The ladies who lunched were silent.
I didn’t give a crap what they thought.
“Themost important person in my life has dementia,” I emphasized. “My grandmother is quite literallylosing her mind.” My heart pounded. “College is extremely important to me, but unlike Annie, it can wait.” The corners of my eyes prickled. I’d only weathered losing my mom at seven and my dad starting a new family a couple years later because I had Annie. I couldn’t imagine life without her. “Graduating a year after my friends sounds much more appealing than coming home for Christmas break and having my grandmother have no fucking clue who I am.”
Had deferring Northwestern been a no-brainer? Yes, but that didn’t mean it had beeneasy. One reason I hadn’t ever visitedGwen or Quincy at college was because I worried it’d bum me out—make me jealous, even. I wanted what they had, a life away from home.
But I thought gradually saying goodbye to Annie as I knew her would be marginally better than the sudden shock that her memory had been wiped. “Please let me spend next year with her,” I’d begged my dad last spring. “What if I leave and she remembers no one and nothing when I come back?”
Now, Erica took a deep breath. “Olivia—”
I couldn’t even look at her; instead, I turned to her friend. “Hilary, I set aside a new romance for you,” I said. “It’s waiting behind the register.”
And with that, I turned around, grabbed a Tupperware off the counter, snatched my keys off the hook, and left the house.
* * *
I drove to Elkins with white knuckles, and thanks to my sweat-soaked clothes and air-conditioning, I’d caught a chill by the time I parked.Keep calm, I told myself as I waited to be buzzed into Finlay House. Their inner double doors were always locked, to prevent Annie and other residents with memory issues from wandering off. I tried not to compare it to a psychiatric ward, but sometimes it was hard. “Hey, Tara,” I said when I reached the nurses’ station. I summoned a smile and presented her with my Tupperware. “Chocolate chip cookies!”
I baked for the Finlay team as much as I could. They did so much.
“You’re too sweet, Olivia,” Tara said, accepting the cookies but not returning my forced smile. Instead, she gave me a solemn look. “We had a sundown yesterday.”
My squared shoulders slumped. “Oh.”
“Yes.” Tara nodded sympathetically. “We gave her something, but…”
I listened while the nurse told me how agitated Annie had been all afternoon, pacing the halls and then demanding to shower at 2:00 a.m. I’d learned that “sundowning” was common for those with Alzheimer’s and dementia; manifestations ranged from increased confusion to anxiety to wandering to insomnia to hallucinations.
“How is she now?” I asked Tara.
“Comfortable,” she answered, then hesitated a beat. “But you should prepare yourself to just be a friend today. She fought Kai every step of the way to breakfast.”
“Okay,” I said quietly. Kai was Annie’s all-time favorite aide. She was only awful to him when she wasn’t herself.
Suddenly, my bones felt weary.
It also wasn’t a good sign that another nurse took over the desk so Tara could walk me to Annie’s room. Her door had been propped open today, as if the staff agreed she needed extra monitoring. “Hello, Annette,” Tara said gently. “You have a visitor.”
My heart twisted when I saw Annie in bed, snuggled underthe fluffy violet throw blanket I’d given her for Christmas. (She loved anything and everything cozy.) Her bed back in her Elkins apartment and then assisted living had been queen-sized, but now she was tucked in to a twin. Barely big enough for me to sit at its foot.
And it didn’t matter, anyway. I knew from the blank expression on her face that she didn’t recognize me. “Hello,” I said warmly, before she could aim a dagger at my heart by asking who I was. “I’m Olivia Lupo.”
Even my full name did not ring a bell. I was truly a stranger to her; she wouldn’t even recognize my laugh.
I willed myself to ignore the pang in my chest.
“Annette, Olivia is here to spend some time with you,” Tara helped, guiding me toward Annie’s armchair. “Doesn’t that sound nice?”
Annie finally blinked. “Company is always nice,” she said as she made direct eye contact with me. There was light there, thankfully. “You know my familynevercomes to visit me.”
A hard lump rose in my throat.Yes, they do!I wanted to cry.Dad visits; I visit; we visit all the time; I’m visitingright now!
But that was exactly what Iwasn’tsupposed to do. There was no winning when you tried to convince someone with dementia that they were wrong. It frustrated them. Erica limited her visits because she admitted she couldn’t wrap her head around it. “Your Cartier watch is gone, remember?” she’d said back when Annielived in assisted living, before her official diagnosis. “You may have accidentally thrown it out.”
“No, I didn’t,” Annie disagreed. “I put it back in my jewelry box, as always.” Her eyes narrowed. “Why would I ever throw it out? It’sCartier.”
They’d gone back and forth until Annie outright accused Erica of stealing the twenty-thousand-dollar watch. Which, my issues with Erica aside, was really sad. Because it was Annie who’d encouraged my dad to start dating after my mom had died, and it was Annie who reassured my dad that, despite Erica beinga lotyounger than him, they made a great couple. Annie had loved my mom, but she also adored Erica.
