Goodnight Beautiful(6)
Yes, I’m at my mom’s, Sam writes to Annie. (Technically.)
How is she?
Good.
Much longer?
Sam checks the stopwatch. Fifty-nine minutes. Not too much.
Tell her I’ll see her tomorrow.
Tomorrow, Annie’s day to visit. They take turns. Every month Annie clips a calendar into the back of his appointment book, one she draws herself at the kitchen table, guiding a black Sharpie along the edge of an envelope, a grid of shaded boxes. The blue ones are her days, the pink ones Sam’s. (Annie likes to subvert gender norms. It’s a thing.)
“You think we need to go every day?” Sam asked when she showed him the first schedule.
“Visiting your mother is the main reason we moved here,” she said. “Of course we need to go every day. She needs us, Sam. She’s got dementia.”
Behavior variant frontotemporal dementia, or bvFTD, if you’d like to get technical, which Sam often does. The condition is characterized by prominent changes in behavioral disinhibition (trying to lick the waiter) and interpersonal relationships and conduct (repeatedly telling the cashier she’s an asshole), and is “an important cause of younger onset dementia” (in her case, sixty-four). That’s how the doctor explained it to Sam last year, as he sat beside his mother in a cold office on the fifth floor of St. Luke’s Hospital, an ache in his chest.
It came on quickly. Spells of confusion, and then outbursts at work. They were minor at first, but the day came when she marched into the office of Principal Wadwhack (the sad sack) and told him that if he didn’t immediately adopt a dog with her, she was going to burn the school down. That was the day that his mom, Mrs. S, the sweetest secretary Brookside High had ever known—way too good for that loser of a math teacher who left her for a model (Talbots, but still)—lost her job, and Sam began the research, eventually landing on this place. Rushing Waters Elderly Care Center: Insured. Trusted. Sixty-six private rooms on eight shaded acres up a windy mountain road outside Chestnut Hill, his middling hometown in the middle of the state, the major employer a so-so private university with five thousand students. “Chestnut Hill: Keep It in Mind.” That’s the town slogan, printed on a signpost at the city limits. Keep It in Mind. That’s the best they could do.
And yet here he is, local boy moving home after twenty years away. There’s even an article about it in the local newspaper, “Twenty Questions with Dr. Sam Statler.” His realtor, Joanne Reedy, suggested the idea. Her niece wrote the column for the local paper, and Joanne thought it would be good for business. Sam’s been spending the last few years trying hard to be a nice guy, so he agreed. Turns out the niece was a girl he’d slept with in high school, and she kept him on the phone for an hour, reminiscing about the old days before asking him a long list of inane questions about his interests. His favorite television show? (West Wing!) Favorite drink on a special occasion? (Johnnie Walker Blue!)
Given a dearth of both art and entertainment, the article appeared on the front page of the Arts and Entertainment insert, including a color photograph of him, legs crossed, hands folded across his lap. Former resident (and renowned heartbreaker!) Sam Statler, is moving home. But don’t get too excited, ladies! He’s married!
Annie hung the article on their refrigerator, Sam’s big, dumb smiling face on display every time he reached for the milk, the charming only son moving home to take care of his beloved and ailing mother.
That’s the great irony of this whole thing. He supposedly moved back home to this shitty river town to take care of the mother who spent a lifetime doting on him, and now he can’t do it. In fact, he hasn’t set foot inside Rushing Waters in three weeks.
He takes a long swig of beer, trying his best to avoid thinking about it, but like all mechanisms of defense, repression isn’t always reliable, and the memory of their last visit abruptly returns. He could see his mother’s confusion when he opened the door to her room, the few moments she needed to put together who he was. Her good days were becoming less frequent; she was angry most of the time, yelling at the staff. He’d brought her favorite lunch—ziti with meatballs from Santisiero’s on Main, the local joint still hanging on after thirty-two years. She ate her portion sloppily, asking him the same two questions again and again. What time is bingo, and where is Ribsy? He explained that bingo was every Wednesday and Friday at four in the recreation hall, and Ribsy, the family spaniel, dropped dead in 1999—the same week, the little fucker, that Sam left for college, leaving her completely alone.
“You’re exactly like him, you know,” Margaret said out of nowhere.
“Like who?” Sam asked, ripping the hard end off a piece of Italian bread.
“Who do you think? Your father.” She put down her fork. “I’ve spent my whole life keeping this in, and I can’t anymore.”
The bread lodged in his throat. “What are you talking about, Mom?”
“You know exactly what I’m talking about, Sam. You’re selfish. Self-centered. And you treat women like shit.”
He reminded himself it wasn’t her speaking, it was her disease. And yet even now, the beer has trouble going down as he remembers the look of disgust on her face. “And you want in on a little secret?” She lowered her voice conspiratorially. “You’re going to leave her, too. That nice new wife of yours. You’re going to end up just like him.”