55
Déjà vu hits as we enter the building. Not the warm, good kind, like the smell of baked cinnamon or the echo of laughter in
an old kitchen: the cold kind that settles in your bones.
Dr. Lorne smiles as we take our seats. There’s little solace in the fact that there will be no prostate exam today.
Lisa talks like I’m not even there. Is this what Beau felt like on the day of his sentencing?
The doctor pulls out the Mini-Mental State Exam. I could fail it in my sleep; I have all the information I need. My habit
of writing down and keeping everything, which once annoyed Beau, will now help him more than he’ll ever know. I held on to
the pamphlets from his first visit, the notes I had taken, names and results of tests. I know an abnormal brain scan is not
needed for a diagnosis, that it’s based on behavior, on signs and symptoms. I googled case studies, and I watched YouTube
videos of people with early-onset Alzheimer’s and their families.
This isn’t the first time I’ve had to put on an act.
I’d played a straight man for the entirety of my teen years.
I’ve become Beau’s understudy; I’ve learned his lines, movements and expressions.
After a month of research, I’m ready to take the stage.
But I can’t do it all at once—that would surely arouse suspicion.
I figure that three or four months is the shortest credible time if I have an even more rapidly progressing variety of dementia than Beau has.
Faster than that, and the doctor might suspect I’ve had a stroke.
I wrote out my plan like a recipe in my notebook: Three cups of forgetfulness, one tablespoon of walkabouts, a hundred grams of putting things in the wrong place, three teaspoons
of not remembering the name of something. I go light on the yelling—that had stood out like lipstick on a goat with Beau but would be mere lip balm on me. I’ve hidden
the notebook in the most impenetrable fortress known to Lisa: in a box of instruction manuals, behind the cleaning supplies.
My sister’s face barely moves when the diagnosis is given. Not because she isn’t sad, but because I think she’s known for
some time; I’ve tried to make sure of that.
“I’m so sorry, Lisa,” says Dr. Lorne. “It’s incredibly rare and unlucky for both of them to have this diagnosis, especially
this particular type. But the tests don’t lie.”
Only I do.
Guilt shows up often, but love always overpowers it. I can think only of Beau. Now, I wait.
One Friday, from Beau’s room, I overhear Lisa tell Allison she wants to admit me. I pull him tight into my arms.
“Would you look at the two of them,” Dayna says, appearing in the doorway beside my sister, her palm pressed to her chest.
“Perhaps it’s a small mercy that they both have it—it’s an awful thing for partners to witness.”
I inhale slowly. I’ve just bought myself a front-row seat, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Because from here, I can
reach his hand.
“It’s pretty special what they have, isn’t it?” the nurse continues.
Lisa nods. “Yes, they’d do anything for each other.”
She has no idea how true that is.
There’s no waiting list, and I move in a few days later.
We have what we wanted. A room. A life of sorts. It isn’t perfect. But now we are together, and that counts for everything.
Beau wakes like the world has rearranged itself overnight. His watery eyes spring open, blinking rapidly, unfocused yet full of fear. “Hello? Griff? Are you here? Where am I?”
I take his hand and place it on my chest, so he can feel my heart beating. “You are with me, Beau.”
His breathing slows, his gaze coming to rest on mine. “That means I’m home.”
So much has been taken from Beau: his voice, his dignity. But not me. Not yet.
His language deteriorates daily, his face filled with the frustration of lost words. At these times, I pass him his viola.
His fingers remember what his mind fumbles, the melody settling something in his chest that I can’t reach with words. It steadies
him; it’s how he speaks now, both to me and to the parts of his mind still fighting to be heard.
For months, the music remains—faithful, steady, the highlight of my day. Then one December morning, a few weeks before Christmas,
Allison walks in as Beau is finishing a song, a clipboard tucked under her arm.
The door hasn’t even swung shut before she’s muttering. “Not that thing again.” She sighs, brushing a stray hair from her
eyes. “One of my exes was a cellist, you know. Ran off with a twenty-four-year-old double bassist. I can’t hear string instruments
now without feeling homicidal.”
Beau lays the instrument on the shelf then nods off in his chair.
Allison clicks her pen and starts ticking boxes with performative efficiency, her sighs louder than necessary. Her eyes dart
to the viola; a flicker of calculation crosses her face. As she reaches for the hand sanitizer, her elbow bumps the ledge,
a tiny nudge, but enough. The viola slips, topples, and hits the lino with a sickening crack.
She winces—a quick, exaggerated grimace—before her eyes drop to the damage, tracing it with the cool precision of someone
deciding how much it’s going to hurt. “Oops. I’m sorry. Shelf must be loose. I’ll log it with maintenance.” And with that
sarcasm-coated statement, she’s gone.
My chest seizes. I crouch down slowly, my bones heavy. There’s a fracture in the neck.
Beau’s voice. Gone. Not because of time or illness or memory, but because someone chose not to see the man behind the music.
Someone decided he didn’t matter anymore.
Rage scorches through me as I hold the instrument in my hands—my husband’s love made audible, muted in an instant.
That afternoon I make some calls in secret to the handful of repairers Beau would have trusted his instrument to. Maybe I
could courier it to them under the radar? But one is retired, one is already on Christmas holidays and the last is booked
solid for the foreseeable future. I search online for a replacement from his beloved viola maker in Cremona, Italy. He used
to joke that if we ever won the lottery, he’d fly there just to smell the timber. They still make violas the old way, each
one a work of art. I find one that looks almost identical. But there’s a huge waitlist and international shipping delays.
It’s fully insured, but it’s not about the money. Even if I pay extra, I know deep in my heart that it won’t arrive in time.
Beau is slipping fast.
I say nothing to Allison but make a silent vow that one day, I will get my revenge.