Page 38 of Good Days Bad Days

Charlie

Present Day

My father had alerted Shore Path that we were on our way, and Nurse Mitchell did a good job of preparing Betty for our arrival. She knows who I am as soon as I walk into the room, calling me Lottie in the same irritated tone she used the last time I saw her on a “good day.”

But within a few seconds, Betty calls me Laura and refers to Olivia by my childhood nickname, making it clear that today is a bit different.

Not exactly a good day but not fully a bad one either.

I’m not sure if that’s entirely positive, but I keep my mental fingers crossed as Nurse Mitchell excuses herself, leaving us alone with Betty.

I thought it’d be hard to explain to Olivia that my mother might be a little pricklier than her loving grandmothers on her father’s side and Ian’s side, but she seems unfazed, even when my mother sends a cutting barb my way every so often.

“I volunteered at Mountainview for my NHS community service hours, remember?” she reminded me when we got into the room. “They had a whole memory wing there.”

“Aren’t you a sweet thing,” Betty declares from her armchair when I introduce her to her only grandchild. Olivia accepts the offered kiss on the cheek.

“You too. I like your green chair. It’s so regal looking.”

“Yes, my husband got it for me. He’s a kind man. Are you married?” she asks Olivia, who seems to find the question funny.

“No, no. Not yet.”

“You have time but might need a haircut and some rouge.”

“Olivia is wonderful the way she is,” I snap back, remembering how my mother’s critiques had stuck with me over the years. “Besides, she’s only nineteen.”

“So, you’re not going to school for your MRS, then?” She makes an old joke I heard several times as a kid.

“No. More like a bachelor’s in arts,” she banters back. “Grandma, how old were you when you got married?”

Betty’s eyes roll upward like she’s counting, but when she doesn’t come up with a number, I fill in the little bit of information I know about my parents’ marriage.

“Thirty-one. Well, thirty-one when I was born. So, a year before that I think.”

“Is that right?” Betty asks as though we are talking about an old friend instead of her own history. I know it’s part of her memory loss, the Swiss cheese, as Nurse Mitchell calls it. I have holes in my memory as well, but for very different reasons.

As Betty and Olivia chat, I pull out a deck of cards, shuffling them a dozen times, keeping an eye on the door for our food delivery and hoping it gets here before Betty remembers who I am again.

“I read your book last night when I got to town,” Olivia adds, catching my interest, as I deal three hands in a clockwise order.

“My book?”

“Yes. The Classy Homemaker.” Olivia retrieves the book from the box we brought with us and lays it on the corner of the roll-away table. “I didn’t know you wrote a book.”

My mother glances at the weathered hardcover a few times and then stares daggers in my direction.

“I wish you’d all stop digging through my things, Lottie. The girl doesn’t know better, but you should and so does your father,” she scolds, as though my childhood mother just popped into the conversation from another room.

Her reprimand releases a flood of frustration inside me as I think about everything we’re doing to clean up the mess she left behind—our time, our money, and the physical and mental effort we’ve put in. I open my mouth to respond, but Olivia stops me with a steady gaze.

“I’ll go first,” Olivia says, flipping the top card of the deck over.

I close my mouth with a click, which stops my retort but doesn’t stop the resentment behind it. It’s so hard not to engage when my mom’s hardened edge returns on her more lucid days.

Olivia’s redirection works, and we all ignore the book on the table, playing silently until our meal arrives.

“Ooo, this looks like a treat,” Nurse Mitchell says as she brings in the brown paper bags of food.

“I hope you didn’t let Mrs. Thompson near it,” my mother bites. “She stole my brownie after dinner last night. I saw her chomping on it in her room.” I cringe, filled with a familiar embarrassment at her sharp complaint.

The paranoia isn’t new, though it’s likely heightened by her illness and new location.

But even when I lived at home, my mother’s anxiety increased as her hoarding intensified.

Eventually, she was sure anyone walking on the shore path was trying to peek into our house.

To my mortification she’d often yell at them if they stopped for too long within her sight.

She also insisted our house be removed from the boat tour’s script and opted to have our mail delivered to a PO box in town rather than the box on the dock.

The one time her paranoia was merited was when CPS showed up and she blamed Miss Johnson, saying my teacher made the call, that she had it in for her. In that case, she was right.

The nurse leaves the brown paper sack, assuring us it’s been in no hands but her own. I distribute the Styrofoam containers, the heavenly scent of homemade soup filling the room, distracting my mother from her suspicion.

“This is sinfully good,” my mother says, taking a spoonful of cream of potato soup with a saturated lump of homemade sourdough bread. “I haven’t had Lake Aire’s in . . .” Her thought drifts off.

“Mmmm, so good,” Olivia agrees. And I remain mute so I don’t distract from their conversation.

“You are a pretty girl,” she says to Olivia, who’s wearing ripped jeans and an oversized sweater that would’ve triggered my mother in my younger years.

“Thank you. I like your nails. Did you just get them done?” Olivia returns the compliment. My mother stares at her cotton candy–pink fingernails.

“I . . . I think so.”

“Well, that’s a lovely color.”

“Thank you. It’s my favorite.”

The idea that the soft pink of a baby’s blanket could possibly be my mother’s favorite color strikes me as odd. Pale pink is such a contrast to the dark cavern of our home.

“It’s my favorite too,” Olivia adds, which is true, though for a brief time in high school she shunned the color, calling it “demeaning” to her feminist values. But apparently she’s realized she can be a feminist and wear pink.

“We should go shopping,” Betty says to Olivia with a youthful verve, finishing the last bit of creamy broth.

A long-lost grandmother shopping with her newly acquainted granddaughter—it’s like a subplot from a Hallmark movie.

It’s sweet and it’s something I never thought could possibly happen in my lifetime.

“Shopping?” Olivia looks to me to see if this is an odd request. I shrug.

“Yes. Shopping. I know a girl who works at JCPenney’s.

She lets me use her discount.” She’s slipping a little, teetering between two times, two realities.

I don’t know if my mom has ever left Shore Path, much less visited a department store.

I peel a piece of crust off my roll and chew it slowly as I watch the interaction.

“And we could go to Ike’s for dinner. If you think this is good, wait until you try Ike’s pot roast. But they only have it on Wednesday nights so we should go on a Wednesday. ”

My ears perk up and I risk an interruption. “Ike’s Diner? In Janesville?”

“Yes, yes. Have you heard of it?” she asks us both politely. Olivia shakes her head as I nod mine.

“Olivia, that’s where I was coming from yesterday. It’s the town I was telling you about.”

“When your phone was off?” Olivia asks with raised eyebrows, leaving out the handsome dentist companion. I roll my eyes as Betty claps her hands.

“We should go to Ike’s,” Betty says eagerly, sitting up in her chair as straight as her stiffened spine allows. Olivia seems nearly as worked up by the idea.

“When I volunteered at Mountainview, family could sign the residents out for the day. We could ask,” Olivia says to both me and her grandmother, which enhances Betty’s mood. She starts to list off places she’d like to take us, a park by her house, the ice cream shop, the studio.

While shopping sounds like torture, I’d love to take Betty back to the mysterious town where she met my dad and see if any of the sights trigger her memories. But I deflate internally as the voice of reason prevails. It’s unrealistic.

“Let’s not get her hopes up,” I say under my breath to Olivia before the fantasy of a day trip can take hold any further.

I read every pamphlet Nurse Mitchell gave me on my first day here, and one of the big rules, after the one about not arguing, is don’t make any promises, especially false promises, to the dementia patient.

I stand up and start collecting the cards.

“Sorry, but we should probably get going,” I say to both Olivia and Betty, cutting our visit short.

The lack of sleep is catching up with me, a piercing headache developing in between my eyebrows.

I’ve been the engaged mom, I’ve shown Olivia the town, introduced her to her grandparents, and even played nice with Ian, but I’m out of parental patience.

I’ve had my oasis invaded and far too many of my choices hijacked.

I need a long bath and maybe a nap before I can think clearly again.

Olivia must be able to tell I’m burned out, and after pushing her luck by showing up on my doorstep, she doesn’t fight me. Betty says easy farewells, the sharp edge to her comments having dulled a bit.

“Ike’s next week,” she reminds us as I write in her visitor’s log, detailing the visit with Olivia, our special lunch, and the card game, leaving out the proposed visit to Janesville, hoping she’ll forget all about it.