Luke grins and wanders off toward Eric. In the doorway, he pauses, staring at the thin, shiny strip of metal edging on the carpet, separating the parlor from the hall. Then he lifts his foot to knee height, stepping over the strip as though it were a raised bar or stair. At first I don’t know what he’s doing. Then I do.
The first time I saw Mom do this was at my basketball championship. She’d been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s six months earlier. She’d sat in the third row during the game, cheering and clapping when we got a three-pointer (and occasionally, when the other team did). After we won, everyone tramped onto the court, greeting us with hugs and high fives. As the shooter of the winning team, I was lifted onto my team’s shoulders and tossed about. It was from there that I saw Mom. She was on the edge of the court, frowning at a line on the floor as though it were some sort of intricate puzzle she couldn’t figure out. I tapped someone to let me down, but before I could get to her, she shimmied up her skirt and stepped over the line as if it were a waist-high fence. A few people looked, but most were distracted by the commotion on the court. Once over the line, she smiled at me, a little relieved, and gave me a hug. “Congratulations, darling. Great game.”
When I told Jack about it, he told me that for some people, depth perception is one of the first things the brain casts off when it starts to degenerate, making it difficult to tell the difference between flat and raised, high and low. That’s the thing about dementia: You can forget for a moment, even an hour. But sooner or later, dementia reminds you—and everyone else—that it’s there.
*
Before I had Alzheimer’s, I used to listen to a radio competition called Beat the Bomb. Callers who dialed in had the opportunity to play for up to twenty-five thousand dollars. When the game began, the clock would start ticking, and every few seconds, an eerie, prerecorded voice would announce an amount of money. “Five … hundred … dollars. One … thousand … dollars. Five … thousand … dollars.” It kept going up. As soon as the contestant said stop, the money was theirs, but the longer they waited, the more they risked the bomb (buzzer) going off and getting nothing.
When I was sixteen, Jack and I came home one day to find Mom in the garage. The car was running, and she was in the passenger seat with the car windows open. Her head lolled against the open door. I ran to call 911 while Jack dragged her from the car. By the time I got back to them, she was awake. Drowsy, making no sense, but awake.
“If I don’t remember,” she muttered. “Will I have been here at all?”
When the paramedics arrived, I listened as Jack explained that she had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and that she was easily confused. She must have thought she was driving somewhere, he said. Or perhaps she thought it was her favorite chair and decided to have a sleep. I wondered if Jack really believed that. As he talked, I stared at Mom, trying to catch her eye. “Is that what happened?” I’d whispered. “Were you confused?” The fact that she wouldn’t look at me told me all I needed to know.
After that, we never left her alone. She had a nurse that stayed with her all day. Dad had already left us, so Jack or I slept by her side at night. After a few months, she went into a nursing home. She’d gone downhill so fast that by that point, even if she’d still wanted to kill herself, she wouldn’t have known how. The window had closed.
Most people who want to kill themselves can wake up and decide, You know what? Today’s not the day. If I feel terrible tomorrow, I’ll do it then. Or the day after. Maybe next year. But the thing about having Alzheimer’s is that you’re a ticking clock. You don’t have the luxury of waiting. You have to beat the bomb.
*
I’m back in my spot by the window, sitting in my chair, looking into the dark night. I wonder if, after I’m gone, there will be an imprint left in this chair. A marker that I was once here. I won’t leave much else in the way of markers. No money. No friends. No children.