“But you ride?”
He was cute, this biker guy. I found myself wondering if there were full sleeves underneath his leather jacket. And what else might be under there.
“I’ve got a Honda 900 cc in my garage,” I said, “just waiting for its momma to come home and take her for a spin.”
Now he leaned forward, assessing me. He seemed pleased with what he saw. “How ’bout you give me your number, and we can go for a spin sometime?”
I found an old ticket on the dash just as the light changed to green and I steeled myself for the honking and cursing. But no one did honk as I scribbled down my phone number. Perhaps it was because Aiden rode a Harley that they didn’t want to mess with him? Or perhaps it was because sometimes people were willing to wait for a glimpse of young romance?
I sped Aiden through the early relationship process, from first date to boyfriend without passing Go. We went camping at Yosemite. We hugged the curves of coastal roads on our bikes. We started our days with sex and, if Aiden hadn’t been smoking pot, ended them with it, too. But afterwards, when we fell asleep, we were always sprawled out and separate—together in our desire to be alone. It wasn’t the love from a romance movie, but it worked for us.
Getting married, I’ll admit, was my idea, and at first, it wasn’t very well received.
“You want to get married?”
I may as well have suggested we bungee jump without a cord. And I understood Aiden’s surprise. I wasn’t a “white dress” kind of girl—this was out of left field. Yet there I was, close to thirty, and it had been on my mind.
“Well,” I said. “Not if this is your reaction.”
It wasn’t that I’d expected Aiden to drop to one knee and pull out a huge rock and get all choked up. God, if he had, I’d probably have said no. But I had started thinking that if we were going to do it, now would be a good time. Mom had been a year younger than me when she got married. By my age, she was pregnant.
“Okay, just forget it,” I said.
“Now, hang on a sec, let a man catch up.” Aiden’s frown morphed into a grin, and he pointed at it. “What if this is my reaction?”
He was sweet, Aiden, and if I’m honest with myself, easily led. He was happy to go along with my plan. But in the end, marriage wasn’t enough.
“I want a baby.”
They say something happens to a woman when she reaches thirty-five and her fertility starts to ebb. Even the coldest, least maternal women start to feel the twinge. Maybe that’s what it was? Kids weren’t exactly something I’d always wanted, but all of a sudden, I started noticing pregnant women. I started looking in strollers and smiling at grubby faces.
Unfortunately, when it came to having a baby, Aiden was less easily led. “Let’s wait a few months,” he said. But a few months became a year. The clock was ticking, and not just the biological clock. I was forgetting things by then. There was no firm diagnosis, but the writing was on the wall.
“Jesus Christ, Anna!” it became, after a while. “Will you let up about a fucking baby? Am I nothing more than a sperm donor to you?”
I wanted to be outraged. To ask how he could even ask me that. But by that stage, we both knew it was an accurate description for what he was. We rarely talked about anything meaningful anymore. The motorcycle trips were a thing of the past. We’d put our old camping equipment out on the sidewalk on garbage day. I may as well have put my ovaries there, too.
So I agreed with Aiden that a baby was a bad idea. And a few weeks later, when I was officially diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, I left.
*
It’s visitors’ day at Rosalind House, and we’re in the garden again—a practical decision, as with Jack and Helen and all the boys here, we couldn’t all fit in my room. Apart from the sun, which is shining right in my eyes, I like it out here. It’s Sunday, and most of the residents have visitors. Southern Lady sits opposite a woman who bears such an uncanny resemblance to her—from the floral dress to the puff of yellow hair—that she has to be her sister. Really Old Lady has a visitor, a young man in gray sweatpants who, age-wise, is most likely a great-grandson, or even a great-great. Young Guy is flanked by an older woman who is either a mother or a grandmother and a younger woman, about my age. And Eric swans around the lot of us, like a King visiting his villagers.
“Can I have a ride in your wheelchair, please? I mean, if you’re not using it.”
My nephew Hank beams at Really Old Lady. Clearly he’s very proud of himself for saying please. He’s definitely not expecting the pinch on the arm that he gets from Helen. “Ow, Mom! What?”
Really Old Lady fiddles with her hearing aid. “What did you say, young man?”
“Nothing,” Helen says hurriedly. “Nothing at all.” She takes Hank by the arm and drags him away, toward the far end of the lawn, where Ethan and Brayden are playing.