“Buddy, I can’t take you out of here, you’ll die.”
He squeezed my hand. “You only live once.”
“Well, yeah, but let’s keep you around for a while longer.”
To my horror, tears appeared in his eyes. “I don’t want to be here awhile longer, I want to see the lake. Please… I’ll never see it again.”
“I’ll do it,” Caitlyn volunteered, surprising the shit out of me. “You’re right, you only live once.”
Before I could open my mouth, she was out the door and stealing a wheelchair. The funny thing was, with Amelia gone, nobody even questioned it. She wheeled it close to the bed. “Step one is a success.”
I shrugged and went for it. Wenton’s electrodes were wireless, so I didn’t have that problem to deal with. I frowned at how light he was when I lifted him from the bed and sat him in the chair. Checking to see if the coast was clear, we zipped down the hallway, not breathing until we were out the door.
“Robert is bringing the convertible around,” Caitlyn said, her eyes shining.
“Good idea.”
We most likely would be arrested for what we were doing, but I had a great lawyer and loads of money. I could handle the heat. We were going to bust Wenton out of here for one last day in the sun. Robert brought the convertible while Caitlyn strolled Wenton out the service entrance unnoticed. As soon as we got Wenton in the convertible and the wheelchair stashed in the trunk, he was beyond thrilled and squealing with joy.
“Shhh, we don’t want to get caught,” I cautioned as Robert backed out of the driveway.
People had begun to take notice, but we ignored them as Robert sped away. As soon as we were clear of the facility, I turned up the tunes, playing all of Wenton’s favorites. He was humming Guns N’ Roses “Sweet Child of Mine” as we rode off into the distance. He made me sad that he couldn’t sing it at the top of his lungs like normal.
Robert drove us to the lake where Wenton and I grew up. It wasn’t far from the facility so we could be back in under fifteen minutes if necessary.
It had been years since we were on the shores that were the symbol of our childhood. I carried Wenton to the water’s edge and placed his feet in the water. Robert had made some calls and left to quickly pick us up a picnic with food, dishes, a checkered blanket, the works. I had him get some towels and a change of clothes too should we decide we wanted to get wet.
It would be a little while before he got back, so we just watched the calm, cool water together. Of course, it was very metaphoric because we knew we were on the edge of a great change in all of our lives. The lake was vast, a large and beautiful body of water. It made the little lake at Wenton’s facility look like a puddle. Wenton and I had looked out at that view so many times in our lives, planning our future. It was so strange to be in a place where the future was here already. In fact, for Wenton, it was almost the end. I had no capacity to deal with the emotions that were bubbling around inside me, so rather than revert to sex, I did the next best thing, laughter.
“Wenton? Do you remember when we went fishing with Grandpa Preston?” I knew this story was one of Wenton’s major triumphs. I wanted Caitlyn to hear it from Wenton himself.
“Yes. I hated fishing,” he pouted.
“You told Grandpa you didn’t want to go because you wanted the fish to stay in the lake.”
“I didn’t want them to die, and I hated to eat fish. The bones poked my mouth,” he remembered with distaste.
“Yeah, and what did you do?”
“Well, you and he caught a lot of fish.”
“I think we caught twelve.” We had a banner fishing day, I recalled.
“I was just hanging over the boat, putting my hands in the water.” Wenton laughed at his devilishness.
I laughed. “Yes, those little hands were under the water, quietly unstringing and releasing each one.”
“Grandpa was like, ‘Where are all the dead fish coming from?’ Cause some of them already died.” Wenton did his best impersonation of our stuffy grandfather, and I nearly fell over laughing.
It was our grandfather’s one and only fishing trip with us. He was a sports fisherman who loved to compete in local fishing events and prided himself on his expert skills. He had invited a group of people over for a fish fry with freshly caught fish, but since Wenton released them all, he had to get store bought. I don’t think his reputation survived that incident.
“And we made a deal that we would lie and say Grandpa didn’t catch any.” I was so proud of that day.
“And we never told anyone ever,” Wenton confessed. He looked at Caitlyn. “Until now.”
“Our mom was so pissed because she knew something was up, but we stood together, and Grandpa nearly killed us,” I added.
“Then there was that time we stole all of cousin Patty’s undies from the dryer,” Wenton said.
My nostrils flared. “Oh yeah, she was visiting us from Maine, and she was bothering you, right?”
“She got mad at me because I got permanent ink on her purse.” Wenton looked a bit guilty about this one.
“You played connect the dots with the Louis Vuitton symbols with a sharpie,” I reminded him.
He frowned, looking angry now. “And she called the police. They got mad, but I didn’t go to jail.”
“So, you stole all her underwear out of the dryer on the day she was leaving. That was brilliant because she had our maid wash all her clothes since she was going home for summer break after our house. You left her like one pair of dirties.”
“Again…we knew nothing,” he said, his fingers coming up to his lips to lock them up.
Caitlyn slapped her thigh. “You guys were terrible.”
“We weren’t the only ones,” I defended my brother. “People didn’t always get us, they were so distant and judgmental, we were better off without them. Right, Wenton?”
But Wenton didn’t answer. He was starting to show some signs of fatigue, his breathing had become shallow, and his eyes rolled in his head.
“Wenton!” I yelled.
To my enormous relief, he snapped out of it and came back to us. I knew we had precious little time left.
“Maybe it’s time for us to go back, buddy.” I wasn’t ready to take him back, but he seemed to be fading.
Robert screeched to a halt and began unloading the car. Along with the requested items, he brought collapsible camping chairs and a table. I was seriously impressed with all he was able to wrangle in such a short time. Another big bonus was in order.
“Wow, you’re amazing,” I said.
“God bless Target,” was his dry response.
We set out the picnic he brought. Nothing too extravagant, but some of Wenton’s favorites, peanut butter and jelly. Brie and grapes, juice boxes and some wine for Caitlyn and me. Sour Cream & Onion Pringles and Snickers. Just what the doctor ordered. I brought Wenton over to the table.
“Look at this, Wenton,” I said, showing him the spread, “It’s a picnic!”
“Ohhhh, take a picture of all three of us,” he said as we scooted together and took a selfie in front of the food. “Send it to me,” he demanded.