Kind Soul

*This story contains scenes and descriptions of a person struggling with dementia and the issues that face their caregivers.

Alma couldn’t remember the exact date the fog arrived. She couldn’t remember any dates after, either. It felt like it had been taking pieces of her for years. And just maybe it had . . .

Her husband, Peter, was a good man. He would take her to the bookcases in the living room and point at picture frames filled with people and events, but Alma couldn’t see their faces. The fog would get angry and swirl around her feet and legs, up her body, before stretching its blurry tendrils toward anything her eyes touched. It smudged faces, signs, letters. It took away thoughts, patterns, and sometimes her ability to understand the words Peter spoke as they came out of his mouth. But there was always a second—just a single second—right before, she could remember something.

“Margaret, Anna, Stella, and Ben; you see them, don’t you? You can see them—right there—can’t you? In the picture! Look, Alma, look hard. You see them? Susan, Betty, Deborah; your friends from the auxiliary. Damn it, Alma, get your head on straight, will you?

Alma pressed the pads of her fingers to one of the frames, allowing the fog to cascade across the picture it held, onto the shelf, and flood the edges of her vision. It swirled about, leaving everything looking like wet newspaper, smudged and frustratingly unreadable. The frame itself—Alma knew the frame. She had carefully cut a photo of her friends and herself putting in a new garden bed in front of the fire hall. Her friends, though, were gone. The fog had taken them from her, their names, their faces, and maybe even their lives—she no longer knew. Pulling back her hand, she picked at the skin around her nails, defeated. “I can’t. I’m sorry, Peter. I can’t see their faces. I don’t know who they are.”

Peter would get angry and yell at her about the fog. He’d tell her it wasn’t real, and to stop making things up. Sometimes, when he would stomp around and demand she remember—where she’d left her wallet, where she’d left the cards for the doctor, where she’d left the checkbook, or the money, or the laundry soap, or her house shoes—the fog would lash about his feet, threatening to climb his legs to his chest. It would turn to her and taunt its ability to take him from her, too. It would brush across his chin or stroke his cheek. “No!” she screamed at it. “No, Peter! Please. Please stop yelling! I will try, I will try harder to remember!” The fog would recede to circle her feet and legs, like a contented cat wanting to be petted. Like it was doing something good for her, as if it took sustenance from the pieces of her memory it was sucking away.

She awoke early one morning, just after dawn. The fog had coiled itself around her house shoes in the cracked-open closet, and Peter still snored quietly next to her. Slipping from the starched, white percale sheets—Peter’s preferred set—she tiptoed out of the room and down to the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator to find that it was nearly empty. Condiments, packets, butter, but no real food. Meatloaf was Peter’s favorite; Alma decided in that moment to go the store and buy the things to make his favorite meal. He was a good man. A handsome man.

Halfway down the street, in their big Buick, Alma realized the fog had not followed her. Her sight was clear, no gray blur at the edges. The letters on signs showed up like she had perfect vision. It was a day to celebrate! Maybe the fog was ready to leave, ready to give up and go back where it came from. Maybe, just maybe, she was free. There was a small bubble of joy in her belly. Maybe she would call her daughters, or her son. She wondered how long it had been since they’d spoken. A few days? Maybe a week? Alma distantly remembered a baby announcement coming in the mail, but the fog had consumed the names on it. Peter had held her while she cried, frustrated that things weren’t clicking. How long ago had that been?

The grocery was loud but not busy. Alma danced to some of the new tunes that played over the speakers in the ceiling. Jazzy songs. Some songs she didn’t like, though, it sounded as if the singer was mumbling their way through almost-words or maybe the fog had found them too, and they'd forgotten real words.

She chose lean ground beef and pork, picked up croutons—the garlic ones that Peter liked—and eggs. For a split second, she wondered why there had been no eggs in the house, or milk, or lunch meat, or bread. When was the last time she’d been to the store? Just a few days, surely. Maybe they’d had omelets, or she had baked a cake, something that took a lot of them. She couldn’t remember.

It wasn’t until the trunk of the Buick was open with groceries nestled inside, that she spotted the fog coming across the parking lot. With nothing to go on, it searched for her, weaving in and out between car and cart tires alike. She knew what it wanted. “Not today, fog,” she said out loud.

The Buick roared to life, and Alma was able to escape the parking lot without being spotted. Her shoulders dropped with a sigh of relief when she was back on Main Street, several lights from the grocery. She wanted nothing more than to give Peter a nice dinner with his favorite meal. How long had it been since she’d cooked? It was no matter, the fog was searching for her far away, and she hoped it would never come back.

They lived on Redfield Parkway, off Main Street, and had been there for decades. It was the most beautiful street in the whole city. At the far end was the veteran’s hospital with its meticulously maintained grounds. They even put flags along the median for special holidays. It was the first street plowed in the winter and everyone in the city wanted to live there. Grandiose oaks and maples and elms enjoyed swaying on perfectly watered, perfectly manicured lawns. They’d been lucky to afford their beautiful home when it had come on the market. Peter had a good job and a good retirement. He was a good man.

“911, what is your emergency?”

“My wife, she’s left our house and taken the car. I don’t know where she went.”

Alma awoke to loud noises and the fog swirling against the inside of the shattered windshield. She cried. It was severely angry with her. Her head hurt. Why was the glass broken? Was that gas she smelled? Someone was yelling at her, banging on the window. It made the fog stretch its tendrils toward her face. “No,” she told it, trying to raise her arms so it couldn’t reach her. “No, please. I jusssss wanted to make Peter meatlooo—” Her world slipped into darkness.

* * *

Peter came and took her to a place that wasn’t their home. It was a white place, with sterile smells and people with fake smiles. They nodded at him and talked as if Alma wasn’t there. They sat her in a squeaky rocking chair facing a window. The fake smiles told him she liked to look out the window, but it was only because there was no other place to look. Peter brought the pictures from the bookcases, the ones that the fog had consumed long ago. He hung them on the wall next to a bed she was forced into every night.

“Alma, do you know who these people are?” He held out a picture of two people; one of them was in a striking military uniform and the other in a heavily laced gown. A dress. A wedding dress? The fog snaked around her shoulders and lapped gently at the picture, but it already knew her memory of that event was gone, so it instead tried to lash out at Peter’s hand. Fearing the fog would take him away, too, Alma said nothing. She stared with empty eyes out the window trying to trick the fog into thinking she'd already forgotten him and hoping it would leave him alone.

“It’s us, Alma, you and me. This was our wedding day. . .”

He stopped asking her about the pictures after that. He was a good man. So handsome.

The fog eventually made her forget Peter. Alma was happy about it, at first. He would be better off without her. She loved him so, but he deserved a happy life. After he stopped coming to see her, the fog was content to steal the shimmering flecks of the few memories she had left. It even stole the memory of Peter’s passing, if she’d ever known it in the first place.

“We are gathered here today to mourn the passing of Peter Hollenbeck. A good man—"

“Mom, why do you keep asking for Dad? No, you can’t call him. You can’t see him either. No, Mom, he’s dead.”

A young woman came to help her eat. A sweet girl; patient, with kind, gray eyes. She introduced herself, but the fog ate up her words as soon as she said them. It was fine, Alma was content just to look at her. She could tell she was a good soul like Peter. Where was Peter? She hadn’t seen him in a while. A few days? No, no, never that long. He must be in the bathroom or out mowing the lawn. He’d come get her soon. Then they could go home.

“Your mom has become almost completely catatonic. She barely eats, sleeps, or even moves from the chair. Sometimes she mutters about fog, or, on her best days, she asks for Peter.”

“What does this mean?”

“It means, we believe she’s in end-stage, now. It won’t be long before she stops eating, and then, her body will slowly begin to shut down until her brain forgets to tell her heart to beat.”

"Is that really how someone with dementia dies? They just forget to be alive?”

“The neurological answer is much more complicated, but yes, the brain's cells die and eventually, the bodily systems just shut down.”

“Oh . . .”

* * *

The young woman came in. She championed Alma’s eating a few bites of soup and a cracker. Encouraged her. She asked her about shows on the TV, but Alma had never even turned it on. “I like looking out the window,” Alma told her.

The young woman’s eyes shot open. She looked alarmed and terrified at the same time. “Alma,” she whispered. “Alma, do you know my name?”

Alma shook her head and looked down at her feet. The fog was there, swirling idly, paying them no mind because there was nothing for it to take. “No, but you have a kind soul. I don’t mind when you come here.”

“I enjoy coming to see you, too,” she said.

“I won’t be here much longer. My husband, Peter, is coming to get me. We’re going to go home.” Alma was quite curt with her response. It was clear, this was something that was going to happen.

“Oh? Do you know when he’s coming?”

“No, but it will be soon. He’s away in the war.”

“Alma—”

“Nothing more to say about it, hmm? I’d know if he'd been killed. He will come.”

Alma clasped her fingers together and continued to rock in the chair, looking out the window. Waiting . . .

“Alma believes Peter is going to come get her. She said he was away in the war, and he was going to come get her and take her home.”

“My parents had a very special relationship. They were never far from each other. She doted on him, and he doted on her. It was something all of us kids tried our best to emulate in our own lives, somewhat unsuccessfully. Mom and Dad met in school and were married the moment it was legal for them to do it. Dad got called away to the war, but he came back against all the odds. And he did take her home."

“That’s kinda sweet. I hope I have a love like that in my life, too.”

When she was finally alone, Alma stood up from the rocking chair and collected a few things from the dresser drawer. Underwear, a flowy teal top Peter said he liked at the department store, a pair of straight slacks that made her rump look nice, and a towel. She stepped into the bathroom and closed the door.

It had been almost thirty minutes when Alma emerged from the billowing steam of the shower. She’d have to wait to put the ringlets in her hair and do her makeup, the mirror was covered in condensation. The TV was on when she sat on the bed. An old movie was on that she didn't recognize, but for once, the noise was nice.

She got up and stood in front of the window, staring out at the driveway. Any minute now, Peter would come for her and they’d go home. Their home. To start their lives together.

“Alma, my love. Did you wait all this time for me?”

Alma turned at the sound of the voice behind her. There, stood a man, the most wonderful man she’d ever known. Tall and strong, shoulders that proved he could split wood but with eyes so gentle, she felt washed overboard when she stared into them. But that was the thing, she hadn’t stared into them in years. Was it four? She thought so. Her breath caught in her chest. He was so handsome in his striking military uniform. So handsome. “Peter,” Alma whispered with her hands clasped together under her chin.

The fog though, the fog lashed about her ankles feverishly. It didn’t try to climb or steal from her, but instead seemed . . . joyous at seeing Peter. He knelt in the doorway of Alma’s room and beckoned the fog to him. If it could have made squeaking noises it may have. Like a puppy whose master had come home from a long trip, the fog glided over to him in big loops and swirls of gray and white.

“Good boy,” Peter said, running his fingers through the mist. “Did you miss me?” The fog spun around Peter’s body excitedly while Alma watched the beautiful reunion.

Standing abruptly, Peter then crossed the sterile white room to her. The fog had settled for swirling around his legs. “I hope he wasn’t too much trouble for you,” he breathed, touching Alma’s cheeks gently with the pads of his fingertips.

She closed her eyes, pressing into his touch, and reached up to put her hand over his. “It was hard, Peter. I felt so many times like I’d lost my mind, like I slowly lost you.”

“I told you; nothing was going to stop me from coming home to you.” He slid his arms over her back and pulled her tightly into his chest. “Are you ready? Are you ready to go home, my love?”

After a long time of breathing him in, Alma looked up, tears streaming down her cheeks and nodded. “I just need to get my bag from the bathroom and I’m ready.” He stepped back to let her get her things.

The mirror had cleared since the shower, but the image that stared back at her nearly made her slip she was so surprised. Her face was young and plump. She had thick, full hair, and rosy cheeks. She was just barely eighteen. Nineteen? Why did she feel like she’d lived a whole life? What about their children? What had happened to them? Their house, the car? Why did it seem so real? Alma stuffed everything into her bag and stepped back out into the room.

She looked around for a few long minutes while Peter watched her with curiosity. “What is it?”

“I’m not sure,” Alma said. “Why am I staying in a nursing home? Do I live here?”

He chuckled, “No no, your letters said you’d been helping take care of an older woman. Said she’d only eat for you. She told you that you had a kind soul, just like her husband.”

Alma smiled at him knowingly and whispered, “Peter. Her husband’s name is Peter.”

Peter took Alma's hand in his, "I could sure go for some meatloaf."

“She couldn’t have left! The doors are locked automatically. Did one of her family members come and take her?”

“No! The cameras show nothing. No one in or out of her room. She can’t just be gone can she? Alert the authorities!"