A car horn blared as smoke wrapped around them like a blanket, warm and fluffy, but more suffocating than one would expect a blanket to be. Boris had trouble opening his eyes, thanks to the blood that had crusted over them, but when he finally managed to, he could see he was looking upwards at the roof of his car. He could feel the slight hint of sunshine that had managed to peak its way through the shattered cracks of his windows and spill onto his face, and the warmth it brought felt surprisingly comforting. Boris had never really been much of an advocate for the sun, but for once it actually was nice to feel its presence on his skin. He groaned and looked around best he could, but his neck was cricked and hurt every time it moved.
And then he remembered he wasn't the only one in the car, and he hurt himself as he craned to look at the backseat where his daughter, Ellen, was sitting, or rather had been seated, her legs now bent at impossible angles, and she appeared completely unconscious. Boris shut his eyes and started to cry to himself, as quietly as possible, because he needed the grieve, even if only momentarily and by himself, for the fact that he was a terrible father. But that wasn't what upset him the most, actually. What he was really mad at was Ellen, and this made him even angrier at himself for being mad at her. But he couldn't help it, this was - in effect - all her fault. If only she'd been better at hiding things, none of this would've happened. *** The thing about anniversaries is that they happen no matter whether you want them to or not, because it's tied to a date, and a date isn't something you can skip past. It's a day you have to live through. Sure one could spend it sleeping, or busy so they don't think about what the day is supposed to represent, but in the back of their head it's always itching at them, like a dog scratching at a door to be let in. That's what it felt like today, of all days, as Boris sat at his desk and tried to jot down some thoughts into his journal. He couldn't help but be irritated at the one thing he was trying so hard to ignore gnawing at him, keeping him distracted from the things he was trying to use to distract himself. Had it really been almost 25 years? Ridiculous. Time flies. He sighed and set his pen down, then cracked his knuckles, stood up, pulled on his coat and his cap and - grabbing his pen and journal - headed out of his room. Perhaps a change of scenery was necessary to facilitate the ability to ignore it. As he walked down the hall, he could hear the sound of shoes clacking on the floor behind him, clearly trying to catch up to him, and before long he noticed Carol was walking alongside him, eating a pudding cup as she walked. "Good afternoon," she said, "Where you going?" "For a walk, want to come?" he asked. "Sure, where we walking to?" Carol asked as she tossed the empty container into a nearby trashcan on their way to the front door and wiped her mouth on her sleeve. "It's a walk, that invariably means there's no preset destination," Boris said, "You just walk for the sake of walking." "Alright, alright, jeez, no need to get snippy about it," Carol said as they pushed their way through the doors and headed outside. The sun outside on his face, it felt nice again, just like it did that very day, and he remembered that no matter how hard you tried, you simply couldn't escape anniversaries. *** Boris was seated in the waiting room, having somehow escaped relatively unscathed, bar a few nasty scratches on his face and his right hand being fractured. He couldn't even hear the people around him, not that he was trying all that hard, it was just that everything else was blocked out by the fact that his mind was so heavily preoccupied by what he'd endured. He was so out of it that he didn't even hear Lorraine approach him and speak to him. It wasn't until she snapped her fingers in front of his face that he finally came to, and looked up at her. "Hey," she said softly - in the nicest tone she'd spoken to him in months, actually - as she knelt in front of his chair, "...are you okay? You don't look too worse for wear." "I'm...yeah, I'm okay. I'm alright enough," Boris said, "...when did you get here?" "Like, five seconds ago," Lorraine said, unclasping the top of her purse and pulling out a small pillbox, "Do you need Ibuprofen?" "Rest assured they already gave me plenty of pain medication. We are in a hospital, after all," Boris said. "Fair enough," Lorraine said, standing up and seating herself next to Boris; she was momentarily quiet, but then, in almost a whisper, she said, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for arguing this morning, before you left. This made me realize that perhaps you should never leave a conversation angry, because that might be the last time you ever speak to the person you're currently angry with and you really don't want your last words to someone you actually love to be that you hate them." "I'm sorry too," Boris said, grabbing and holding her hand, squeezing it, he added, "...this was all my fault. I was so busy being mad that I didn't focus enough on driving. I should've been more present in the...well, in the present." "Hah," Lorraine chuckled, squeezing his hand back, "sure, but these things also just happen. I don't think it's very fair to assign blame. Especially not immediately after it happens. Has anyone said anything to you about Ellen yet?" "No," Boris said quietly, clearly simultaneously afraid to ask about his daughters status and ashamed he hadn't asked yet. He wrung his hands and bit his bottom lip, trying not to cry here in front of all these people. He didn't mind crying in front of Lorraine, but he was always afraid of crying in front of strangers. These last few months, however, he hadn't liked showing any emotion whatsoever in front of Lorraine either, as things had grown more and more stressed between them. "Boris," Lorraine said, touching his shoulder as he turned to look at her; she smiled and said, "it'll be okay, it's not your fault." Everyone would tell him this for years, but he would never allow himself to believe it, no matter how many times he'd come to hear it. *** "God I spend so much time indoors I often forget how good the sun feels," Carol said, slipping her hands into her cardigans pockets, adding, "It's so nice and warm, it feels like the sky is hugging you like a grandmother used to. A hug you could actually feel and appreciate the sentiment behind, you knew it was genuine." "Wouldn't really know," Boris said, "never really got to know my grandparents. The ones on my moms side died young, and my father didn't speak to his parents. Overly religious, and he wasn't, so that kind of created a wedge between them." "That's rough, pal," Carol said, "grandparents are simultaneously one of the greatest and worst gifts you can give a child. On one hand, you get memories you'll cherish forever, and love you'll always appreciate having gotten, but on the other hand you're the first person to break that childs heart because you'll be the first one they love who dies." "Dark," Boris said, making Carol smirk. "Honest," Carol corrected him, "I mean, you're the first person outside of their parents that they love, and often you spend more time with them than their parents do when they're little, so when you finally bite it it really does a number on them. Suddenly this person who loved them unconditionally, who spent all their waking time with them...is just...gone. You know?" "I do know," Boris said, "I was that person." "I didn't know your daughter had children." "She doesn't. I did it to her." Carol stopped and watched as Boris came to an intersection and looked at it, and then looked down at his journal, pen tip still pressed to the page in an eternal placement of 'about to start writing'. What the hell did he mean by that, Carol wondered. *** Having someone in your family in a wheelchair changes the whole dynamic of not just your life, and their life, but also the layout of your home. Suddenly ramps were necessary to simply get in and out of the house, and stairs were no longer a viable means of movement. Now, whenever she needed to get up the stairs, Boris simply had to carry her. This wasn't a problem when she was a child, of course, but as she got older - got bigger, got heavier - it became more of an issue, especially since the crash wound up tweaking Boris's back indefinitely in a way that nobody, no matter who it was he sought treatment from, could ever fix. And Boris did it all, because, not only was it the right thing to do of course, but he felt responsible for putting Ellen in that chair. Her legs not working now were a direct result of his automotive ineptitude, or at least that's how he saw it. After the first few weeks of getting things in order, life mostly seemed to resume normal as before; Ellen went back to school, Lorraine and Boris went back to work, and Ellen, much to her enjoyment, no longer had to play Soccer after school. Boris never understood why she hated it so much, but now it was a moot point, as she could no longer play it. Boris tucked Ellen in one night, then read her a few stories from a collection of old fables, and as he got up to leave, he kissed the top of her head and, reaching the door, heard her speak. "It's my fault," she said quietly. "What?" Boris asked, turning back to her. "What happened. It's my fault," Ellen said, "Because...I hid your keys. If I hadn't hid your keys, we would've been on time and that accident wouldn't have happened. It only happened because we weren't leaving at the right time." "This wasn't your fault," Boris said, trying not to sound enraged that she actually thought this, "Do you hear me? This was NOT your fault. These things just...happen. If anything, it was my fault, because I wasn't paying attention. I was...I was yelling at you, I wasn't focused. I was mad, I was angry and yelling because you kept telling me you didn't want to go to Soccer practice, and I couldn't understand why, and I...I simply wasn't paying enough attention to the road." Boris came and sat down on the side of her bed, looking at her and scratching the back of his head. "Why do you hate Soccer so much?" he finally asked flat out. "I'm not good at sports, I don't like it," Ellen said quietly, "I feel embarrassed playing in front of other kids who like it and are good at it, they're always judging me." "...I'm sorry. I'm sorry I forced you to do it," Boris said, "I'm sorry I put you in the chair." "I don't mind being in the chair," Ellen said, surprising him, as she added, "I mind that I put myself in it." "Please don't think you did this," Boris said quietly, as he leaned closer and put his arms tightly around her, squeezing his daughter to his chest, crying softly on the top of her head, his teardrops falling into her hair, "please, please don't ever think you did this. That would hurt me far more than what actually happened." "Okay," Ellen said, hugging Boris back. After a few more quiet minutes, Boris said goodnight to her, got up and left the room. He made it down the stairs, then into the hall heading towards the master bedroom before he finally leaned against the wall and broke down. The master bedroom door swung open and Lorraine stood there, in her silk pajamas, her thumb stuck in a book as she looked at Boris. Boris was sobbing uncontrollably as he slid down against the wall, and Lorraine walked down the hall and sat down beside him, pulled him against her and stroked his hair, just letting him cry on her. "It's okay," Lorraine said, "you're okay." But it wasn't okay, and it never would be again. *** Standing at the intersection, Boris wouldn't say a thing. He just leaned against the pole and scribbled in his journal as Carol stood back and watched, arms folded, a mixed look of utter confusion and absolute despair on her face. Finally Boris wiped his nose on his coat sleeves and turned to look at Carol. "She blamed herself for the accident, I blamed myself for the accident, and Lorraine...I don't know what she thought," Boris said, "...I signed her up for Soccer after school, and she hated it. She always fought me on doing it, but I always pushed her to keep doing it, I told her it was a good thing to learn teamwork. Only now do I realize there's a million ways to learn teamwork, and often times teamwork isn't even necessary of even worth it in the long run, because you wind up alone." "You're not alone," Carol said quietly. "...she hid my car keys, made us late. I was angry, I wasn't paying attention, I drove into the intersection without thinking and we were just...reamed. She lost the use of her legs, and she blamed herself. A little girl, blaming herself, for being in a wheelchair. I tried to convince her it wasn't her fault, but what child listens to their parent? So she blamed herself, I blamed me and nobody ever really got over it. It happened 25 years ago today. Right at an intersection, just like this one." Carol approached Boris and rested her head on his arm as he ripped out a piece of paper from his journal and, taking out a piece of gum and chewing it until it was good and soggy, used it to stick the paper to the pole. "Accidents happen," Carol said, "Look at most of the people in the home. They're not there because they want to be. They're there because most of them had an accident. You're there because you decided not to be a burden to your daughter as an adult, because you felt responsible for what happened to her, right?" "Right." "But...but that's the thing. It was just an accident. Hell, so much of life itself is an accident. So many babies are born on accident, so many people die by accident, it just...it's all so random. It's impossible to find rhyme or reason for anything. I'm sure Father Kricket would tell you the same thing. Sometimes things happen, and sometimes those things are bad, and that's just existence." Boris nodded, then turned around and hugged Carol as tight as he could, whispering into her ear. "thank you for liking me," he said, and she nodded, patting his back. After the hug ended, Boris turned and began heading back the way they came, saying he'd treat her to lunch. Carol agreed, but stayed back momentarily to look at the paper he'd stuck to the pole. She grabbed it and looked at the words scribbled on it, then smiled and followed him. *** Things never got better, at least not while he still was young and had a family. But when Boris moved into the home, and he met Larry and Burt and Carol, and to some extent Polly, things began finally getting better. It just took a few decades, but now he was happier than he had been in years. But none of that lasted, because then his daughter decided to try and get her legs fixed, and because he'd given his blessing to it, she was now in a coma. Twice now, he felt, he was responsible for what had happened to her. For putting her in the hospital. And that wasn't something he lived easily with. But thankfully, with the company of people like Carol, he didn't have to live with it alone. That's the thing Boris realized, is that pain may be awful, but sometimes you don't have to deal with pain by yourself. And sometimes that's the best you get, if you're lucky, and he was lucky. So sure, things never got better. But they were at least becoming manageable.
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"You selfish son of a bitch".
It was scrawled, the handwriting not only near illegible but also unrecognizable, across a piece of paper taped to Boris's door. Boris groaned as he stood and stared at it, Polly at his side, chewing on a bear claw. Boris took the paper off and looked at it closer, almost like he was inspecting it, as if he'd find some clue that would somehow lead him to its author. "I didn't know someone hated me this much," Boris muttered. "I hate you that much, but I didn't do this," Polly said. "No, of course you didn't, you'd have to know how to spell to do this," Boris said, making Polly smirk as she followed him down the hall, presumably looking for Carol. Unfortunately, Carol was nowhere to be seen, and he groaned and stuffed the paper in his coat pocket. "So what are you gonna do about it? You gonna find out who it is and challenge them to a deadly game of shuffleboard?" Polly asked, snickering. "You're the same age as me, why do you act like you're not?" Boris asked, sounding annoyed. "You're only as old as you feel," Polly replied, "And I feel 45." "Well you look 90," Boris snapped back, making her laugh even harder before adding, "And honestly, if you're not gonna help me, then just get lost, alright? I don't need anymore stress around me right now." "You want my help?" Polly asked, "I'm a pretty good sleuth." Boris turned to face her as Polly finished eating her bear claw and licking her fingers. He sighed and rubbed his forehead, then threw his arms up in frustration, giving up and continuing to head to his bedroom, Polly right behind him. As they entered his bedroom, Boris opened his desk drawer and found his pad of personalized paper, then pulled the paper ball from his coat pocket and spread it out on the desk as Polly sat on his bed and watched. "Just as I suspected," Boris said, "It's from my pad. Someone came into my room, found my paper and then made a note on a piece of my own personalized paper. That's just an extra bit of cruelty." "How and why do you have personalized paper? I want personalized paper!" Polly said, standing up and taking the now uncrumpled paper ball from him, looking at it closely, "It's shaky. This indicates we could be dealing with someone who has Parkinsons." "That's not stereotyping at all," Boris muttered. "I'm just giving you the facts as I see them." "As you see them?" "Yes, the only ways facts are meant to be seen, by me," Polly added snarkily, making Boris chuckle; she continued, adding, "I mean it could be something different, but that would be my first guess is someone suffering from Parkinsons, and likely poor eyesight considering how sloppily this is done. So someone with glasses, or perhaps on medication for Glaucoma." Boris looked at her in sheer awe, something Polly had never experienced before given the general animosity of their strangely almost laughably pseudo vicious rivalry. She shrugged and smiled as she handed the paper back to him. "What can I say," she said, "I really loved Nancy Drew." Thankfully, with this information Polly had somehow gleamed from this paper, Boris knew exactly who to go to. *** "That's classified information, I can't tell you that," Whittle said. "What do you care, you don't even work there anymore!" Polly asked as Whittle stood up from her dinner table and walked across the kitchen to the sink to get a glass and pour herself some more coffee. Whittle took a few sips before leaning against the sink and looking back at Polly and Boris sitting together at the table. "What is this?" she asked, "What's this little, uh, weird Sherlock and Watson thing you got goin' on here? Normally you two hate eachother." "It turns out Polly somehow has a natural talent for sleuthing," Boris said, "I don't know how she's good at anything, but remarkably she is." "And, only I am allowed to make Boris's life miserable. That job is taken," Polly said, leaning back in her seat and crossing her arms as Whittle laughed a little and walked back to the table, sitting back down. "If I tell you this, you cannot tell anyone who it was that told you," Whittle said as she leaned in and lowered her voice, "...you want Room 213. Ask for Mrs. Sylar." *** Room 213 was easy enough to track down, as they discovered once back at the home. Second story, thirteenth room, but upon knocking on the door they were greeted with something fairly unusual. It wasn't the room of a patient, but rather a janitorial closet. Once it was opened, a young woman stood there, looking out at them, dressed in her janitorial garb. Polly and Boris glanced at one another, the looked at the young woman again. "Uh, Mrs. Sylar?" Boris asked, and the girl nodded, opened the door the rest of the way and let the both of them in. She shut the door behind her and then leaned against it, looking at Boris and Polly who now stood in the center of the small closet, looking around at all the various cleaning supplies. The woman, who they presumed was Mrs. Sylar, was fair skinned and heavily freckled with buck teeth and mousy brown hair. She looked at them as she chewed her thumbnail on her right hand. "My name is Boris, this is Polly," Boris said, "I was told to ask to speak to Mrs. Sylar about finding out information about a patient." "I'm Sylar, but not Mrs. I'm not married," Sylar said, "What do you need?" "Someone left me a fairly strongly worded message on my door, and we figured their handwriting meant they suffered from one or multiple ailments that impaired either their ability to write or see properly," Boris said, taking the paper out from his coat pocket and handing it to Sylar, "So we want to know who might've done this. We're thinking perhaps they have glaucoma or parkinsons." "This is definitely the chickenscratch of someone with parkinsons, most definitely," Sylar said as she looked at the writing on the paper, "Remarkably only one person in this entire home suffers from it. They take a medication called Levodopa to help deal with it." "How do you know this?" Polly asked. "Because I steal medication and sell it on the street," Sylar said walking past them and pulling out a small black book from her pocket on her jumpsuit, "Yes, you want Mr. Druback, in Room 119, Building B. But you cannot tell anyone I gave you this information." Polly nodded, then turned and began to exit the room as Boris stood behind and waited for Sylar, who stopped as she got near him. "Why are you telling me this if you know you could get into a lot of trouble?" Boris asked, and Sylar looked at the floor, her voice almost a whisper now. "Because people think I'm a selfish son of a bitch too, because of my reliance on the drugs I steal, and the money I make off of them," Sylar said, "I know what it's like for people to hate you." Boris didn't know what to make of this. He never really expected anyone at the home to outright hate him. Sure, he and Polly had a somewhat clashing relationship, but it was all in good fun, he'd always felt. But this note left on his door? This was done out of anger and spite. Someone was truly unhappy with and at him, and that was something Boris didn't know how to deal with. He'd never been very good at dealing with people who didn't like him. Especially not since the accident with Ellen. Boris turned and followed Polly back out into the hall, as Sylar shut the door behind them. "Well," Polly said, "That sure was a load of something." "...why would someone be so mad at me?" Boris asked. "You really gonna let a little note scribbled by someone who likely can't even hold their own dick to pee anymore get you down?" Polly asked, "Get over it. You're in much better shape than they are, maybe that's why, because they're envious." "I can't imagine anyone who would be envious of me," Boris said, leaning against the wall and rubbing his face with his hand, feeling deflated. "Boris," Polly said, approaching him, "I don't go out of my way to be nice to, well...anyone, but especially not you, so I hope you appreciate what I'm about to say. A lot of people would be envious of you. You're in much better health than most of the folks who live here, you can come and go as you please and, most importantly, you still have someone from your life who visits. Even if it's an ex wife, it's somebody. You have a lot to be envious of, believe it or not." Boris looked at her, and could see she wasn't just putting him on, she was being sincere, or as sincere as Polly could stand to be anyway. Either way, didn't matter. They had their name now; Mr. Druback, Room 119, Building B. *** They had never visited Building B aside from the one time Boris came to find Leanne. But even then he hadn't really stopped to take into account just how...shabby, it was. It was a lot more rundown than Building A, and a lot less cheerful in a decorative sense. As Boris and Polly walked down the halls, trying to find Room 119, they could both feel the chill in the air that permeated the entire establishment; a chill of both sadness and illness. This was not welcoming like their building was, and they both began to feel bad for anyone who was forced to live within these quarters. It wasn't squalor, by any means, but it was definitely a step down. "Just being in here makes me feel like I'm committing elder abuse," Polly mumbled, making Boris chuckle. "It's pretty dang dreary, yeah," he said, "This must be where everyone who can't afford the nicer accommodations ends up. People without money, or health insurance or health care of any kind. This is the place old people who have kids that don't care about them get stuck." "God I'm glad I never had children," Polly said. "Really? You never had kids?" "Can you blame me if this is what they would do to me?" Polly asked, gesturing to their surroundings. "Fair argument," Boris said, as they finally stopped in front of a door and he pointed at it, adding, "There it is. Room 119. Mr. Druback...I don't know that I've ever even heard of him or heard his name. God, I'm terrible. You'd expect me to be friends with more people around here." "Please, you're really gonna spend your last few years alive making friends? Most will likely die before you do, and then you'll just be left with a world of grief," Polly said, knocking on the door. "Jeez, what happened to you to make you so cynical?" Boris asked, but she merely folded her arms and didn't answer him. The door swung open to a young woman standing there, a nurse, who looked surprised to see people outside in the hall. She glanced between the two of them before asking what they needed. "We're here to see Mr. Druback," Boris said quietly. "Come in," the nurse said, moving aside so they could enter. The interior of this room was like a snapshot of the forties. The wallpaper well patterned, the carpet shaggy, the lighting dim yet accessible. Bookshelf after bookshelf lined the wall, and there, in the middle of the room in a bed, in front of a television, was an old man hooked up to machines. Boris and Polly slowly entered and walked towards it, the nurse right behind them. "Mr. Druback, these two want to see you," she said, before leaving them to their business. Mr. Druback, nearly bald, large bags under his eyes, rolled his head to the side and glared at the two, before exhaling. "God dammit," he mumbled, "What do you want?" "You left me a note on my door," Boris said, "It called me a selfish son of a bitch." "And what? You're here to dispute that?" Mr. Druback asked, "Go ahead, try and tell me how I'm wrong." "I...I don't think you are, is the thing," Boris said, surprising both Polly and Mr. Druback, as he seated himself on the chair beside the bed and hung his head, "...the truth is, I've spent all day, we spent all day, looking for who wrote the letter because I was hurt and angry. I thought it was malicious and cruel. But I never recognized just how lucky I am, and that maybe, to someone else, I really am a selfish son of a bitch. But it's not intentional. I don't think I ever recognized how lucky I am to have the things that I have. I haven't always been lucky, and my luck isn't all that great. I have a daughter in a coma and an ex-wife with a bitter unstable relationship with me, but I have my health - give or take - and some friends and I have money and...and I guess I'm pretty lucky in that regard." Mr. Druback shifted in his bed and folded his hands in his laps, waiting for Boris to go on, while Polly stood by, one hand on her chest, surprised by this sudden outpouring of honesty. "...and what it really boils down to is after spending a whole day being angry, I'm now angry at myself for being mad at someone for being so brave to tell me the truth. I wish I had that courage. I wish I could tell the truth as easily as you seem to be able to. I always sugarcoat it, I always try and make it less harsh than it is because I don't want to hurt people but...but I think sometimes the truth needs to hurt. If it doesn't hurt, then it doesn't make an impact, and thus the lesson that's supposed to be learned from it is easily forgotten or outright ignored." Boris shook his head and pulled his cap off, running his hands through his thinning hair. "Thanks for being mean," Boris said, half laughing, "I think maybe it's the exact kind of thing I need." With that, Boris held his arm out and Mr. Druback, half hesitant and half confused, reached out and shook his hand. After the shake ended, Boris stood, put his cap back on and headed out of the room, Polly quick on his heels. As she closed the door behind her, saying goodbye to Druback's nurse, she turned to see Boris leaning against a wall, his arm posted up on the wall, his face shoved against his arm. "Well," Polly said, stretching best she could and yawning, "I think I could use a nap after all this excitement. That was, uh, kind of surprising what you said in there." Boris was quietly crying, and Polly stopped and cautiously placed her hand on his back and rubbed, trying to comfort him. It'd never occurred to her that perhaps she was actually the best person he had in his life, if for no other reason than because she argued with him and pushed him to fight back, something Carol and Burt and the others didn't do. Their dubiously antagonistic behavior seemed to actually be better than complacency, and she'd never really considered this a positive. After a bit, Boris finished crying and turned to face Polly, who - for the first time he could remember - genuinely smiled at him. "Thank you," he said quietly, "Thank you for coming with me, for helping me figure this out. Thank you for being mean." "Hey, it's no big deal, I just did what I normally do," Polly said. Boris and Polly walked back to their building together and spent the rest of the evening getting dinner, playing a few games of Scrabble (surprising everyone else by their odd, unnaturally cooperative demeanor) and then went their own ways. After Boris went to his room for the night, Polly went to hers and sat on the end of her bed, staring at the vanity mirror propped up on the table across from her against the wall. She shut her eyes and tried to remember, tried to remember back to when Boris had first moved into the home. *** He was new here; tall and well dressed, and didn't seem nearly as physically or mentally impaired as most of the residents of the home were. Polly and Carol were sitting together at a table, as Polly did a puzzle and Carol read a magazine, but upon Boris's entrance, they both looked up at him and watched his every move. "He looks fine," Polly said, "I can't imagine why he's in a home. He doesn't seem to be the kind who needs the help." "Who knows," Carol said, "None of our business." "He doesn't need any help, he's cognizant, he's not stumbling around, he looks like he has money, and yet here he is, ready to take up space that someone much worse off than him likely would appreciate and need," Polly said, scoffing, as she turned back to her puzzle and under her breath muttered to herself, "what a selfish son of a bitch." *** Sitting on the bed that night, Polly swore to herself she'd try to be less combative towards Boris from then on. He wasn't selfish, he was in deeply immense pain, just like everyone else; it just wasn't as physical as most of the people in the home. She laid on her bed and looked at the ceiling overhead as she reached to the bedside table and turned on her radio, tuning it to the old jazz station and shut her eyes to let the notes carry her off into a restful sleep. He wasn't a selfish son of a bitch, and that wasn't something she was afraid to admit being wrong about. "You don't know the first thing about flowers," Carol said, standing with Boris as they watched Larry dig in a small plot of soil outside in the garden area of the home, hands on her hips, "What makes you think you can do this?"
"Because how hard can it be? You're just putting plants in the dirt," Larry said, digging up yet another hole for another flower to be inserted, "It can't be that difficult for god sakes." "The man has a point, how hard can it be?" Boris asked, looking at Carol. "You want to know how hard it can be? Have you ever seen a landscaper do their job? A gardener? Knowing where to prune and sheer? It's an art, a science," Carol said, "It's not something one can just pick up and do, unless you don't care about doing it poorly." "...did you just call planting a flower a science?" Boris asked. "Would you two either shut up or join me, because you're distracting me," Larry said, annoyed. With this ultimatum, Carol and Boris turned and started walking away, towards the gazebo. "You ever get the feeling like this is just reverse daycare? It's like, when you're a child, someone looks after you, cleans up after you, feeds you, gives you pointless activities that go nowhere for you to pass the time with until you go to sleep, and that's exactly what's going on here," Boris said, "Except our sleep is the eternal sleep we're all eventually going to face down." "God talking to you is depressing," Carol said, "Though, you're not totally inaccurate. I for one never assumed I'd be spending my final years in a nursing home, that's for sure. Especially one so...low maintenance." "I know, this nursing home is so low maintenance that if it were a woman it would still be above my standards," Boris said, making Carol chuckle as they sat on the bench outside the gazebo and looked at every other senior passing them by; Boris continued, "See, each is involved in their activity, their mindless time wasting activity, all just awaiting that inescapable visit from the reaper." "Well hopefully the reaper shows up sooner than expected," a voice from behind and somewhat above said, making both Boris and Carol startle and look up. In the gazebo behind them, leaning on the rail and sipping a carrot juice, was Polly. "What tomb did you crawl out of?" Boris asked, as Polly finished her drink and capped it. "You two are making fun of that man for trying to make a garden and beautify this place, and that's just mean," Polly replied, "What are you two doing? Just sitting on your asses? Real lovely way to spend an afternoon, being judgemental while doing something of even lesser value." "You're one to talk, you judge people so much you should be in a court somewhere," Carol said, making Polly smirk. "Well, I'm gonna help him," Polly remarked, coming down the stairs of the gazebo and handing her carrot juice bottle to Boris, adding, "I think it's nice to have flowers around. Not like there's a lot of pretty faces here to look at as it is." With that, Polly turned and headed off, leaving Boris and Carol alone. They glanced at one another for a moment, before Boris looked at the bottle in his hands and then looked back where Polly had been. "Hey!" he shouted, "I don't want your trash!" *** Gardening had been something Larry had never done before. He'd only watched one other person do it...his wife. She always wore a big sunhat and green latex gloves and a large pair of sunglasses when she went out to the garden in the backyard, and Larry would always join her. He'd seat himself on a pull out chair and drink lemonade from the pitcher they kept on a table nearby with them, pouring himself and his wife each a glass whenever they needed it, and he would read a book while she gardened, occasionally giving into conversation. It wasn't an excuse for him to relax or even partake in a hobby. It was an excuse for him to just sit back and admire his wife from a distance. He would watch everything she did, not understanding much of it, but it didn't matter. He just liked how happy the act made her. She'd hum, usually not realizing she was doing it, and he felt like he didn't ever need a radio if he had her around. He'd much prefer to listen to her humming than anything he could find on an AM/FM station. She'd run a small gardening shop that she'd taken over from her own father, but it had shut down a few years back, and that's when she started gardening at home. She just couldn't get away from it, it was something that made her extremely happy. And then one day she died, and Larry couldn't stand to look at a single flower for years afterwards. *** Boris was sitting on his bed, sifting through some old papers he had written some poems down on. This thing with Leanne had hurt a lot, and he wondered if he'd just be better off burning his remaining poems. But he could never bring himself to actually do it, and instead he always merely locked them right back up into the briefcase and pushed it back under his bed. He was in the middle of doing this when a knock came at his door, and he opened it to find Father Kricket standing there. "Oh," Boris said, "What're you doing here?" "There's a man down the hall, very sick, likely not to last through the night...could I borrow your bible? I seem to have forgotten mine," Kricket said, wringing his hands, clearly feeling bad about this failure on his part. "It's out of date but sure," Boris said, stepping aside for him to enter the room, "Come on in and let me dig it up." "A bible is never really out of date, to be fair," Kricket said, smirking, "If we're being semantic about it." Boris pulled open a drawer on his desk and inside was his bible and a few dirty magazines. He took the bible and handed it to Father Kricket, who merely shook his head and rolled his eyes as he took the book and stuck it under his arm. "It's in good company," Boris said. "I'm not going to comment," Kricket replied, chuckling, "Thank you very much." As he turned to leave, he stopped and turned back to face Boris. "Yes? Do you need my rosary too?" Boris asked. "No, I...I just wanted to see how you've been lately. I know things at the hospital aren't really going as well as you'd hoped...are you doing okay?" Kricket asked, and Boris folded his arms, shrugging. "About as okay as someone in a nursing home with a comatose daughter can be, I suppose," Boris said, "There's nothing I can do about any of it, so I try not to dwell on it. The whole thing is fucked, you know? So why think about it constantly and make myself feel even worse than I already generally do?" "Solid line of thinking, I guess," Kricket said, "Well, you know where to find me if you ever want to talk. I care about you, you're my friend. Thanks for the book." And with that, Father Kricket exited Boris's room, leaving him to smile to himself. He'd called Boris his friend. It'd been a while since Boris felt like he had a real friend. Oh sure, he had Whittle, or people in the home like Carol and Burt, but...the way Father Kricket said it, it felt more genuine, like a real friendship and not simply a friendship for the sake of friendship because of their situation. Boris went to bed happy that night. *** "This looks awful," Carol said, watching Larry and Polly still try and plant flowers the following day; she continued, "Not to be mean, I'm just...this looks awful. Do you guys want me to go to the library, get a book out maybe about how to garden? Because it looks like you need it. I didn't expect two people to not be able to complete one task, but well done, ya did it." Polly pulled her hat up and wiped her forehead with her arm, glaring over her shoulder at Carol. "Well, I'm sorry it doesn't live up to your majesty's garden at the palace," Polly said, "We're doing our best." "It's weird how your best is still bad," Carol replied, just as Boris strolled up and looked at the 'progress' that had been made. He stood there, chomping on a sandwich beside Carol, while Polly continued to put flowers into the ground and pat the dirt lovingly around them. "Wow," Boris muttered, "Somehow it looks less like a garden than yesterday." "I'm sorry!" Larry said, standing up, throwing his arms into the air, "I'm sorry I don't know how to garden! She never taught me how to do it properly! I was just...I was just trying to steal back a piece of her, you know? I'm sorry it doesn't live up to your weirdo standards of perfection! I was just...I was just trying to bring her back. Any part of her back. Just for even a moment..." With his sudden outburst complete, Larry wiped his eyes on his sleeve and turned to walk back into the building. Boris and Carol stood there, rather shocked by this surprising evidence of emotion from a man so usually stoic, and when they finally looked at Polly, who was now standing up herself and wiping the dirt from her knees, she crossed her arms and stared them down. "So, feel better about yourselves now?" she asked. "Not really no," Boris admitted. *** It had happened while he'd been at the store. Larry had gone to get ingredients to surprise his wife with a dinner, and when he got back he knew she'd still be out gardening. Larry prepared and cooked the entire meal, and only once it was plated and ready, wine glasses filled to the brim and candles lit, did he finally head outside to the garden to find her. Find her he did. She wasn't hard to miss, as she was laying on her side in between a row of roses bushes and her wheelbarrow. Larry rushed to her side, even though he knew full well that there was nothing he could do at this point. That she was gone long before he'd even gotten home. When the doctor finally informed him of the cause, cerebral hemorrhage, Larry didn't even care what had done it. He didn't even really get upset at the fact that it had happened. Mostly, he was furious that it had happened while he was completely unaware. That's what upset him more than anything else. He'd never wanted her to die alone, who would want that for anyone really? Sitting outside as the paramedics loaded her onto the stretcher, then covered her with a sheet and carried her to the ambulance. After they left, Larry sat there on the marble bench near where she'd dropped and stared at the spot her body had lied for hours before he'd found her, wringing his hands. If only he hadn't left. If only he'd come home sooner. If only he'd been here when it had happened. A million examples of 'if only' ran through his mind, and try as he did to ignore them, he couldn't. What would become of her garden? Turns out he wouldn't have to make that decision, as a few months later he'd slip getting out of the tub, give himself a concussion and his son would bring him to the home, then move his own family into the home. The garden, from what Larry had been told, had been left untouched, but not cared for. It too, like them, had rotted away and was now nothing more than a mere shell of itself. They'd added more to the backyard; a bigger deck, a barbecue built into the ground and a playset for the kids, a porch swing for themselves, but nobody really had any passion for gardening, so as the backyard grew in life, the gardens life diminished. Larry always had seen the empty bits of land on the grounds of the nursing home community, but he'd never had the guts to do anything to it until now. But now, as he was discovering, he couldn't do it properly. No matter how hard he tried, he simply couldn't bring even the smallest piece of her back, even momentarily. *** Larry woke that morning and laid in bed for a while. Usually he got up immediately and got dressed and went for breakfast, but not today. Today he lay there, thinking, mostly about her. After a while of silently apologizing to her memory that he couldn't make the garden happen, Larry finally got out of bed, put on some slacks and a turtleneck and headed to the cafeteria for breakfast. He sat by himself, figuring the others felt bad about how they'd treated him the day prior and were now avoiding him, and ate his oatmeal before finally deciding to go see his friend Don across the community in the other building and have a game of chess. As Larry stepped out onto the back steps and began to cross the grounds, he spotted Boris, Carol and Polly all by the area he'd tried gardening at. "Christ," he mumbled before striding over there, "What the hell is going on? Come on, I told you I was done, it's pointless! You can all stop now and-" And as they moved aside, Larry saw they'd done it. Boris, Carol and Polly had made a nice little garden full of different flowers in the space, and Larry was without words as he approached it and knelt before the floral arrangement in the dirt. "After what happened we all, well Carol and I really, felt bad about how we behaved towards the idea, and towards you, and...you're our friend, Larry, and if this is what would make you happy, then we wanted to help. We also had no idea it had something to do with your wife," Boris said, stepping forward, planting one hand on his shoulder and pushing a flower encased in dirt in front of him. Larry took it and looked up at Boris who smiled. "It's the last one to be transplanted, if you'd like to do the honors," Carol said. Larry took it, set it into the dirt and lovingly pushed the soil up around its stem, then leaned in and smelt it. Tears swelling up in his eyes, his fingertips gently touching the silk petals, he smiled and whispered. "I did it, Petunia. I did it for you." "Well this is lovely, isn't it?" Leanne asked, cutting off another piece of steak, "A nice candlelit dinner, relaxing music, intimate small talk. This is the kind of stuff reserved for women much classier than I."
"Hey, don't talk that way about other women," Boris said, making her laugh as he raised his wine glass, "To us. To taking new chances. Braving new horizons, and all that other romantic crap." And together they clinked their glasses, the sound of it echoing throughout the restaurant, until Boris woke in his bed, remembering it was all just a dream. He sighed and rolled over, silently cursing himself for having this dream once again. Hell, he hadn't even seen Leanne since she'd left the home, so why was he suddenly dreaming about her? Shit, his alarm went off, and he remembered he was going to be late to take Whittle to an appointment. Boris quickly, quickly as an old man could anyway, got up, got dressed and rushed out the door. *** "God, can't you women ever be ready before you're supposed to leave?" Boris asked, as Whittle flipped him off and stuffed some more things in her purse; he leaned on the doorframe to her apartment, crossed his arms and sighed, "Why am I taking you anyway? You drive." "My car's got a flat tire, remember? I told you that." "Oh, right. Well maybe we should focus on getting that fixed instead." "Hey, you wanna get your toolbox out and change it? I got a spare," Whittle said, grabbing her coat off the rack, "Be my guest if that's how you'd rather spend your afternoon." "Beats standing here being verbally berated," Boris muttered, making her laugh. That's when his eye caught the glimpse of the shimmer down the hall. A green shimmer, like an emerald, and as he protected his sight from it, he also realized where it was coming from. A woman, an old woman, wearing an emerald broach, being helped to the door of an apartment by a young man. It was Leanne. Holy hell, she lived in the building, right down the hall. What were the odds? Did he dare go speak to her? Did he really want to make that move? Would she even remember him? Her memory was beginning to fail her, so would she even remember him, and if not, wouldn't that only make him feel more embarrassed than he already did for not seeking her out sooner? "Hey, you do know where we're going, right? I don't need to..." Whittle started, coming out the door to her apartment, locking it behind her, "...Boris?" "Wh-what? Uh, yeah, I know where it is, you don't need to give me directions." "Everything okay out here?" "Yeah, I'm just admiring your hall," Boris said, "You know, you get so tired of seeing the ones at the home that any new hall is just something to behold and bask in." "You're so weird, dude," Whittle said, laughing as she passed him, and he followed quickly after her. He only glanced back once, but he wished he'd gone and knocked on the door. The not knowing was worse than any rejection he would've faced, he felt. Boris drove Whittle to her appointment, which was just her applying for a secondary nursing job to make extra money since she was now living alone. Boris sat in the waiting room, since he was her ride. He puttered around the waiting room a bit before finally picking up a magazine off a nearby table and sitting down with it. Boris read a few articles, and then turned the page to see a full two page spread ad about life insurance, featuring a happy, smiling older couple. A couple he would never be a part of, he knew. *** "I'm back from the store!" Leanne called out as she entered the small, cozy apartment. "Did they have what we needed?" Boris asked from the kitchen, "I need that pasta, pronto." The apartment was littered with indoor plants, some hanging from the ceiling, others sitting in windowsills, and dozens upon dozens of books, considering the two were avid readers. They often found themselves sitting up late into the night, reading passages they found amusing or interesting or simply well versed to one another. It was a humble life, but a life worth living, at least. They finished cooking the dinner together, and then ate, each discussing their day so the it was as if the other didn't miss out on a single thing. Afterwards, they ate ice cream and watched game shows, then laid in bed and read to one another until they each fell asleep. This was the life Boris had always wanted, and now with Leanne, he had it. Now he had this life, and he couldn't be happier. He loved getting up every morning, putting on the coffee and making them breakfast. They could read the daily comics together and start their day with a laugh. But, like all other dreams, Boris realized, this too didn't come true, and he woke up the following morning sick to his stomach, wondering if he should've spoken to her in the hallway. *** "You know what your problem is?" Carol asked as they sat eating lunch, "You got no moxie!" "I'll have you know that I have moxie falling out of my butt, alright," Boris replied. "You should get that looked at," Burt said, not even looking up from his tray, making Carol smirk. "You need to stop imagining what you could've had, stop asking yourself 'what if I'd just talked to her' and actually go talk to her and see where it could lead! You never know, she might remember you!" Carol said, scooping up a handful of chips and eating them one at a time, "Heck, you might be the only thing she remembers!" "Well I don't know if I wanna be the only thing someone remembers. That's a lot of pressure on me," Boris said, "I wanna leave a last impression, not be a lasting impression." "Well, be that as it may, I still think you should talk to her," Carol said, "You felt really awful when you found out she was suddenly gone, and now you have the chance to make things right and you don't wanna take it?" "Because the last time I tried to do that, my daughter wound up in a coma," Boris said flatly, making Carol immediately regret what she'd said. She went quiet, and Boris went sullen. They finished eating in peace and then all went their separate ways for the day. But Carol was right, and Boris knew it. Here he was, being given yet another second chance to fix a relationship, and he was willing to throw it away all because of a medical accident that befall Ellen? Ridiculous. That, unlike the accident that had crippled her in the first place, wasn't even his fault! Boris wandered the garden outside for a bit, where and Leanne had first met, and he couldn't help but feel like the real reason he didn't want to approach her was because he was embarrassed. Embarrassed for how attached he'd gotten so quickly, only to have her presence ripped away from him, like so many other people had been throughout his life... He barely knew her, after all, so why had he become so fond of her so fast? If Boris had to guess, it was likely because she had been nothing but nice to him. Carol and Burt were fine, but they were snarky and snippy, and they gave him shit (which he gladly gave right back to them), and Polly was...well, Polly was Polly. Better to leave it at that than even begin to attempt to examine that relationship. But Leanne...she'd just been approachable and friendly and interested right off the bat, and that was something Boris hadn't gotten from another person his own age in god knows how long. Whittle was that way, but Whittle was not his age. And suddenly he found himself walking by a small stone monument with a plaque on it. He slid his hands into his pants pocket and staggered up to it, reading the words off the shimmering gold plate that looked up at him. "To love is to throw caution to the wind, to hate is to be overly cautious of what we don't understand." He nodded, then wondered why he'd given physical recognition to a goddamned plaque with a random quote on it. He really was losing his mind, he thought. He made a decision right then and there, though, that the next time he was at Whittle's complex, he would go and try to speak to Leanne, if given the opportunity. Guess this random plaque really was useful. Boris headed back inside and went to his room, where he sat down at his desk and opened a notebook. He picked up a ballpoint pen and started writing. If he was going to do this, he was going to do it the right way. The only way he knew how. With a poem. *** "I'm not saying the kids are wrong," Leanne said, "I'm not saying that at all. The kids have plenty to be angry at and for. They've been handed a shit on planet with a myriad of issues they had no hand in creating but are now inheriting and expected to fix, all the while not being given any chance to make even a meager enough of a living to simply survive with the basics. If anything, I'm surprised the kids aren't angrier." "You make a good point," Boris replied, "And we know for a fact that plenty of them grew up with people who ruined them so deeply that they can barely function as a relatively capable human being. They're forced to recover from a thing they should've been able to take for granted, childhood, and that's sick too." Boris and Leanne were sitting at a small table in a cafe, both sipping hot chocolates and sharing a box of doughnuts. For a moment, while they sat chewing and sipping, they just smiled at one another from across the table, each happy that they had someone to talk to, to care for, to be cared for by. "I think I'd do terribly in the world today," Boris said, "If I were just starting out, you know? Certainly there's a lot more options, but that almost makes it worse, makes it too overwhelming to know which road to go down and constantly be afraid you've gone down the wrong one. I just don't think I could make it work, and I'm always in awe of the young people who do because it seems so vastly difficult." "I know what you mean," Leanne said, leaning back in her chair, wiping her mouth on a napkin, "My children have so many possibilities at their fingertips that I'm really in shock that they can navigate each and every one as well as they can, not because I doubt them but because it just, as you said, seems so very overwhelming." Boris reached across the table and took her hand, and as he felt her thumb rub the back of his hand, he woke up again. He was getting tired of these dreams. He'd much prefer nightmares over these. But, then again, weren't they nightmares in their own unique way? *** Standing in Whittle's doorway, leaning against the doorframe with his arms folded while Whittle stuffed some dirty clothes she was preparing to take down to the laundry room into a hamper, Boris couldn't take his eyes of the door that he'd seen Leanne go through. He wondered if he should approach, but what would he say? He pulled the poem he'd written out of his coat pocket, unfolded it and glanced at it, quickly reading it over. Boris then gathered his strength and walked over to the door, before knocking on it after hesitating for a split second. But nobody answered. Just his luck, he figured, the one day he had the courage to do it, nobody was even there. So, Boris simply slid the poem under the door and then walked back to Whittle's, where he helped her carry her stuff down to the laundry room. Sitting on the machine while it ran, sharing a can of soda back and forth between them, Boris leaning against the wall, Whittle sighed and lit up a cigarette. "I don't know, man," she said, shrugging, "I've never seen her, so maybe you hallucinated it." "Gee, thanks," Boris replied, "That sure makes me feel less old." "Did you leave the poem?" "Yes, I left the poem. I figured, best case scenario, she reads it, and she remembers me and she wants to get together. Worst case scenario, she doesn't remember me and I never hear from her again," Boris said. "Well it sounds like you have this all thought out then," Whittle said. "It's hard to meet people you like romantically when you get to be my age, not because it becomes hard to approach them, it's not that it's any easier or harder in that respect than it was when you were younger...it's more because you become afraid of making a comitment to a person who could drop dead at any second." "Yeah, but isn't the happiness you'd get out of the short term worth the pain in the long term?" Whittle asked, "I mean, don't you deserve to be happy, no matter what age you are?" Boris didn't have a response for this. *** Boris laid in bed that night, staring at the ceiling, chewing his lip. He couldn't help but feel like a fool, someone who had put himself out there and would now regret it once again. What had made him think for even a split second that he deserved some sort of happiness? He almost wished he hadn't done it now, just because he felt so embarrassed by his actions. And then the phone rang, and he sat up. Boris got out of bed and slowly approached the phone, then answered it. "H-hello?" he asked. "Boris?" Leanne asked, and he smiled. "Yeah, it's me." "I got your poem, it was absolutely lovely!" "I'm glad you think-" "But you're an idiot, Boris. You're an idiot thinking anyone would want to spend their last few years alive with someone like you. Have you seen how awful you are these days? You're sick and mean and nobody should be forced to be around someone like that." Boris stood there, stunned, until he realized her voice had become distorted, the phone melting in his hands. And then he woke up. He stared at the ceiling, catching his breath, realizing it was just another dream, but this time the worst kind. She'd remembered him, but she hadn't wanted him despite that. He sighed and rolled onto his back, and then the phone rang. He stood up, and slowly walked across the room to answer it. He picked it up, his hand shaking the entire time, and lifted the receiver to his face. "He...hello?" he asked softly. "Hello, is this Boris?" Leanne asked, and his spirits lifted. "Yeah, yeah it is, I guess you got my poem!" Boris said, sounding happy now. "I did, it was very beautiful!" Leanne said, "I...I don't know you at all, but I thank you for brightening up my day nonetheless!" Boris stood there, silent. "Hello?" Leanne asked. "Uh...yeah, you're...you're welcome," he said. Boris didn't have any dreams about Leanne after that. |
About
Golden Years follows the exploits of a bunch of old people in a retirement home as they try to have fun, relax or come to terms with the soon to be end of their lives. Archives
April 2024
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