part0010

They walked out the door and came to a halt. How many years since they were outside unaided? It was at least eight years for both of them. It felt both wonderful and scary at the same time.

It was a sunny spring day in Baltimore with a temperature of around seventy-eight degrees. The air had that big-city perfume of automobile exhaust, garbage, the smell from the Chesapeake Bay, and a Baltimore special, a mixture of spices from the large spice company located at the docks.

All in all, it was wonderful to the shut-ins. It smelled of life.

“Times a-wasting there’s ice cream to be had,” said Peggy.

They turned right out of the door and walked one short block and across the street to a McDonald’s.

Needless to say, Rick and Marsha were thrilled with the ice cream even though it was plain vanilla.

As they sat eating their dishes of ice cream, Rick noted. “Things have changed. The menu is different and it shows the calories on every item.”

“The food police are out in force nowadays,” said Emily.

“Pressure was being brought on companies to do this. In New York City, the mayor got into the act. Now the federal regulators are talking about linking your outside dining to your health records. If you eat the wrong foods and have related health issues, they don’t want to cover you.”

Emily continued, “The federal budget is in such bad shape, they are doing everything they can to deny benefits. At the same time, they cheerfully add to the dependency roles to gain voter support. It is a mess.”

“Why Emily,” said Rick, “You sound like a Republican. ”

“Oh no they are just as bad since they rebranded themselves to get the Hispanic vote,” she replied.

Rick said, “The strangest thing about that is most Hispanics I know are hardworking conservatives.”

Emily went on, “I am not sure if I have a political home in America anymore.”

Marsha broke in with, “That is sad. You are so young and cynical already.”

Emily then laughed with her funny little sound, which sounded like she was going Hut, Hut, Hut. There was no real way to describe it, but it was a pleasant sound.

“It’s too nice of a day to be sad and serious. The world will go on,” she said.

They trooped outside but on the way, Rick picked up a job application.

Peggy joked, “I can see the old geezer now. Do you want fries with that?”

Rick replied, “Have a nice day.”

For some reason, this broke the group up.

On a more serious note, Rick brought up the fact that both, he and Marsha seemed to be well on their way to real life .

“The only problem is we are dead broke and have no idea how we got to where we are, much less what happened to our funds and who to talk to about getting them back and how to get out of the rest home.”

Rick brought this out all at once, and it left him gasping for some breath.

Peggy thought for a moment, “You both should check your Schaefer records. They should have some sort of a trail. I would do it for you, but I am out of here in less than an hour.”

Emily added, “So am I, but I’m local so if I can help I will.”

They strolled back to the rest home. Both Rick and Marsha were showing the strain of their longest journey yet. They hugged both ladies goodbye one more time and went to their respective rooms for a nap before dinner.

When they went to dinner, Marsha said, “Let’s sit at a separate table tonight, we have a few things to discuss.”

“I agree,” said Rick.

“Besides it will give those old ladies something to talk about.”

Marsha giggled as she replied, “The rumor mill will be going crazy. However, we need to have a serious discussion about what we are going to be doing. ”

Later, as they sat down, Rick brought up the elephant in the room.

“We are different, aren’t we? Our minds are clear, and we now seem to be in exceptionally good health for our ages. Then there is the fact that we both have a mystery of how we got here in the first place.”

“Right Rick, now what are we going to do about this?”

“Well, I don’t think either of us wants to spend the rest of our life in this joint. We can’t predict our future so let’s plan our lives like everyone else, that things will be fine until life tells us differently.”

“That works for me. That means we need to get out of here. We also need to find out what happened to our money. I suspect if we can find how we got here we will be well on our way to getting our money back if it is still there.”

“Marsha you had to say that, but I worked awful damn hard for that money.”

“Like my husband and I did, but we have to be realistic. So I understand our long-term goal is to get out of here and retrieving our money if we can. I assume we are doing this as a team.”

As she said the words, ‘as a team,’ Marsha had a funny feeling. She looked up at Rick and saw a different person, she saw him as a man she could be interested in .

“Marsha being a team is about the only way I can see this happening. Now let’s talk short term. We need some seed money for this enterprise. I had been thinking along these lines when I picked up that application at McDonald’s. We will need far better clothes to be taken seriously in any legal event. However, to get a job, I will need identification and the freedom to walk out of here unaccompanied.”

Marsha said, “Then we will have to be perceived as self-sufficient by the staff. So we take care of our rooms, clean and feed ourselves and generally are independent here. That will make us the only two doing it in the building.”

“What about ID,” Rick asked?

“We need to look into our files here. If any ID accompanied us, it will be stored there. Part of my task will be to volunteer to help in the office. They are so shorthanded I think they will gladly take me up on my offer. In the meantime, look through all the clothing bags for better outfits.”

“Sounds like a plan or at least the start of one,” replied Rick.

The next day they started on their project. They went to housekeeping and volunteered to look after their rooms. After being looked at like they had two heads each, they were shown where the linens and cleaning supplies were .

After jointly making their beds and cleaning the rooms, they went their separate ways. Rick went to the room with the clothes bags which was fortunately unlocked.

Marsha stopped at the office to see if she could help with anything.

Rick hauled all the bags out to a table and started going through them. He did it methodically and neatly. It never occurred to any of the passing staff to question his actions. He looked and acted like he had an absolute right for what he was doing. The staff was all so stretched they were not about to get involved in anything else.

As he sorted the clothes he thought about Marsha. She was quite a woman. Hmm, he hadn’t thought about women like that in many a year.

Marsha entered the office area which looked entirely too cluttered to her. She announced to the two ladies there that she was bored and was there any filing she could do. Silvia the office manager immediately took her over to a pile of folders that needed to be put away. It took about two minutes for her to explain where they went.

It took her several hours to bring order to the files. When she was done it was close to lunchtime. She announced she was leaving but would be back the next day to continue helping.

Silvia nodded and said, “Thanks for the help. Lord knows we can use all we can get. ”

At lunch, Rick and Marsha reviewed their progress. Rick was a little down because he could not find any clothes that made him look better than a street person.

Marsha laughed, “The way you’re dressed you could beg on some street corner.”

Rick got a thoughtful look and said, “That just might work. I am going to check some things out tomorrow.”

Rick and Marsha went to the kitchen in the morning and picked up breakfast treys instead of waiting to be served. No one commented, after eating and returning the trays and sorting out the dishes and silverware they left to clean and straighten their rooms.

It was a bit of a struggle for both as they regained their strength, but they managed.

From that point, Marsha’s day followed the same path as the previous day. The only difference was her pleasantly answering a phone call and taking a message while the other two were out of the office. She passed it to Silvia on her return.

Silvia said, “Thanks.” That took care of that, now Marsha could answer the phones. She was one step closer to freedom of the office.