood. Suzanne blew her nose and stifled a sob.
I reached for the suitcase under the bed and flipped it open. I emptied the dresser drawer of my undies. As I scooped my socks out of the drawer, a primal scream from upstairs froze me in place. I counted back the days since Andy and Suzanne had taken their romantic getaway. It hadn't been that long, but rabbits weren't dying to announce pregnancy anymore. Like everything else, I supposed pregnancy tests brought good and bad news with lightning speed. I dropped the socks back in the drawer and moved to the bottom of the stairs. I stood there longer than I like to admit, listening, praying for someone, anyone, to come through the door with the magic words Suzanne needed to hear. My hands trembled over my heart. Every shuddering breath she took, every sob she swallowed, called to me. Clearly she believed I was still safely ensconced at the cottage and she owned the privacy to grieve her loss.
I turned toward the bedroom.
Suzanne called out, “Please, oh please, God. Just one baby. That's all I ask. One baby.”
I turned toward the front door. Perhaps a walk would do me good.
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