SAFELY BURIED Chapter 21: Memory Care

The assisted-living/memory-care section of the health center had its own entrance. Half a dozen wooden rocking chairs stood under a high portico. A pleasant-looking, heavyset woman was rocking on one of the chairs and stood up as I approached.

“Mr. Larrison,” she said with a bright smile. “I’m Judy.” She read the lack of recognition in my eyes. “I knew it was you because I saw you at a meeting of the history society last year.” She did not mention the scrape on my cheek. Either she was just being polite or it didn’t look quite so bad today.

“Oh, that was the dedication of the new museum,” I said. We shook hands. “I’m sorry I didn’t recognize you.”

“Don’t worry about it,” she replied. “It’s easy for me to remember you—you were the only reporter there. But you can’t be expected to remember all the people you meet in your line of work.”

“Actually I try to,” I said. “I just don’t do a very good job of it.”

She laughed. “Well from now on maybe you’ll remember me.”

I held the door for her, and we went inside. A young receptionist smiled at us from her desk and said, “How are you today, Mrs. Dubbs?”

“Still kickin’,” Judy said. “Hi, Allison. That’s a pretty dress you have on. This is Phil Larrison from the Gleaner. We’re going to visit with Esther for a while.”

“Oh, that’ll be real nice,” said Allison, who looked like a high-school cheerleader.

The spacious, high-ceilinged lobby, with its Corinthian pillars, oversized sofas, flowers, and fireplace, made me feel as if I were in a ritzy hotel instead of a nursing home. Beyond the lobby was a bright sunny dining room where thirty or forty people were eating lunch and Tammy Wynette was singing “Stand by Your Man.”

“Have you ever been here before, Phil?” Judy asked.

“No,” I said, “ but maybe I’ll move in. It’s very nice.”

“If you can afford it. I couldn’t. This is the assisted-living section. The other end of the building is intermediate- and skilled-care. Esther is in memory care. That’s this way.”

I followed her around the receptionist to a pair of large windowless doors, where she punched four numbers into a keypad on the wall. The doors swung open to reveal a wide hallway with rooms on both sides. Halfway down the hall was a common area, which included a pair of desks where a woman in a yellow polo shirt was working, a small dining room where a dozen people, mostly women, were having lunch around a large table, and a lounge where three old men were watching TV, or rather one was watching and two were asleep.

The woman at the desk—her tag said she was a licensed practical nurse—looked up as we approached. Judy said, “Hi, Sharon. How’s Esther doing today?”

“Pretty well,” the LPN replied. “She wanted to go back to her room.”

“Did she eat much today?”

Sharon called over her shoulder to a red-shirted aide: “Hey, Laura, how did Esther do with her lunch?”

“About sixty percent,” Laura called back.

“That’s par for the course,” Sharon said.

On our way to Esther’s room, Judy said, “By the way, Phil, Esther doesn’t know about the murders. I haven’t told her. I was afraid it would upset her. She’s so confused, she’d probably get some wacky idea like her husband and his girlfriend were murdered, even though Frank never had another woman.” She laughed affectionately. “Poor thing, she’s all mixed up. Everything is jumbled together in her mind like a big salad—memories, dreams, TV, real life, her own imagination. I don’t think she knows which is which anymore.”

“That’s too bad,” I said. “How long has she been like this?”

“It’s a progressive disease, Alzheimer’s. I first noticed some problems a few years ago, but looking back, I realize she did some things before then that were probably caused by the Alzheimer’s—here we are.”

The door to Esther’s room stood wide open, as did all the doors in the hall. Judy rapped her knuckles on the door and at the same time said, “Esther, company’s here.”

Esther was sitting on the end of her bed, about two feet from the TV, with her false teeth halfway out of her mouth.

“Esther, your teeth are sticking out!” Judy exclaimed. “Put them back in your mouth. You look like a monkey.”

An old rerun of Matlock was on, and Esther burbled something to the TV.

“Here, let me help you,” Judy said, reaching for the teeth, which were the uppers. Esther went on talking as Judy gently pulled the plate out of her mouth.

“Those aren’t my teeth,” Esther said in an unexpectedly firm voice.

“Whose teeth are they?” Judy said.

“How should I know?”

Judy looked at me and rolled her eyes. She went to the bathroom and laid the teeth on the sink. Then she tried to start over. “Esther, you have a special visitor today,” she said in a singsong voice. “Look who’s here. It’s Phil Larrison, from the newspaper, the Gleaner. He came to talk to you.” She sounded as if she were talking to a little child.

Esther wasn’t interested. She went on watching her show and laughed when Matlock, who looked old enough to be in the nursing home with her, got in an argument with a judge.

Judy said, “Did you have a good lunch today, Esther? What did you eat for lunch?” When Esther still did not answer, Judy said, “Let’s turn this off, shall we, Esther?” She saw the remote lying on the floor and with some effort picked it up. Then with a deep breath she zapped the TV. “There, that’s better, isn’t it, Esther? Now we can hear ourselves think.”

The white-haired woman in her nineties went on staring at the blank screen. What am I doing here? I asked myself.

Esther Dubbs was a small woman with a sagging face that was creased with wrinkles, though not nearly so many as her wattled neck. I suspected the face had benefitted from plastic surgery sometime during the past quarter century. Her skin had a smattering of brown spots, and purplish veins bulged on the back of her hands. She wore a silky yellow top, gray pants, a white cardigan sweater, and white tennis shoes. A soft, fluffy hairdo proclaimed that she had been to the beauty shop that morning.

Judy said, “Let’s sit over here on the love seat so we can talk.” She took Esther’s hands and helped her onto her feet, then guided her across the room.

“What does he want?” Esther said, looking at me for the first time.

“Phil would like to talk to you about the house you used to live in. You remember the house on the farm, don’t you?”

“I don’t own it anymore. I got rid of it.”

“That’s right, you did.” Judy shot a wide-eyed glance at me, marveling as if this was our lucky day.

“Does he want to buy it?” Esther said.

“I don’t think so,” Judy replied. “But why don’t you ask him yourself. You’re looking straight at him.”

“Hello, Esther,” I said. “It’s nice to meet you.”

She seemed a bit mystified. Her eyes had not left my face since she first looked at me. Perhaps the scabby scrape fascinated her.

“I’m Phil,” I reminded her. “I’m writing an article for the paper about your old house in Blind Horse Hollow. I’d like to ask you a few questions about it, if you don’t mind.”

“The horse was named Lug. He belonged to my grandfather.”

“Really?” I said. “With a name like that, I bet he was a real workhorse.”

She nodded. “He pulled a plow.”

“How did he go blind?” I asked her.

“He was born blind.”

That’s a downer, I thought. You’re born blind and you get to pull a plow the rest of your life. “Did you ever ride him, Esther?” I said.

She seemed to try to remember but did not answer.

I came back with, “What color was the horse?”

“Brown.”

Judy said, “That’s very interesting, Esther. You never told me about Lug before.”

“You never asked me about him.”

One of the aides rapped on the open door and came into the room. “Excuse me,” she said to Judy, “I just wanted to see if she was ready for me to lay her down.”

“Not yet,” Judy said. “Give us another ten or fifteen minutes, okay?”

“There’s no hurry,” the girl said. “Whenever you’re ready.” She bent over Esther and said, “Your hair sure looks pretty today, Hon. I’ll come back in a little while, and we’ll go to the toitie and take a nap, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Esther said.

Judy took advantage of the occasion to tell the girl about Esther’s teeth. The girl went to the bathroom and got the plate. “I wish we could put their names on these things,” she told Judy. “Sweetie,” she said to Esther, “would you open your mouth for me. Let’s see if these fit.”

“Those aren’t my teeth,” Esther said. She would not open her mouth again.

I sat there tapping my fingertips together while this was going on, and after the redshirt left, I said, “Esther, would you like to know how I got all these scratches on my face?”

No response. Just the stare.

“I fell down the cellar steps in your old house, and my face scraped the wall.”

Judy said, “What did you want down there?”

I wished she would butt out so I could talk to Esther. “I just wanted to see what it’s like,” I said. “For my article.”

Esther said, “We lived in the cellar.”

“You did?” I said. “Why?”

“It was nice and cool in the summertime.”

“Oh, Esther, you’re making that up,” Judy said. “You never lived down there.”

Esther pursed her lips.

“I bet it was nice and cool,” I said to her. “The floor and walls are bare earth. I bet it was a good place to play when it was hot or rainy outside. I bet you dug holes in the ground, didn’t you?” I caught myself treating her like a child and told myself to knock it off.

“We didn’t dig any holes,” she said as if I had said something stupid. “The floor was made of wood.”

“Was it? I didn’t realize that.”

She nodded emphatically.

Judy said, “They must have used it as a storm cellar.” She put a hand on Esther’s arm and said, “You went down there when the weather was bad, didn’t you, Esther, like during tornado season?”

Esther did not answer.

I leaned forward and said, “The cellar where I fell is like a big room, Esther, but it’s much smaller than upstairs. Is there another room like that one under the house?”

Her lips remained pinched together. She stared at the TV.

“Is there another set of cellar steps somewhere?” I said.

Judy laughed and said, “No. She’s making it up. You’re just funning with us, aren’t you, Esther? You have a terrific imagination. You should have been a writer.”

Esther ignored her and went on looking miffed.

Judy got up and mumbled to me, “She’s in la-la land.” She laughed softly and went to the bathroom.

As soon as the door shut, Esther’s head swung toward me. She crooked her finger and motioned me closer. I scooted my chair toward her until our knees nearly touched.

“Don’t trust her,” she whispered.

“Why not?” I said.

“She’s no good. She took my husband away from me.”

“She did?” I said, acting indignant.

Esther’s serious nod reminded me of a little girl. “She takes everything,” she whispered. “I have no furniture. She took it. I don’t have any money. I can’t go shopping. I can’t buy anything. I don’t have any jewelry to wear. She took it all. I don’t have anything.”

I heard Judy tinkling in the bathroom.

“You probably shouldn’t keep your jewelry here, Esther,” I said. “It might get stolen.”

“She already stole it.”

Water ran in the bathroom sink. “Do you want me to report her to the police?” I said to humor her.

She nodded solemnly.

I lifted my chair backward as the door opened and Judy came out of the bathroom. “We’ve been having a nice talk,” I told her. “Esther says she would like to have her jewelry back so she can wear it once in a while.”

“Oh, Esther,” Judy said, “we’ve talked about that a hundred times. You know what would happen. It would get lost, or somebody would take it.” To me she said, “I swear, some of the people who work here don’t own a pot to pee in.”

“Maybe she could have a couple of pieces,” I said, “or maybe you could bring her some of her jewelry to wear while you’re visiting, and then take it back with you when you leave.”

“No!” Esther shouted. “I want my jewelry. It’s mine, not hers.”

“Now don’t get excited,” Judy said. “I’ll see what I can do.” She gave me a cross look and muttered, “Thanks a lot.”

Breathing hard, Esther went on fighting: “Where’s my furniture? All I have is this junk. I don’t even have my own bed.”

The girl in the red shirt came scurrying into the room. “What’s all the excitement about? You know what, Esther—I think it’s time for a nap, don’t you? Shall we go to the bathroom first?”

“Shut up. Get the hell out of here. Leave me alone.”

“I have to do my job, Sweetie. You don’t want me to get fired, do you?”

“We’re going now, Esther,” Judy said. “You have a good rest. I’ll be back to see you next week. I’ll bring your favorite necklace for you to wear, okay?”

“I want my jewelry.”

“Goodbye, Esther,” I said. “It was nice meeting you.”

Sharon, the LPN, entered the room as we were leaving. She and the nurse’s aide teamed up to calm Esther down.

Way to go, Larrison, I said to myself. You done good.

The way Esther had clammed up when Judy began correcting her made me wish I had come by myself.

I decided to do that.