Page 55 of Good Days Bad Days
Present Day
My father had alerted Shore Path that we were on our way, and Nurse Mitchell did a good job of preparing Betty for our arrival. She knows who I am as soon as I walk into the room, calling me Lottie in the same irritated tone she used the last time I saw her on a “good day.”
But within a few seconds, Betty calls me Laura and refers to Olivia by my childhood nickname, making it clear that today is a bit different. Not exactly a good day but not fully a bad one either. I’m not sure if that’s entirely positive, but I keep my mental fingers crossed as Nurse Mitchell excuses herself, leaving us alone with Betty.
I thought it’d be hard to explain to Olivia that my mother might be a little pricklier than her loving grandmothers on her father’s side and Ian’s side, but she seems unfazed, even when my mother sends a cutting barb my way every so often.
“I volunteered at Mountainview for my NHS community service hours, remember?” she reminded me when we got into the room. “They had a whole memory wing there.”
“Aren’t you a sweet thing,” Betty declares from her armchair when I introduce her to her only grandchild. Olivia accepts the offered kiss on the cheek.
“You too. I like your green chair. It’s so regal looking.”
“Yes, my husband got it for me. He’s a kind man. Are you married?” she asks Olivia, who seems to find the question funny.
“No, no. Not yet.”
“You have time but might need a haircut and some rouge.”
“Olivia is wonderful the way she is,” I snap back, remembering how my mother’s critiques had stuck with me over the years. “Besides, she’s only nineteen.”
“So, you’re not going to school for your MRS, then?” She makes an old joke I heard several times as a kid.
“No. More like a bachelor’s in arts,” she banters back. “Grandma, how old were you when you got married?”
Betty’s eyes roll upward like she’s counting, but when she doesn’t come up with a number, I fill in the little bit of information I know about my parents’ marriage.
“Thirty-one. Well, thirty-one when I was born. So, a year before that I think.”
“Is that right?” Betty asks as though we are talking about an old friend instead of her own history. I know it’s part of her memory loss, the Swiss cheese, as Nurse Mitchell calls it. I have holes in my memory as well, but for very different reasons.
As Betty and Olivia chat, I pull out a deck of cards, shuffling them a dozen times, keeping an eye on the door for our food delivery and hoping it gets here before Betty remembers who I am again.
“I read your book last night when I got to town,” Olivia adds, catching my interest, as I deal three hands in a clockwise order.
“My book?”
“Yes.The Classy Homemaker.” Olivia retrieves the book from the box we brought with us and lays it on the corner of the roll-away table. “I didn’t know you wrote a book.”
My mother glances at the weathered hardcover a few times and then stares daggers in my direction.
“I wish you’d all stop digging through my things, Lottie. The girl doesn’t know better, but you should and so does your father,” she scolds, as though my childhood mother just popped into the conversation from another room.
Her reprimand releases a flood of frustration inside me as I think about everything we’re doing to clean up the mess she left behind—our time, our money, and the physical and mental effort we’ve put in. I open my mouth to respond, but Olivia stops me with a steady gaze.
“I’ll go first,” Olivia says, flipping the top card of the deck over.
I close my mouth with a click, which stops my retort but doesn’t stop the resentment behind it. It’s so hard not to engage when my mom’s hardened edge returns on her more lucid days.
Olivia’s redirection works, and we all ignore the book on the table, playing silently until our meal arrives.
“Ooo, this looks like a treat,” Nurse Mitchell says as she brings in the brown paper bags of food.
“I hope you didn’t let Mrs. Thompson near it,” my mother bites. “She stole my brownie after dinner last night. I saw her chomping on it in her room.” I cringe, filled with a familiar embarrassment at her sharp complaint.
The paranoia isn’t new, though it’s likely heightened by her illness and new location. But even when I lived at home, my mother’s anxiety increased as her hoarding intensified. Eventually, she was sure anyone walking on the shore path was trying to peek into our house. To my mortification she’d often yell at them if they stopped for too long within her sight. She also insisted our house be removed from the boat tour’s script and opted to have our mail delivered to a PO box in town rather than the box on the dock.
The one time her paranoia was merited was when CPS showed up and she blamed Miss Johnson, saying my teacher made the call, that she had it in for her. In that case, she was right.
