The Caretaker

*TW - Themes of sexual and physical violence*

In the shadows, I watch as he stares and grinds the gummy remains of his teeth. I meet his yellowed eyes and watch a dark stain grow across the quilt. His gnarled knuckles clutching the bars of the bed. Gasps rattle through the collapsed caverns of his lungs and escape with what words he can still stammer.

Maura 

Maura

Whispers barely audible over the pounding of his heart, staccato percussion against his brittle ribs. It’s a taxing performance, as I watch fear possess his body. His mouth will be dry, a hardened lump will form in the small of his throat, choking each word and breath that passes. His ears will be pounding, a roaring sound as his blood pumps harder and faster. Light-headedness. Dizziness. Crippling fear.  

Maura

His eyes start to water, a refusal to blink. Next is the tremors, his body is a mass of bones that pestle together which each involuntary shudder. A choke. I’ve yet to speak.

Maura please

I don’t know who Maura is. He gets no visitors. Occasionally nurses will come to feed and bathe him, change him from one soiled hospital gown to another less soiled one. They don’t speak to him and he is as pliable as a doll, making no noise and staring straight ahead as he’s cared for. It takes two of them to change him, one to hold the sack of bones up while the other lifts the gown, careful of bed sores, and replaces it. They feed him silently, mopping up what doesn’t stay in his mouth with a cloth kept in their pocket, stained with more geriatric spit up. They have the tv on, a depressing deluge of homes under the hammer, bargain hunters, omnibus repeats of the soap from last night. Each day feels like a repeat of the last but it’s okay, he’s not really there to live it. 

Maura

He spends his days internally, his eyes are open and move without looking, watch without seeing. He hums fragments of songs. The same fragments over and over. His body is just the vessel for his mind to play out the memories of his life, like an old vinyl, skipping and distorting. I wonder who Maura is? A late wife, married for 50 years, in love for 15 of them and tolerating each other for the rest of it? A daughter, needy and precocious until avoidant and embarrassed until guiltily putting her father to the back of her mind? Do they swap places in his memories? Is his daughter cooking him dinner and taking him to bed, is he reading his wife stories and pushing her on the swings?

Maura I

I step forward. He pushes back into the pillows, forcing his upper body to contort as he tries to keep the distance between us. I catch myself in the mirror of his room. This is Maura. A middle aged woman with graying hair swept back into a bun. A lilac blouse with a small stain on the lapel but everything else spick and span. I could be a visitor, if anyone passed the door and peeked through the small glass panel, there’d be nothing out of place about my image. But they can only see the back of me. They can’t see the shifting snowy static in place of a face. 

Maura I didn’t please

I watch as he creates his own horror, morphing me into his darkest fears. I take on the forms of his wife, his daughter, a woman he worked with. Their anger, their hurt and their betrayal become my own, creating a context for my being. He’s Cornelius. He’s my father. This is the man who turned from friend to threat after a few drinks. I feel the shadows of his hands grip at my throat and the bruises form on my arms and legs. 

Maura

My bones crack under the force of his past, jutting out at angles unnatural. A low keening starts, funereal, from the pits of my stomach deep and undulating until piercing and solid. I’m screaming. I’m on my knees twitching. 

Maura

A younger Cornelius. Shadow man. Dark suit, newspaper in the mornings, steak and eggs for dinner. Broken plates and burst blood vessels. Sunglasses in the winter. She’s always been a clumsy child. Listen to your father. Have another. I couldn’t possibly. I said no. Frigid bitch. Flowers. Sorries. I just get so angry. I can’t control myself. If you’d only just

MAURA 

Finally. I stop screaming. He sits straight. I stand and I watch. 

Why are you here?

A small girl sits and pulls at the ladders in her tights as she listens to her mother pleading. She’s not had dinner but she knows to stay upstairs when Daddy’s had a drink. She has to tiptoe to reach the tap but manages a couple of handfuls of water from the bathroom. She gets into bed, still in her school uniform, and turns out the light.   

Why are you here! 

He brushes the bedside table and knocks the glasses to the floor, shattering them. I watch as he swings his legs around, out from under the covers, pulling himself out of bed till he is standing beside it. No longer possessed by fear, instead by wrath. He pulls himself along the bed, shambling and limping, his yellowed eyes no longer wide and confused, instead hardening themselves into slits. He takes no notice at the shards of glass he stands on, lodging into the soles of his feet. 

I Told You What Would Happen

Spit coagulates in the corners of his mouth as he pushes the words from his lips. Bloody footsteps and he pulls himself to the end of the bed, gripping the posts behind him as he faces me, mere inches away. 

If You Show Your Face Around Here Again

He’s yours. I can’t go home, they’ve kicked me out. Please. A bundle of warmth in my arms, standing on a rainy doorstep.

You’re Disgusting. You’re Nothing. How Dare You 

Checkered floor. Black and white.His body is a heavy weight, peine forte et dure. Grunting. Whispered apologies. My shoulders cracking into the floor with every thrust, skirt pulled up to my waist. He finishes and leaves to clean himself up. There’s crumbs under the oven. 

Maura is that you

The static stops. Silence fills the dingy hospice room. Is this where they’ve left you to die? 

Maura I’m sorry you never deserved

A step towards me and I take his face in my hands. My thumbs stroke the whiskered, age spotted face of my husband, my father, the father of my child. Tears spill from our eyes and I spread them across his cheeks. Tenderness and remorse in his face. 

Maura

Heavy sobs. Held up by my hands. His chest collapses into himself as he cries, the memories catching up to him. Guilt and deep breaths. Acceptance as he faces what comes next. Stand up straight. I place one hand on his forehead. Another beneath his chin. An imperceptible nod.   

Twist. 

Snap. 

He collapses to the floor beneath my feet. 

The silent static dissipates, leaving a face, a nose, a mouth. I fix my hair and smooth my blouse, pressing the call nurse button as I leave the room.