Letters to Adonis

Chapter:: Seventeen

Dear Adonis,

My dad and I got busy helping the nurses at my mom’s center pack up her things to move her. So that basically means that I had no time to think about what my father could have told you, especially since you were being so stubborn and secretive about it. You didn’t seem to mind backing off for a few days while I tried to convince my dad that this was the best thing for my mom. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him that I would miss her, because she didn’t have an impact on my life anymore.

Just thinking about this made me cringe. She was my mother and I couldn’t spare three words even if they were all a lie. It all just felt fake. Even as we were stacking her belongings in boxes that the kitchen staff at her nursing home supplied, I couldn’t help but think of how stupid this all was.

Mostly it was me that felt stupid about . . . well, me. How could I not cry or pitch a fit or demand one more day with my mother? Maybe it was the fact that we had the same disease that made me not want to do anything with her. I didn’t need a sneak preview of what my future is going to be like. Fortunately, she didn’t remember me anyways so she couldn’t give me the guilt trip.

I didn’t try to talk to you about this. It’s not that I can’t, it’s just that I don’t think you’d understand. Your parents are happily married and mentally healthy, two things you wouldn’t think that would be in common with each other. I’m not saying that my parents’ marriage crumbled when my mother got diagnosed, but that’s the earliest memory on my timeline that I can place.

Even if I did have time to spend over at your house, I don’t think I’d be able to. Seeing your mother’s happy glowing face makes me yearn for the days of my mother’s soft face. I didn’t know when I started to miss her, but maybe I always had. I never thought about the possibility that she’d get moved to another facility, I just assumed that she would stay at the home a couple blocks off of Cooper Ave.

The conversations with my dad since he got back had been sparse and about things like ‘where’s the tape?’ and ‘should we wrap this in newspaper?’ When all I eventually realized I wanted to talk about was the memories I was struggling to recall without the disease eating at them. Mom always used to joke that dad had to have a great memory to make up for her disease; does that mean he would remember even more since I have it too?

Whenever I saw my mom on the couch watching t.v., sometimes knitting and other times staring out the window, I wondered what she was thinking. Was she trying to search through her memories? Did she have flashes of her life before dusty curtains over windows to show what she used to have. In a way the disease was scarier than jail. In jail you can eventually get out, but the disease eats you up every way it can until it spits you out, your brain left with worm sized holes.

After taping up a box, I decide I need to see you. It’s only been a few days but the depressing whispering of nurses to patients make me realize that I’ll be here someday. The thought makes me start to hyperventilate.

“Dad,” I breathe in heavily as I find him bent over another box, “I need to leave. I’ll see you at home.” I didn’t wait for his approval, and I didn’t’ really question if I wanted to try to walk to your house. All I needed to do was get outside, call you, and wait.

The wait isn’t special as I wait for you to pull up to the front of the home. I see you drive up in your car and try to force a smile as you lean over to pop the door open. Your hair is wet and your lips look like a soft pink. What a weird thing to notice as I’m trying to keep myself stitched together, I notice. Your eyes seem to glow as you watch me, your eyebrows crinkling with concern. “Just drive to your house,” my voice rises before it falls and a sob breaks out. It’s a strangled noise that makes me want to laugh if I didn’t feel as if I were drowning. Have you ever wondered why I cry around you so much? As I put my fingers under my eyes to catch the tears, I realize how unhappy I must seem to you. And I think if you are actually getting anything out of this relationship. It feels like you babysit me half the time and I blush at the thought.

“Ariel,” you whisper my name like some people would pause when they see something heartbreaking. Exactly like a bad car wreck, a school shooting, or even a little kid falling off his bike for the first time.

“Why do you say my name like that?” I manage to squeeze between heart quenching sobs, “you know it only makes me cry harder.” And as if I predicted the future, my sobs come from a deeper place. I try to keep the tears from blurring my vision as I check to see if we are close to your house. I blush at the fact that we are sitting in front of your house and I hadn’t even noticed, how long had we stopped?

“I can’t help it,” you whisper to me. You open your arms and I take my seatbelt off before diving into your arms, on another cycle of tears yet again. It takes several quiet moments of you rubbing my back until my tears slow to hiccups. I only pull away when I realize the massive pressure I feel on my head.

“I have a killer headache,” I whisper as I try to laugh it off.

“Come on, I have Advil inside.” You lean your head to your house as you open your door. I open mine and get out while feeling my face. It’s definitely puffy.

“What would I do without you, Adonis?” I ask you as I shut your front door behind me.

“I wouldn’t dare to imagine,” you tell me jokingly, winking as you say it before handing me an Advil and a glass of water.

Love, Ariel