~Aging (September 1)~
Doctor’s note: Patient is showing no signs of improvement; her energy levels are deteriorating rapidly. May recover but most likely has slightly over two weeks to live.
Dear Matilda,
My vertigo is worse. I can’t twitch my head without feeling like my vision is continuing to move without me, and I stagger whenever I try to walk. The numbness is now in my left hand as well as my right, and it’s growing harder to keep a straight grip on the pen. Plucking at my arm and fingers, I test them for life; though I feel nothing, I continue out of habit.
When Shrep and her parents came to drive me to the hospital, California’s cool dawn air carried hints of dew, and swaths of purple enveloped the sky. I hobbled out to meet them, gripping the doorknob to steady myself. My back ached, and my vision swung left and right and up and down, dizzying and maddening. Guillain Barre ages me in time lapse.
Shpresa swept off her imaginary top hat when she met me, and trying her best to grin, offered me her arm. I accepted gratefully, and we toddled towards their family’s small Hyundai.
“What’ve the neighbors been eating these days?” I inquired.
“Pardon?”
I repeated the question carefully, taking time to shape my syllables. Guillain Barre makes my voice nasal and unintelligible unless I concentrate.
“Barbecue! It was wonderful,” Shpresa replied sprightly, fingers tightening on my arm as I stumbled.
Straightening, I grinned. “Thanks for helping me up. I can’t believe your family hasn’t asked them to fix that vent, though.”
“I mean– I feel like the barbeque’s worth it,” Shrep confided. “If we fixed the vent, we couldn’t smell anything they cooked, good or bad. It’s the greatest feeling in the world to be standing in the shower and half choking on the smell of burning oil. It’s like frankincense and myrrh.” She tipped her nose up into the air and inhaled noisily, almost falling over herself. I had to clamp onto her arm in an attempt to ground her, grinning at her flailing arms.
“Hey, Shrep, cut it out! My side hurts enough already, please stop.”
Glancing down guiltily, Shpresa bit her lip. “Oh– I– I’m sorry, Lai. I didn’t mean to–”
“I was joking,” I amended hastily. “Please–keep going.”
Shrep hid her face quickly. Then she shrugged and straightened, trying to relax and mostly failing. “How’s the motor-neuron disorder?”
“Just about the same as yesterday, thanks for asking,” I returned, matching her buoyant tone. “My vertigo and numbness are fine. They just make me look a little tipsy.”
Opening her mouth, Shrep paused, then drew into herself as storm clouds hovered near the edges of her visage. “I wish Aunt Amanda were back.”
Oh, dear. Not this again. “It’s fine,” I interjected. “She has her business; let’s just leave her alone.”
But Shpresa plowed forward: “She’s almost never around. I thought if it was just like old times, you know, the three of us again… But now she’s gone.” Shrep dragged her hand down the side of her face in despair. “I guess you’re right; I guess I shouldn’t dream”—Shrep gesticulated falteringly–“I shouldn’t fantasize.”
Pausing, we let currents of wind crisp with autumn’s cool touch whisper around us.
Finally, Shrep asked dully, “Do you know why she left?”
“Went to find something, I think.” I scooted into the back seat, and Shrep followed. “Have you been writing anything recently?”
She froze, then shook herself out of her stupor, flashing a grin. “Yeah. You could say that. It’s not really working out, though. I’m already on my sixth draft.”
She seemed so despondent at that moment; I was taken aback. “You alright, Shrep?”
Shrugging, Shpresa turned away, allowing the shadows to swallow her features. “Fine.”
Matilda, as my journal, you know as well as I that I should probably be more worried about myself right now, but something’s eating at Shrep. I think if she only believed in our friendship’s tenacity–then she’d confide in me.
Until I write again,
Wang Xin Lai
Photo credit: pixabay.com/photos/hand-human-woman-grown-up-hands-3666974/