Jace followed him outside, but kept his mouth shut until Victor had a
cigarette lit and had inhaled a few times. Then Jace started slowly. “It’s
hard seeing her like that,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
Victor nodded. “Today was a good day. Sometimes she’s angry. Or
scared. Mom will react to me like I’m a stranger breaking into her home.
She can give the nurses hell too. That one in there, Sandra, she gets on
my nerves. I saw my mother tear into her once, screaming up a storm
about how she was going to call the police and have her shot, but Sandra
kept her cool.” Victor scowled at the concrete walkway, jaw clenching.
“I wish I could do that. You know I think it’s pointless to get angry about
things that can’t be changed. I can’t help it though. Part of me wants to
knock this place to the ground, brick by brick, just so I can take her home
again. No, fuck that. I want to destroy it just for the satisfaction. I want to
break the world for being the sort of place where this can happen.”
Jace remained quiet, letting Victor smoke his cigarette and not
commenting when he finished and lit another. Only when his face had
returned to its normal color did he dare to ask. “Does she ever remember
you?”
“Yes,” Victor said. “Less and less, but if I’m persistent, I can get
through to her. Or she’ll think I’m Richard. That’s my father. I guess I
look like him or something. When that happens, I try to play along,
hoping it’ll be a bridge back to me.” Victor closed his eyes and shook his
head. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“I wish I could help.”
Victor shook his head again, but then looked up. “When we go back
in, let me try by myself. I think it’s confusing for her that there are two of
us. Maybe you can talk to the nurse about us bringing her home.”
“Okay,” Jace said. “No problem.”
Except Victor’s attitude made the atmosphere at the nurses station
tense. Jace sidled up, tried a smile that Sandra didn’t return. Instead she
continued rolling up cutlery into cloth napkins.
“Any way I can help?” Jace asked.
“With your friend or in general?” she huffed.
“Sorry,” Jace said. “He doesn’t mean to act that way. He even said
what a good job you’re doing.”
“Ha!”
Okay, maybe Jace was laying it on thick. “Fine. He said he wished
he could keep his cool, like he saw you do with his mother.”
Sandra seemed somewhat placated by this. “It’s normal what he’s
going through,” she said. “Adults tend to cry. The young ones, they get
angry. Usually it’s a grandparent. When it happens to your parent…” She
shook her head. “That’s rough.”
“She’s all Victor has,” Jace said. “It’s just him and his mother.”
Sandra seemed taken aback by this. “No other family?”
“No one.”
She looked up from her task, hands still working. “Wife or
girlfriend?”
“Nobody. Just me.” And Star, he supposed. Jace wondered what she
thought of all this.
“You seem like a good friend,” Sandra said. After a moment, she
added. “I’m sorry he’s on his own. I didn’t know that.”
“I think he’ll be all right, once he adjusts. I mean, people get used to
it, right?”
“Their parents slowly forgetting who they are?” Sandra finished
rolling the last napkin and set it on the pile. “You want the fairy tale
answer or the truth?”
“The truth,” Jace said.
“We all lose our parents. One way or another, we watch them go,
and it’s never easy. Every single one of us goes through that trial, and I
can’t say you come out stronger, but you sure as hell appreciate your
parents more when they’re gone. With a slow death, at least you learn
that lesson soon enough to tell them.”
“I should have asked for the fairy tale version,” Jace said.
Sandra laughed. “Yes, you should have.”
Now seemed like a good time to try, while he had her laughing.
“Listen, do you think we can take Mrs. Hemingway home tomorrow for
the holiday? Just for the day.”
“I don’t recommend it,” she said. “I understand wanting to bring a
loved one home for Christmas, but at her stage of Alzheimer’s, you’re in
for a struggle. Getting her settled into her routine here was the best thing
for her.”
“Regardless,” Jace said. “If we wanted to try, just to see how she
does, would we be allowed?”
Sandra looked taken aback. “Of course! This isn’t a prison. Mr.
Hemingway has DPOA.”
“DPOA?”
“Durable power of attorney. If your friend wants to take his mother
out of here forever, he can. I’ve told him that myself, but I’ve also
chewed his head off for even suggesting it. I can’t divulge what’s in her
file. You’ll have to ask him how she came to be here, but I keep telling
him that taking care of someone in her condition is a twenty-four hour
job. Now that I know he’s alone, things make a lot more sense, but I’m
even more determined that she stay.”
“But it’s not up to you,” Jace repeated.
“No it’s not,” Sandra said, crossing meaty arms over her chest.
Jace would hate to tangle with her. Not that he intended to. “Sorry. I
just wanted to be sure I understood. He acts like this is all against his
will.”
Sandra let her arms drop. “Honey, nobody wants this for their
parents, even if it’s best for them. Like I said, the young ones are angry.
You want my advice?”
Jace nodded.
“Bring Christmas to her. Decorate the room, put up a small tree and
do it all here. Taking her home again isn’t going to bring her back, but a
little home here can do wonders. Not a miracle, but I think she’d enjoy
it.”
“Okay,” Jace said. “Thanks.”
Duty called Sandra away after that. Jace sat in the main room and
waited, thinking over what he had learned and trying to imagine what he
would do in a similar situation. He and his sister had always been braced
for their parents to die earlier than they were ready for. That fear came
with having older parents, but he hadn’t seriously considered one of them
slowly forgetting who they were.
Soon an old woman sat next to Jace and chatted to him about her
grandkids. She seemed happy enough, if not a little desperate for
conversation, which helped improve his opinion of the place. He talked
with her until Victor reappeared.
“Ready to go?”
“Yeah,” Jace said, standing and saying goodbye to the old woman.
On the way out the door, he braced himself and asked, “How did it go?”
“I was Richard for the rest of the visit, but at least she thought she
knew me. Better than being a stranger. Come on.”
During the drive home, Jace told him what Sandra had said. At least
about Christmas plans. Victor didn’t take it well.
“She doesn’t know. None of them do! My mom loved Christmas.
Maybe it will help her remember.”
“Maybe it won’t,” Jace said carefully. “When she still lived at home,
was she forgetting who you were?”
“Yes,” Victor hissed. “But that could have been a bad phase.”
“I don’t think it works that way.”
“Suddenly you’re an expert?”
Jace could feel the heat of Victor’s glare. “No, but that nurse deals
with this sort of thing every day. I can’t say I like that place, but your
mom seems cared for. And safe. Can you honestly offer her that at
home?”
“Do I have a choice?” Victor shot back.
Jace swallowed, unsure if he wanted to go there, but he and Victor
had never shied away from the truth. Not with each other. “She also said
you have power of attorney, so yes, you do have a choice.”
Victor was quiet. They were parking in front of the house when he
spoke again, his voice terse. “I don’t have a choice because you’re right.
I know I can’t take care of her the way she needs me to. They can, and I
resent them for it because it should be me. I’m just a fuck-up. It should
be me, but I know I can’t do it.”
“You’re not a fuck-up,” Jace said, reaching over to take his hand.
“And you’re still there for her. Maybe deep down she still recognizes
you. She would want you to keep visiting and would be proud of your
bravery.”
“Jace—” Victor said, sounding like he wanted him to stop.
But he wasn’t quite done. “Tomorrow is Christmas. We’ll go there in
the morning, decorate her room, and count how many times we make her
smile, no matter who she thinks we are.”
Victor sighed, looked out the window at the house. Dusk was
approaching, and no windows were lit. A house was an empty shell
without a family inside.
“Deal?” Jace pressed.
Victor nodded. “Deal.”
* * * * *
“You’re glad I’m here, aren’t you?” Jace breathed, touching the tips
of their noses together.
From beneath him, Victor smiled, reaching up to toy with one of his
ears. “I never said I wasn’t.”
“But you never said you were,” Jace prompted.
“Okay. I’m glad you’re here.”
Jace kissed him and grinned. “I knew it!”
“And yet, you still needed me to say it.”
“Yeah.”
Victor’s hands found his hips and ran up the sides of his torso,
bunching up his shirt the higher they went. “Take it off.”
Jace pushed himself up to a sitting position, Victor’s hard bulge
beneath his rump. He stripped off his shirt and tossed it to the bedroom
floor. From the side table, a little gray kitten had its huge eyes fixated on
them.
“Uh, what’s Samson staring at?” Jace asked.
“He probably thinks we’re fighting for dominance,” Victor said.
“He’s waiting to see who wins.”
“Well I am on top.”
Victor smirked. “We both know that’s not how things will play out.”
Jace glared at him, forcefully pulling Victor’s shirt up and over his
head. Then Jace stretched out on his side next to him so he could run
fingers from his chest to his stomach and back again. “So if Samson’s
never seen anything like this before, that means you haven’t gotten much
action.”
“At home, at least,” Victor said. After a humble expression, he
added. “Or anywhere. Not since your last visit.”
“Really?” Jace said a little too hopefully.
“Don’t take it as a sign of commitment,” Victor said.
“I wasn’t.”
“You were.”
Jace shrugged. “Okay, so maybe the thought crossed my mind.”
Victor gave him a knowing look, then rolled over on top of him.
Bracing himself with his arms, he pressed down with his hips, rubbing
their crotches together in a steady rhythm. “You still like it slow?” he
asked.
“I guess.”
“You guess?”
Jace bit his lip, thought about drawing blood just to distract from the
question. And the emotions filling him. “I don’t do this with anyone but
you.”
“You mean—”
“I’m a top,” Jace said.
Victor chuckled, but then his face grew serious. “Really?”
“Yeah.”
“We don’t have to—”
“No!” Jace said. “I like it. But only with you.”
Victor’s eyes searched his. “Should I take that as a sign of
commitment?”
“No, but only because I don’t want to scare you away.” Jace laughed
at Victor’s glare. “Commitment or not, when is this going to end? Are
we going to be ninety years old and still playing this game?”
“I hope so,” Victor said, but then shook his head and rolled off to the
side. Propped up on one elbow, he considered Jace. “No, eventually
you’re going to meet someone worthy of you and wander off.”
“Will he be pretty?”
“Breathtaking.”
“And he’ll want a commitment?”
Victor thought about it briefly. “He’ll propose on the first date and
expect the wedding to happen on the second.”
“And on the third date?”
“Matching tattoos.”
Jace sat up. “And if I tire of this gorgeous, clingy man?”
“Then you’ll come back here to discover that I’ve kept my promise.”
Love. Victor still had it for him after all this time. And if they
wanted, they could keep making it together for the rest of their lives. In
fact, Jace was up for making some right now. But first he gently picked
up the kitten, set him outside the room, and closed the door.
Chapter Nineteen
On Christmas morning, Jace showered at Victor’s and then drove to
his parents’ house. Gone were the days anyone woke up at five to
celebrate. When Jace arrived at nine, his sister had just crawled out of
bed. He went through rituals that once thrilled him but now left him
bored. Not that the presents weren’t nice, or that he was too grown-up for
such things, but this year he had more on his mind. When his mother
expressed frustration at how withdrawn he seemed, Jace apologized and
told them about the nursing home.
“That explains a lot,” Michelle said. “Greg mentioned that he hadn’t
seen Victor around lately.”
“I don’t know who I feel more sorry for,” his mother said, pressing a
hand to her cheek. “What Victor is going through is terrible, but to forget
your own children…”
The festive mood became somber until Jace mentioned their plans to
give Mrs. Hemingway a good Christmas. That sent his family into action.
They repurposed a few presents, such as scented candles and a coffee
table book of wildlife photos, Jace’s dad wrapping them while Serena
gathered food they could take along. Once his car was packed with these
things, Jace headed over to Victor’s.
Meeting him at the door, Victor seemed somewhat pensive. Jace
asked him to help load the Christmas decorations they had sorted out the
night before. That got him moving and more optimistic. At the nursing
home, Jace was surprised to see Sandra on duty again.
“Don’t you ever go home?” he teased.
“No,” she grumped. “Even if I got time off, I probably wouldn’t
know where home is.”
Jace slipped her a frosted Christmas cookie for her troubles. Then
came the moment of truth: carrying boxes into Mrs. Hemingway’s room.
He worried she might find it upsetting or confusing and send them away.
She appeared uncertain at first, clearly not recognizing either of them,
but when the first decoration came out of the box, she was hooked. Jace
had pictured her sitting in her chair and watching them work, but she
wanted to help. The part of her that loved the holidays remained intact.
Mrs. Hemingway’s roommate, an elderly black woman who
repeatedly smacked her lips over her toothless gums, also seemed to
enjoy it. Jace hooked her up with some cookies as well, and she treated
