We Are Not Ourselves


48


It was a Tuesday in early July. They were lying in bed with the windows open. She tried reading a novel but felt jittery and distracted until she gave up and retrieved one of her Alzheimer’s books from the pile she kept hidden under the bed. Ed was supposed to be reading, but he had his hands folded across his chest and was looking at the ceiling.

Four months had passed since the diagnosis. She had gotten swept up in the strange logic of that moment—Don’t tell a soul—but it was clear that Ed couldn’t be counted on to know when enough was enough.

She couldn’t just tell people herself, because she knew Ed wouldn’t forgive her for betraying his trust.

She closed her book and propped herself on her elbow to face him. “How about if we have a dinner? Invite our closest friends over. We can tell them all at once.”

“I’d prefer if we didn’t.”

“It would be easier than telling everyone individually.”

“Who says we have to tell them individually?”

“A nice dinner party,” she said. “It would make it feel like a team effort to tackle this thing. I’ll see if I can get it together for Saturday.”

He gritted his teeth. “You sound determined.”

“We’ll have to tell Connell.”

“That’s where I draw the line,” he said, almost growling. “I’m not telling him yet. I don’t want him to see me that way, reduced like that. I still want to be his father.”

“You’ll always be his father,” she said, but instead of soothing him she only disturbed herself with thoughts of what that “always” implied—the time when the disease would have tangled his synapses and hobbled him, when he would no longer be all there.

“In any event,” Ed said, “I want to wait.”

Connell was often playing baseball or in the city or at a friend’s house. When he was home, he stayed in his room. If she was extremely careful, she could keep it from him a little longer.

“Fine,” she said. “We’ll hold it back a bit. But you’d better prepare for it. We can’t keep it from him forever.”

“I could.”

“Honey, no offense—you couldn’t.”

“If I’m not alive,” Ed said darkly, “then he doesn’t have to see me like that. He can remember me as I was.”

“That’s nice. That’s just lovely. You get that goddamned thought out of your head this instant. You’re not going anywhere.”

“If it could just stay like this,” he said, his tone changing, “I could live with it.” He pulled the sheet up under his chin.

“Maybe the drugs will start working,” she said. “Or if these drugs don’t work, there’ll be others that work better. The science will catch up to this disease. And we’re going to do everything we can in the meantime. We’re going to be very busy. You’re going to stay alert. You’re going to read a lot.” She looked at his book on the nightstand, which he hadn’t picked up in days. “We’ll do the crossword together, we’ll go to plays and operas. We’ll go on trips. We’ll keep this thing at bay.” She took his hand; it felt stiff, a little cold. She put her other hand on his chest to feel his heart beat.

She didn’t know how much of what she’d said she believed, but it felt good to say it. She went back to her book. The chapter she was reading discussed how the disruption of context might accelerate the patient’s decline. Familiar settings and people, it suggested, could have a prophylactic effect on memory loss.

She thought of how strenuously Ed had fought leaving Jackson Heights. Had she exposed him to harm in moving him to Bronxville? A guilty feeling took root in her thoughts and blossomed into panic.

“We can’t afford to wait to tell Connell,” she said. “What if he finds out for himself? What if he overhears me on the phone?”

“Don’t talk on the phone.”

“We have to tell him tomorrow,” she said.

“Give it another week.”

“Fine,” she said. “This Saturday is the dinner. The one after that, we tell Connell.”

“He has a game that day.”

“You have his schedule memorized?”

“He plays every Saturday.”

“After his game, then. Trust me. It’s the best thing.”

“Okay,” he said. “I trust you.”

She was strangely disappointed to hear him give in so easily. She understood that this new relationship of theirs signaled the beginning of the end of the old one. He would have to become something like a child to her.

? ? ?

The afternoon of the dinner, as she was running around getting the last things ready, Ed came in and told her to call it off.

“It’s not true,” he said. “It’s a lie we’d be telling them.”

“Honey,” she said.

“It’s a lie.”

It was too late; the Cudahys, possibly the McGuires, were already on their way. Dishes were simmering on the stove.

“These are our friends.”

“It’s a lie.”

“Would it be easier for you if I told them myself?”

“Do what you want,” he said, waving his hand at her in a way that called to mind an angry old man.

“They’ll be here in a little while. Tell me what to do.”

“This is your affair,” he said. He ran the tap and put a glass under it. Water filled the glass and spilled up over the sides. He held it under for a while. It looked as if he was making a little fountain out of it.

“I think we should do it the way we discussed.”

“No!” he said sharply. “They don’t need to know anything. It’s all a lie.”

“Do you think they can’t tell anything?” she found herself shouting. “You think they can’t figure it out? You think they don’t have eyes and ears?” She paused. “And brains?” She regretted it as soon as she’d said it.

“They won’t see anything,” he said, seething. “There’s nothing to see.” He left the room.

She found him stewing on the front stairs and took a seat beside him. “We have to tell them sometime.” She reached to touch him, but he flinched away. The neighbors across the street were pruning their flowers. She hadn’t met them yet. She had wanted to wait to introduce herself until she felt herself to be operating from a position of strength, but that time hadn’t come, and she felt too self-conscious to go over there now that they had looked at each other so many times across hedgerows without waving.

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“Would you rather nobody knew?”

He didn’t answer.

“Because if you want to do this alone, just us and Connell, I can’t. Maybe I’m not as strong as you. I thought I was, but I need all the support I can get. Now more than ever.”

He turned and looked at her.

“I won’t say anything tonight,” she said. “We can do this when you’re ready. On one condition.”

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