Chasing Memories

[15] Admitted

    Situated a stone's throw from the county border, Maudlinkestle Hospital defied Elise's past experience with medical settings. Its brown-brick outer walls and wood-beamed entrance gate better resembled a farm estate than the sterile, oblong blocks that constituted modern hospitals, a fact the pervasive aroma of freshwater and wet dirt drove home. Dense hedgerows surrounded much of the premises, leaving little more than glimpses of the stream's unhurried flow beside the carpark. Starry pins pricked dazzling holes in the untarnished night sky overhead.

    Elise stared out across the restful valleys from the hospital's rear wall. A single oil lamp hung behind her dispelled enough darkness to sketch the outlines of her shoes, withholding its glare from the steep sloping land ahead. Lights of distant cottages gave shape to the land's twilit nooks, reinforced by the occasional whirl of car headlights between the hills. With just the faint splashes of the brook's water breaking the silence, Elise had to press her fingernails into her air-chilled arms to keep out of sleep's shifting sands.

    "There she is," Cadence's voice said, its owner vaulting over the wall before falling beside Elise. She wielded a paper cup in each hand, and she extended one towards Elise, its steam trails making an offer too tempting to resist. "Here. I figured you deserved some overtime for this midnight detour, Miss Editor. Caffeine's good as part-payment, right? They didn't have any milk left, though, so you've got black. Sorry."

    Taking the cup between her hands, Elise laughed and stifled a yawn while basking in the drink's piping hot air. "Believe me, I'm more in the mood for engine grease than a cosy foamy latte right now," she said as she nudged Cadence's heel with her foot, admiring the soft brushstrokes the lamplight left across her friend's tired profile. "How's your mum doing?"

    Small gravel fragments scraped beneath Cadence's boots. "She got lucky, apparently. It was a mini stroke rather than a full-blown attack, so she should bounce back in a few days," she said, pausing to take a sip of her coffee. The sigh she released afterwards bore too much weight to come from just the drink's heat. "But the coats think she's at high risk of suffering another stroke because of her age, diet, and high blood pressure – not to mention the fact that she doesn't move a damn muscle, all day, every day."

    "I had a feeling they'd say that," Elise answered. Her own cup of molten lava tasted more like rusty metal than roasted, earthy cosiness, yet its scorching heat ensured it did the trick of waking her up. "What about her dementia? Can they assess her for it here?"

    "I told them all about her episodes, and they claimed they'll see what they can do." Cadence set her coffee on the wall and folded her arms, gazing up at the scattered stars. "This is fucking crazy, Ellie. When I saw Flo in that hospital bed, it was like she was barely there. She was just so small and weak and...dead."

    Elise huddled her shivering body closer to her hot cup. "I get it. She's been struggling for a long time, Cade, and it's been putting so much strain on her." A series of lights flickered out in the faraway villages, leaving a wall of shadows in their wake. As Elise ran her nails along the side of her drink, small shimmering droplets appeared in the corner of Cadence's visible eye. "Florence is in the best place now, alright? They can help her here."

    "Yeah, for now, but what about later?" Catching wind of her harsh tone, Cadence wiped her face and let deep breaths pass through her body. "Flo's not even sixty. She'll probably be living with this shit for years, and she doesn't have anybody around to help her but me. What the hell am I supposed to do? I don't know how to find a care home, or manage someone else's finances – and I'm not scrubbing her gritty, grumpy butt by myself every week, no way!"

    "It'll be alright, Cade," Elise said as she placed a hand on Cadence's shoulder and met her friend's eye. "We can figure all this stuff out bit by bit, and there's a bunch of places we can get help from too. Whatever happens, you won't be scrubbing anybody's butt by yourself, alright?"