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“Mr. Rubin, do you need anything?” the nurse asks when she comes in to check on me. I’ve been placed in a chair next to the window. Spring has come, the white blossoms of the flowering dogwoods are peeking out, and the Kentucky bluegrass has begun to turn from brown to green.

“Yes, an escape plan,” I say.

“Aren’t we treating you well?”

“I just miss my wife.” I hate living without her, but she doesn’t belong here. I wish I didn’t belong here.

“I’m sure she’ll be here soon. Do you want to go to the lounge and visit with people while you wait?”

“I’d rather stay here. Before you go, can you bring me … um … that?” I point, but I can’t remember what it’s called. “The … the …”

“The glass of water?” she asks. I nod. “Of course.” She reaches over to the side table, picks up a glass, and holds the straw up to my lips.

I drink slowly and then take my lips off the straw so she knows I’m done. “Thank you. I keep drawing a blank. The other day, I forgot my granddaughter’s name.”

“We all forget things,” she says, as if it happens to her all the time, but she hasn’t been diagnosed with a disease? Will the dementia take over day by day, month by month? Will I notice as it’s happening? I’m terrified that I will. This is not the way I thought my life would go. One minute I’m a young man, and the next I’m in an old age home where I can’t do things for myself. I want my old life back.

“Hi, honey,” Dorothy says as she walks in the room, carrying a few magazines. The nurse greets her and leaves us alone. I know how lucky I am to have a wife like Dorothy. She never complains and she gives up a lot to come see me every afternoon. She leans down and kisses me, and even though I feel as if I’m a hundred years old, my heart beats as fast as it did when we were dating.

“I’m relieved to see you,” I say. She sits down on the edge of the bed.

“Is everything okay?” she asks in her worried tone.

I burst into tears. “I thought you got into an accident.”

She looks perplexed. “Why would you think that?”

“When you weren’t here already, I was sure something terrible happened.” Ever since she told me about the dementia, the tears keep coming.

She gets up, comes over, and kneels next to my chair. Then she takes my hand and looks in my eyes. “I’m fine. Nothing’s going to happen to me. I’ll be here every day.” She goes over to the table next to my bed and gets a tissue out of the box.

She waits quietly while I blow my nose and wipe my eyes. She stuffs the tissue in her pocket as her cell phone begins to ring. She fumbles in her purse and pulls out two receipts, a compact mirror, a granola bar, and a Sharpie before she finally finds her phone. She’s so close to me that I can hear Jerry’s voice coming through the speaker. He’s asking questions about how I am, but she’s being cryptic with her answers. I may be losing my mind, but I can still tell if someone’s keeping things from me. Dorothy gets off the phone as quickly as she can.

“If Jerry wants to know how I am, he should come visit,” I say.

“He will soon, but for now he sends his love,” she says.

“Right,” I say with as much sarcasm as I can muster. She hates when I point out that Jerry and I aren’t close. It bothers me too, but it’s too late to change it. I’ve apologized to Jerry, but I’m not sure he’ll ever get over it. The things parents can do to mess up their children. “Do you think he’ll notice when I die?” I ask.

“No one’s dying,” she says emphatically.

A rush of anger sweeps over me. “Didn’t you stick me in this place so you could get rid of me until I die?” I’m swimming in my emotions, stuck at the bottom of a pool and unable to see the waterline.

“I would never do that.”

“I didn’t want to come here,” I say.

“I’d much rather have you home with me too.”

“Then let me come home.”

“You need to be where there are people who can help you. I can’t take care of you by myself anymore.”

“Fine,” I say. After a moment my anger subsides. Dorothy is relieved when the redness leaves my face, and I’m calm again.

She holds up a magazine, her way of changing the subject. She says she thought I’d like to read about the person on the cover because she knows how much I like him. When I tell her I have no idea who it is, she gets anxious. She tells me it’s Stephen Colbert. Still I have no idea who that is, but to appease her, I pretend I do and thank her. She asks if I want to read it, but I tell her maybe later. Why would I want to read about someone I don’t know?

I feel as if everything I once remembered is being taken over by the mud that’s seeping into my brain. I remember all the lyrics fromIf I Had A Hammer, but I can’t remember what I was doing five minutes ago.