The Dream Life of Astronauts (25 page)

Claire was the name of Martin's wife. She'd had cancer, and she'd died the same week as Bob Hope.

And the comic-book character's name was Sad Sack.

They were passing the chapel room now, where she had one of the staff members wheel her several times a week just to sit in the peace and quiet and gaze up at the starburst on the wall that wasn't supposed to be Jesus or Buddha or anyone else a person could actually pray to. She thought about asking Martin if they could stop in, but it was against the rules to talk in the chapel, and hadn't Martin said he wanted to talk? That he had something to tell her? There were diamonds on the floor—big, ugly, turquoise diamonds against a mud-colored background. She hated the new carpet.

“I think you and your latest roommate are a good match,” Martin said from behind her.

“She's an idiot,” Ellie said. “And a typical Italian.”

“I predict she's going to be the first one who ends up not asking to move,” Martin said. “She seems stubborn enough to stand up to you.”

“There is just no telling how perverted some people are until they show their true colors. Don't you think I'm right?”

An ancient but energized-looking resident in a bathrobe and tennis shoes strolled past them and nodded hello. They nodded back.

“Of course you're right,” Martin said, and Ellie recognized the patronizing tone in his voice—the same tone she used to hear in her own voice when he was six years old and would come running into the house babbling about something she had no interest in. He was placating her, letting her prattle. They'd come full circle.

“What do you think about standardized tests?” she asked, reaching for a topic that would lend her authority and show how smart she still was.

“I was never very good at them.”

“You certainly weren't. But I don't think they're fair to the teachers. They measure what's been
learned,
not what's been
taught.
See the difference?”

“Sure.”

“If I teach you how to tie your shoes, that doesn't necessarily mean you've learned it forever. People forget things. What if you wear loafers every day of your life except for the fifth of May? Do you think it's fair that they'd come after
me
for that?”

The question was most likely rhetorical; she would keep going if he grunted, which was good because he was trying to figure out where in this place you were supposed to have a conversation without people lingering around and listening in. Maybe that was part of the idea of assisted living: you were assisted, or accompanied, each and every moment of the day. His stomach was growling. He should have eaten lunch before coming here.

“I taught all those children how to read music, but it was just dots to them. And who can be expected to remember what you never had a passion for to begin with? One of those boys—his last name was Pratt, I'll never forget it because it rhymed with brat—told me I was a waste of his time. Can you imagine? A third grader sassing a teacher like that? Standardized tests would have weeded out the Pratts of the world, let me tell you, but the school board didn't want to use them for electives.” She was vaguely aware of having gone back on the point she was trying to make. “Let's stop in here,” she said, motioning toward the open doors of the dayroom.

Not that Martin's assessment mattered, but the dayroom was his least favorite part of Serenity Palms—the room he found most exanimate and depressing, the room he would avoid entirely if he were a resident here (and, indeed, some of the residents looked to be not much older than him). There were overstuffed chairs and couches laid out in a kind of grid. An entire wall of windows facing an over-fertilized lawn. And at one end of the room, a large console television around which a dozen people sat staring at Judge Judy. Thankfully, Ellie never wanted to linger in the dayroom. Today, for some reason, she wanted to show it to Martin as if he'd never seen it before.

“There they all are,” she said, her eyes scanning the room, her voice lowering, but only by a few decibels. “Greeks and Jews and Irish and Italians. Mostly Greeks. And only one colored, which, if you ask me, is unusual.”

Several residents looked their way.

“Mom,”
Martin whispered.

“What? I said ‘colored.' And I'm pointing out there should be a few more of them, statistically. I'm all for the melting pot, so long as everyone behaves. The Greeks can actually be nice people.”

Martin turned the chair around.

“Where are we going?”

He steered them out of the room.

“I'm not a shopping cart,” she said.

“No, you're not,” he said, as if he wished she were.

“Slow down, then.” They were already moving at a snail's pace, but she disliked the surrender of control implicit in the wheelchair. She didn't need the chair for short distances—she had the cane and the walker for those—and being lowered into it always made her feel like she might never come out again. She could be as bossy as she wanted with the Serenity Palms staff when they wheeled her around, and they would either suffer it quietly or dish it right back to her in a jovial sort of way she didn't mind. But Martin was so sensitive. Always brooding. He'd never been in a full-blown argument in his life—not with her, anyway. Certainly not with any of the bosses he'd had, who'd been so stingy with their raises and promotions. And not with his wife, who, as far as Ellie could tell, got everything she ever wanted. And whose name was Claire. And who was dead, she reminded herself. There you go, that bit of information was secure and it was nothing to shake a stick at; she was a widow herself—since before Martin had ever gotten married—and she could barely remember what life with Howard had been like. The sound of his voice, yes. The stink of his cigarettes, certainly. But not how his presence had felt in a room, or in their bed. Sometimes it seemed as if her memory was as big as a hatbox. For everything she tried to fit into it, something had to be taken out. She had given up whole pieces of herself to make space for the clutter of other people, and who ever thought to acknowledge that? Who ever thought to thank her? “Where in the world is the fire?” she asked, gripping the arms of the wheelchair.

“We're barely even moving, Mom. Would you like to stop for a while and rest?”

“I'm not
doing
anything. Why would I need to rest?”

“Listen, about your ring. Who's this Mr. Hollingsworth? I don't know what kind of person would think it's okay to do that, but you can't just take someone's jewelry and give them a—snack.”

“Weetabix,” she said. “British Weetabix.”

“But you gave him your wedding ring. It's valuable.”

“Probably not, knowing your father.”

“Sentimental value, then,” Martin said. “It has that, doesn't it?”

“I suppose.” She wanted to change the subject. More and more, she found that interacting with anyone made her want to change the subject. “Who cares? Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?”

She could still surprise him, now and then, by paying attention. He did want to talk to her about something; he just wanted to get her someplace private first because he knew that no matter how gently or diplomatically he phrased his news, she was going to react poorly.

“Are you hungry?” he asked. “Do you want to go to the cafeteria?” The cafeteria was sometimes empty between mealtimes.

“God, no.”

“What about outside? It's not so hot today. It's nice, actually.”

“Why are you so eager to get somewhere?”

“So we can talk,” he said.

This didn't bode well, she decided. Martin wasn't usually crafty, or particular. Under normal circumstances, he was as clear and simple as a glass of water. He had something up his sleeve. “Come around here,” she said. “Come around so I can see you.”

She felt the chair stop moving. Then he was squatting down in front of her, his knees crackling. She was relieved to see that he didn't have a crazed, Richard Widmark glint in his eye. It was this godawful chair that was getting her so rattled. Unless you were Franklin Roosevelt, it was impossible to stand your ground in an argument when you were sitting on wheels.

She had to remind herself that they weren't arguing. But he looked so somber, her Martin, such a little doughface. “There's my little man,” she said, wanting nothing more than to see him smile.

He did smile a little. He even leaned forward and gently hugged her—something he usually did only at the end of his visits. Things were sliding back into Ellie's favor. Her throat, which had been fluttering just moments ago, was now regaining its grip. Her nostrils flared as she caught the scent of something disagreeable—the wallpaper, maybe, or the glue behind it. But all of this was going to be fine.

T
he atrium was a compromise, since Ellie refused to go outside. Located in the center of Serenity Palms, it had, until just a year ago, been a proper atrium: open-air, exposed to the elements, with a pond in the middle where koi and goldfish swam. But the fish couldn't keep up with the mosquitoes, and the summer storms scattered the mulch over the walkway—little sticks that might catch on slippered feet—so the atrium had been enclosed with a peaked skylight. The bugs were gone now and the walkway was clear, but the air was no different than in any other part of the building and hummed with the compressor of a hidden air conditioner. Also hidden were a set of speakers that dripped music—sometimes piano, today violin. The fish had been removed. The pond had been filled in with cement and was now a sitting area.

Martin put the brake on Ellie's wheelchair. He pulled out one of the patio chairs and sat down across from her.

“It's like the great outdoors without having to be there,” he said.

“I liked it better when it was open.”

“You never wanted to come in here before. The smells, and noise from the highway, remember?”

“Now it smells worse.”

“But there's music. You like music.”

She looked down at her lap and smoothed the fabric of her robe with both hands. “You don't need to tell me that,” she said. “I know I like music. I used to
teach
music. I just don't think Vivaldi should get as much attention as he does. He's not serious enough, flits around too much. If Charlie Chaplin had had violins for eyebrows, they'd have played Vivaldi.”

Fair enough, Martin thought.

“And you look spotty,” she added, as if these topics were at all related. “When's the last time you saw a dermatologist? Some of those marks on your forehead could be cancerous.”

“Do you like it here?” he asked.

Possibly a trick question. She glanced at the ficus trees, the bamboo, the Mexican fans.

“Not the atrium,” he said. “The facility. The home.”

“It's okay. There's a lot wrong with it.”

“But you like it better than the other two homes, right? I mean, you seem at least a little happier here than you were at Garden View or East Haven.”

“That's what you wanted to talk about?”

“I'm just asking,” he said. “Just checking in.”

“Do you want to take my temperature, too?”

“No.”

“What is it? You're acting so strange today. Why did you even bother to come?”

It occurred to them both that she was getting ahead of herself. She usually saved this particular zinger for just when he was about to leave.

He sat forward and rested his elbows on his knees. The whites of his eyes looked pink all of a sudden. “I came because I love you, okay? And because I wanted to see you.”

She didn't like the sound of that. “Go on.”

“And there's something I need to tell you. The fact is—” He sucked in a shot of air through his nose. “I've gotten really tired of being alone all the time.”

“Me, too!” she said with more spark than she'd intended. “I've been alone my whole life.”

“No, you haven't. And neither have I. But I've been on my own since Claire died, and that was eleven years ago.”

“Bob Hope's been gone for eleven years?”

“Who—would you just listen, please? For once?”

All she did was listen. All she did was get talked to. She pressed her lips together and widened her eyes at him.

“I had a great life with Claire. We were married for twenty-eight years, and we shared something that's always going to be special to me. I know the two of you never got along, but there was nothing I could do about that—”

“Stubborn,” Ellie slipped in. “She was stubborn.” Then pressed her lips back together.

“—and she always told me she wanted me to move on. So the fact is, I've met someone.” He paused for a moment to let this sink in, but nothing changed in his mother's expression. “Her name is Beth. She's a landscaper—she's retired now, but she still grows orchids and takes them to shows. We've been doing that together for a while. We're serious, Mom.” He cleared his throat. “We actually got married six months ago.”

One of the doors to the atrium—the front or the back, Ellie couldn't tell which—swung open and then hissed shut on its slow-moving hinges. No one appeared, though. “
That's
what you wanted to tell me?” There was an opportunity here, she just wasn't sure what it was. Martin had had a toy when he was little, a Volkswagen car that had flashing lights and a mechanism inside that made it back up whenever it ran into something, back up and redirect, over and over, until it was turned off. Her thoughts felt like that sometimes. They felt like that now. Back up, redirect. “Does this person have children?”

“Beth. She does. She has a son and a daughter. And her daughter has a daughter. Which makes me sort of a grandfather.”

“Why didn't you ever have children? You and Claire, I mean.”