Susan entered her thumb into the lock-reader of the apartment she shared with John Calvin, her father. The whisper of a click that followed was apparently enough to clue her father, who whipped open the door and personally ushered her inside. As usual, he gave his grown-up daughter an enthusiastic hug, crushing her cheek to his slender chest. Aside from his height — a couple inches over six and a half feet — he resembled her closely: hair straight and mousy brown, though shorter than his daughter’s; eyes blue; chin undimpled and a bit prominent compared with his gaunt neck. “Welcome home, kitten.” He glanced at the Vox on his wrist. “You’re later than you expected.”
Susan did not have to consult her own wrist computer to know it was after seven thirty. “I stopped to talk to Nate.”
John’s brows rose. Closing the door with a foot, he gestured toward the kitchen to indicate he would make her some food, though the conversation had nothing to do with dinner. “You rode all the way to the hospital to talk to a robot when you have a perfectly good father waiting for you at home?”
Susan responded to the gesture first. “I grabbed a sandwich on the way home.” She had considered waiting until she arrived to eat, but it seemed pointless. Her father whipped up some of the most unique and scrumptious meals, but he had not eaten with her, or anyone else, in more than twenty years, not since the death of his wife, Susan’s mother, Amanda Calvin. A portrait of the only woman he had ever loved still took up much of the far wall of the living room. As a young child, Susan had thought little of her father’s quirk, though she did pine for the days when all three of them had eaten together as a family.
John Calvin did not allow his daughter off the hook, though he did lower his gesturing hand to his side. “And what could N8-C supply that I couldn’t?”
“Medical expertise, for one thing.” Susan studied her father in the overhead lighting. She had heard of situations where adult children left for a year or two, then returned to find their parents startlingly older. When children returned to school from summer vacation, they always looked so much different to their friends’ parents, yet exactly the same to their own. Family members as close as she and her father never noticed the years creeping over their loved ones, so she tried to examine her father through the eyes of a stranger.
He was now fifty-two years old, and Susan thought he appeared younger. Gray hair flecked his temples but had not yet found a toehold in other parts of his scalp. When she looked closely, she did notice a few lines around his mouth, forehead, and eyes. She could think of nothing in his recent actions to suggest he might fall victim to any form of dementia. He still worked full-time at U. S. Robots and Mechanical Men. He showed no propensity for mangling names, forgetting why he entered a room, or mysteriously discovering his wallet in the freezer. Neither of them had ever worn glasses or needed corrective-vision procedures, and he read without the aid of a magnifying lens or adjustment to the focus of his Vox. He had been thin almost to the point of gauntness for as long as she had known him, but he did not act in any way sickly. She had the same tendency to lose track of hunger in times of activity and stress, particularly over the past year.
Given the events of the day, Susan could not help imagining John Calvin as a patient in the Winter Wine Dementia Facility, requiring full-time care. She had smothered the thought while she toured the unit but could not help conjuring up the scenario several times since leaving it. Now, standing directly in her father’s presence, her consideration of the matter seemed more real and confusing than ever. Of course, she would continue to visit him every day he remembered her and responded positively to her presence. Logically, she knew that if he developed dementia, a time would come when he no longer cared if she came or not, could not differentiate her from a stranger. All that would remain was an empty John Calvin–shaped shell, without memory or reason. What purpose did it serve to nurture such a pitiful thing? Whether or not he felt at peace, and she doubted he would, it would prove little more than torture to her.
Susan had learned to ignore what other people thought of her. She had, at times, been a curve buster, a swot, the type of student who appears to value learning over social outlets. She could never win a beauty contest. She would never bow to societal pressures, would not visit a human vegetable, even one who had once been her beloved father, simply for appearances.
John Calvin cleared his throat. “Are you stunned by my ravishing charm?”
Only then Susan realized she was still staring at her father. With a quick shake of her head, she refocused her attention on the familiar furniture: a tan sectional sofa just beginning to fray at the edges, an oblong coffee table nestled into the muted semicircle of couch, and the metal and glass shelving that took up most of the wall space, supporting everything from the television/ stereo to her father’s journals and a few classical books, mostly physics and mechanics texts. “Sorry. Just lost in thought.” She took a seat at the far end of the sectional.
John Calvin also sat. “An enigma already? I wouldn’t think there’s as much to puzzle over in a dementia unit.”
“This is more of a what-if dilemma,” Susan admitted. “There’s an area devoted entirely to end-stage dementia, and it’s got me more angry than stymied.”
“Angry?” Susan’s father pressed. “‘Frustrated,’ ‘wretched,’ ‘miserable’ seem more appropriate.”
Susan sighed. She did not wish to hash over the same ground with her father as she already had with Nate. “The nurses fawn over these patients, speaking to them as if they could understand, treating every ingrown hair and patch of dry skin, vigorously clearing every bit of mucus from the depths of their lungs, styling their hair, and clipping their nails.”
John blinked. A moment passed in silence before he said, “Did you want the nurses to verbally abuse them? To beat them? To leave them filthy and unkempt?”
Susan waved the madness away. “Of course not. I would never justify causing suffering.” She sighed deeply. “But why do we need to spend scarce health-care resources prolonging suffering when it could be better used battling illnesses we can treat? Or even researching ways to prevent the very dementia that put them in this state, so their descendants, at least, might benefit?”
“Are you talking euthanasia?”
It surprised Susan how swiftly the e word came up in these conversations. She shrugged.
“Because some people would call that playing God.”
And the G word. “I don’t see how allowing nature to take its course is playing God. Perhaps that’s why God created pneumonia and bedsores, to end the suffering of people like those in Winter Wine’s End-Stage Dementia Unit. I could maintain that forcing these empty husks to go on breathing for as long as humanity-created technology allows is playing God.”
John smiled, and Susan suddenly realized he had been baiting her more than actually arguing. They were not going to resolve an argument as long-standing as politics itself in an evening.
“And since when do you concern yourself with God? We don’t go to any church, at least not since Mom died.”
John explained, “I only made the point that some people would consider it playing God. Not that I necessarily did.” He scooted over to sit directly beside her, then put an arm across her shoulders. “Kitten, if I’m ever in Winter Wine End-Stage Dementia Unit, feel free to pull the plug.”
Susan found tears in her eyes and could not wholly explain them, which sparked more irritation. For the past week, her emotions seemed to be acting irrationally, of their own accord. “Unfortunately, there aren’t any plugs to pull, Dad. Dementia eats away the brain, but it doesn’t affect the heart and lungs at all. That’s what makes it so singularly awful.”
“Yeah, well.” John stroked his chin. “Feel free to put a pillow over my head, then. And don’t visit. I could never live with the thought I might become a burden or cause pain to my daughter, assuming I could still think in any capacity. Getting on with your own life would be the best thing you could do for me in such a situation.”
Susan winced. She did not want to think about the matter any longer, though she did feel a kinship with the families of the patients she would be tending for the next month. They went through a private hell she hoped she never had to deal with, never had to bear. Until that moment, she had focused wholly on the patients, on their lack of future, on their discomfort and inability to beg for mercy. Now she considered the lot of the loving caretaker and could not imagine anything more confusing or exhausting, more testing of a person’s stamina, resilience, and grief. No wonder people responded so differently: the demanding son who berated an overworked nurse for not tending to his mother’s hair quickly enough, the daughter who came up with myriad excuses not to visit, the brother who sat weeping over a patient without tending to his own needs, the grandchildren standing in stunned boredom, the neighbor who sat and stroked a comatose man’s hand for hours. All of them coped with an impossible situation in their own way. A tear rolled down Susan’s cheek.
John Calvin said softly, “You’re thinking of Remy, aren’t you?”
Susan did not believe that to be the case, nor could she see where her father had come up with his theory. “What?”
“You’re imagining your life, had the explosion destroyed his brain but left his body intact.”
Susan could not deny the thought had occurred to her; she had said as much to Nate. She brushed the tear from her cheek. “I don’t like thinking about that possibility.” She could not help asking, “Is it … immoral to be glad he died instead?”
“I don’t believe so.” John Calvin reached behind him to pull a bulky envelope from the shelves. “I thought you might want this.” He dropped it into Susan’s lap.
Susan had no idea what it might contain. She hoped it was not his will; she had contemplated his mortality enough for one day. Opening the flap, she pulled out a professionally framed, glossy 8-by-10-inch photograph.
Susan recognized the site in the picture immediately: a concrete bench just outside their building, beside an immense playground. If she walked out on the terrace and looked down, she could probably see it almost directly beneath them. What held her spellbound were the figures on the bench. She sat on the right, her attention riveted to the man beside her, looking as content and comfortable as she could ever remember appearing. The wind carried a strand of her hair; her open and genuine expression softened her features until they looked almost pretty. It was the best picture of herself she had ever seen. Beside her, Remington Hawthorn looked as suave and self-assured as always. Dressed in casual khakis and a T-shirt, he studied Susan with a look of obvious adoration. The familiar dark blond curls swept across his forehead and barely missed eyes that held Susan’s gaze longer than any other feature. In the picture, she saw genuine affection. No one could feign that depth of feeling. As he had stated that day, while they sat on the bench together, he had truly loved her.
“Oh, my God,” Susan whispered. She could no longer slow the tears bunching in her eyes. They ran down her face in rivulets. “Oh, my God.” She tore her gaze from the picture to meet her father’s stare. “Where? Where did you get this?” She had no idea such a picture existed.
“Old Ms. Crabtree.” John Calvin jerked a thumb upward to indication their upstairs neighbor. “She said she saw you sitting there, and you looked so happy she snapped the picture with her Vox. She forgot about it until last week, when she took some other snaps in for enlargement and found it. I took it to the art store for framing and picked it up after work today.”
Susan’s attention returned to the photo. “It’s …” She did not know what to say. “Perfection” seemed immodest. “Beautiful” did not do it justice. “… wonderful. Thank you.” She clutched it to her chest, the metal frame cold on her arms.
John shifted his position so he could comfortably keep his arm around his daughter’s shoulders without interfering with her special moment. “I’ve been thinking.”
Susan wiped away her tears, and a glimmer of joy slipped through. She remembered the conversation on the bench, the first time she had told Remington she loved him, the first time any man, other than her father, had spoken those words to her. They had made plans for her to lose her virginity to him that night but were interrupted by a visit to USR, which had led to a string of harrowing events and, ultimately, to his death.
Although Susan had not acknowledged her father’s words, he continued what he had to say. “It’s clear something special was happening on that bench.”
Susan nodded but did not go into details. It was not the sort of conversation a daughter had with her father. Realizing she needed to say something, however, she nodded. “It was.”
John pushed on, “With Remy being buried in his hometown, does it bother you that you can’t … commune at the gravesite? Put some flowers on the marker now and then?”
Susan forced out a chuckle. Neither she nor her father were spiritual people, although they did make a twice-yearly pilgrimage to Amanda Calvin’s grave. “Dad, if there is a heaven, we know they sent a limo for Remy. Whether there is or isn’t, there’s no real purpose to visiting the place where the empty shell was placed. Even if ghosts existed, I couldn’t imagine Remy’s hanging around his coffin, waiting to see who visited his rotting corpse.”
John Calvin quirked an eyebrow, shrugged. “Surely you don’t really think people visit gravesites to appease the ghosts of their loved ones. It’s a great place to sit and think about the person who died, regardless of your religious beliefs, a quiet place to reflect and remember or to privately say all the things you wish you had managed while they were still alive.”
Susan rubbed the last of the tears from her cheeks. “I know that. I really do. It’s just hard to justify the time and cost of flying to Ohio on my rare days off just to visit a gravesite. It’s not like I know his family, either. I never laid eyes on them until the funeral.” The Hawthorn family seemed nice enough, but they could not possibly understand how close their son had become to her in the short time they had known one another.
“That’s what I was thinking,” John explained. “We can’t be hopping planes or trains to Ohio on a whim. But that bench …”
Susan studied the picture again. Ms. Crabtree had clearly taken it from behind the playground structure, where scores of preschool children had been playing. “You do know that’s the bench right outside the building, right?”
“Of course.”
“Well, one could hardly consider that a place of” — Susan tried to think of words that described the typical gravesite — “serene seclusion.”
John grinned. “Well, no. But it’s symbolic, isn’t it? We could share fond memories of him there with no one the wiser. Even though it’s filled with children during the day, the kids are too busy having fun and the parents too busy watching their kids to notice a person enjoying a spiritual experience. And if you do need quiet, it’s always empty after dark.”
Though Susan liked the idea, she could not help adding. “Empty … except for the muggers.”
John smiled at the facetious comment. “Well, there is that. But I doubt you need to carry a mess of valuables to visit a dead guy.” Gingerly, he took the framed photograph from Susan’s hands and placed it on the wall beside the one of Amanda Calvin. Apparently, he had planned that as well, as a preplaced hook anchored the picture at the exact same height and an eye-pleasing distance from Susan’s mother.
Susan did not have to force a smile. She appreciated what her father had done for her and wished she had not turned his thoughtful idea into a joke. “Thanks for memorializing the moment, Dad. It means a lot to me.” She tore her eyes from the picture to add sincerely, “And for the idea of using the bench as a spot to connect with my memories and grief. It is a great symbol, though I don’t think I’ll leave any flowers unless I get a hankering to provide preschool kids with bouquets for their mothers.”
John tipped the frame this way and that until he found the perfect balance, then straightened Amanda as well. Finally satisfied, he returned his gaze to his daughter. “Just because Remy’s picture’s up there with Mom’s doesn’t mean you get to go doolally, like I did.”
Susan understood the reference, having confronted her father only a year ago about what she had decided were neuroses. He had not dated in the more than twenty years since Amanda’s death, and he dined only when alone. John had reminded Susan he had survived the same accident that had killed her mother, a fact Susan’s young age and denial had allowed her to forget. Neurological impairment affecting his senses of smell and taste, as well as sexual desire and function, explained his peculiarities. “Nerve damage is different from neuroses.” She gave him a sly wink. “And most of my ilk require an actual psychosis to diagnose someone ‘doolally.’”
“All right, a bit nutty, then. My point is you have to start dating again, Susan. Someday I want grandchildren to spoil.”
Susan quirked an eyebrow. “You got anyone in mind for the father?”
“How about that redhead you keep talking about? Kendall Stephenson.”
“Kendall Stevens.” Susan corrected, shaking her head. She had met Kendall the same day as Remington, the first day of their residencies, and had never thought of him as anything more than a friend.
“He’s funny, right?” John persisted. “And you could use some humor in your life. Is he seeing anyone?”
For the first time, Susan thought about the possibility of she and Kendall becoming a couple. She had never seen him with a woman who could pass for a girlfriend, and he had not mentioned dating anyone she could remember. They spent enough time together that, had he engaged in even a casual relationship in the past year, she ought to have known about it. “Not to my knowledge, Dad. But he’s never shown that sort of interest in me, either.”
“No good man would. You were seeing Remy,” John Calvin reminded her. “Then Remy died. Not a good time to cozy up to any woman.”
Susan found herself unable to imagine Kendall and herself in a relationship. “He’s a good friend, Dad, but only a friend. We have a good thing going. Why complicate it with …”
“Sex?” John filled in.
Susan felt her cheeks heat up, and it surprised her. She thought medical school had inured her to embarrassment. In the presence of her father, however, she reverted to the mental status of an eight-year-old. “Dad!”
“What? You asked me about my sex life, and turnabout is fair play. Right?”
Susan did not see the comparison. “But I’m a doctor, a budding psychiatrist. And you … were acting …”
“Doolally?”
This time, Susan did not quibble with the terminology. “Yeah. And master headshrinker that I am, I thought I had all the answers.” She rolled her eyes. “Only to discover I didn’t even have the questions right.”
John laughed. “You know, when I was young, my best friend was a woman.”
“Really?” Susan could not help asking, “How did that work out?”
John grinned nearly from ear to ear. “I married her.”
Susan realized she had walked right into his trap. Her demeanor softened, and she could not help looking at the picture of her mother she had memorized over the years. “And I’m glad you did. Otherwise, I wouldn’t exist.” She leapt to her feet. “And now I’ve got some research to do. There aren’t many treatable causes of dementia, not a whole lot of differential diagnoses, either. But, if I can save just one patient from the hellhole that is Winter Wine Dementia Facility, I will consider this rotation worthwhile.” She headed toward the palm-pross in her bedroom.
“That’s my Susan,” John said to her retreating back.
The rancid odor of the dementia facility pervaded Susan’s nose, and she wondered how long it would take to become so accustomed she ceased to notice it. She had spent as much of the morning as possible poring over the patients’ charts, trying to find some small clue to suggest a misdiagnosis. Every few moments, her study was interrupted by a nurse seeking fresh orders, asking her to medicate an agitated patient, or assessing some blemish, erythematous area, or scratch that might indicate an impending wound infection or bedsore.
Once again, the hopelessness of the place invaded Susan’s soul. Though she hated the interruptions to her examinations and thought processes, she did appreciate the dedication and caring of the nursing staff. She marveled at their ability to see these shambling bodies as the human beings who had once inhabited them. Tireless and strangely upbeat most of the time, the nurses performed their duties without grumbling or complaining, without screaming or crying, with the patience of Job. Though they dealt with the same issues day after day, month after month, year after year, they treated the patients as individuals and answered the identical questions of concerned, angry, desperate, and grieving relatives as if each case were fresh and new, unique and special. They had a knack for this type of work, and the patients and families had little idea how lucky they were to have found these forbearing angels.
And then Susan saw him. He was just one aimless, meandering man among many, an average-sized adult with spiky gray hair, a medium build, and the typical parkinsonian masklike face. Susan was not even sure what had caught her notice, but she found her gaze riveted to him and she drifted toward him. She was on Unit 2, the second step in the three-stage shuffle, which meant he might still have enough of his faculties to carry on the reasonable facsimile of a conversation.
Susan moved directly in front of him, and he stopped. He stood hunched over, his limbs trembling beyond his control, weaving back and forth as if he might fall at any moment. Yet he remained standing, almost rigidly at attention. His face revealed little expression, but his eyes drifted upward to find her own. They were brown, soft, and sad, but at least they did not stare through her. “Hello,” she said. “I’m Dr. Susan Calvin.”
“Hello,” he returned in a hoarse voice that suggested he did not use it often. “I’m Chuck.” His eyes rolled, and he repeated, “Chuck, Chuck, Chuck.” She did not know if he had echolalia or was searching for a last name somewhere deep in what remained of his memory. She knew she would need more than “Chuck” to find his chart and examine his history.
“Do you know what you’re here for, Chuck?”
“Chuck,” he repeated. This time, he parroted her. “In for.” His facial expression did not change, but she thought she saw a bit of effort in his eyes, as if he was using repetition to gain time to find a more rational answer. “I’m lost,” he finally said. “I was on my way to the bathroom.”
Susan could see the telltale bulge of an adult diaper beneath his slacks. If he was seeking the restroom, he clearly made a habit of not reaching it on time. “Come with me, Chuck. I’ll take you there.” She headed toward the patients’ toilet. When he did not follow, she turned to face him again. Chuck had not moved. His eyes revealed confusion bordering on panic, and Susan did not want to pressure him. Pushing demented patients often resulted in a violent backlash.
Susan returned in a gesture of harmless concession. “Nice meeting you, Chuck.”
“Nice meeting you,” he said, though whether to complete the ritual or as more echolalia, she could not tell. His face revealed nothing. He paused for several moments, focused on the floor, as if his brain could not convince his feet to begin moving again. After a few seconds of this, he continued his awkward facsimile of walking, and Susan observed his ambulation from the side and the back, certain his movements were what had attracted her attention in the first place.
Chuck had clear bradykinesia, slowness of movement; his steps were short, his slippered feet barely clearing the floor, and his ankles rotated outward.
One of the nurses, a woman named Asha, left her patient to approach Susan. “That’s Charles Tripler,” she explained. “He goes by Chuck. He’s sixty-six years old. Used to be a plumber. Parkinson’s disease for ten years and dementia for the last two.”
Susan acknowledged Asha with a nod and a “thank you,” but kept her gaze on Chuck. If she had had to guess his diagnosis, she would have gone with Parkinson’s, but not everything about his movements was typical for the disease. Pressing the Record button on her Vox, she settled into a chair, planning to observe Mr. Charles “Chuck” Tripler until her next interruption.