“Mr. Townsend?” she asks in accented English.
“Yes.”
“Mr. Farina has been waiting for you,” she confirms. “Please come inside.”
A medicinal odor mixed with a heaviness in the air pummels my senses as soon as I close the door behind me. While the outside looks serene, slightly majestic, the inside is a different story.
The entryway leads down the hall to a kitchen where I observe two people, dressed in scrubs talking, while another healthcare worker sits at a dining table, assisting a person in a wheelchair as they eat.
To my right is a small study or TV room. Two more people sit in it watching television, a man, in scrubs as well, sits in between them commenting on what’s happening on the screen and asking for their input.
Their replies are murmured words or simple nods of their heads. Looking away, I notice that the wall to my right there’s a whiteboard. On it is a schedule of times, names, and lists of medications.
What stands out is the third name on the schedule. Farina, L.
“Excuse me?” I ask the woman who welcomed me at the door. “What is this place?”
Her brows knit together. “You weren’t told?”
I shake my head. “I was given an address and told that Luciano Farina wanted to speak with me. But that can’t be ri?—”
“Yes, that is correct,” she says. “This is a private facility.”
I glance around again, seeing everything anew.
“Facility,” I repeat. “As in a nursing home?”
She gives me a tight smile. “Perhaps, I should allow Mr. Farina to explain. He has been prepared for your arrival. Allow me to show you to him.”
My mind can’t conceive of what I’m about to walk into. All around me, as I follow the nurse to the second floor, are signs and sights of illness.
I can’t conceive of Luciano Farina needing to be in a place like this. Not unless something severe happened to him after he retired.
The nurse knocks on an opened door. She holds out a hand for me to wait.
“Luciano, your guest is here to see you,” she says, her voice pitching higher. “Can he come in? Are you prepared to see him?”
“Y-Y-es,” comes a reply. It sounds nothing like the Farina I know.
She waves me in, and I enter the large bedroom. “They’ll both see you now.”
“They?”
At the center is a made-up bed on which a man I don’t recognize sits. The left side of the room is a half-empty bookshelf, while the right side houses a large window that looks out onto a stream among the trees.
It must be the same stream of water I heard before entering the house.
Luciano sits in a cushioned chair in front of the window, staring out of it.
“Will you be all right?” the nurse asks him.
He nods.
It’s not until she closes the door behind me that he finally turns to look at me. He’s dressed in an oversized grey sweatsuit, a blanket covering his lap.
My mind fills with the last time I saw Luciano. It was the day he won the championship. The way he looked larger than life as he stood on top of the podium, spraying champagne and cheering for his win is a complete contrast from the man before me now.
“Sit,” he says, his voice low.
