won’t. I only want to ask her a few questions about mutual friends.” That wasn’t completely accurate, and it wasn’t totally false.
“Mrs. Kelly, patients such as Ms. Adkins are unpredictable at best. If she speaks to you, her answers may not make sense.”
“I’m not well experienced with dementia.”
“Dementia is a syndrome comprised of a group of symptoms,” Becky explained. “Alzheimer’s is a type of dementia that progressively worsens. Unfortunately, that is Ms. Adkins’s diagnosis and relatively speaking, she was diagnosed younger than most. While she has good days and not-good days, we can’t expect her to get better.”
“Thank you for explaining.”
“If she answers you at all, it will be her truth. I am not saying it is the truth.”
Her truth.
Patrick’s hand came reassuringly to the small of my back.
“Are you saying,” I asked, “that she might lie or that she might not know the truth?”
“Part of the disease and often an early symptom is the loss of the ability to conquer language. Everyone forgets a word from time to time. This, however, is more extreme, for example, using a totally inappropriate word in place of another. “I want to eat baseball for lunch,” is a rather simplistic illustration. We don’t eat baseball. The patient doesn’t mean baseball. He or she may mean anything from spaghetti to ice cream. There’s no way of knowing. And yet the request to eat baseball is said with full conviction. In the mind of that patient, they aren’t saying baseball but their chosen food. I’m telling you this because if she says something that makes no sense, it isn’t her fault, and she may become agitated at your lack of understanding.”
“I understand,” I said.
“We can only allow the two of you to visit for a short time, and if Ms. Adkins becomes agitated, we will ask you to leave.”
“Thank you,” Patrick said, “for allowing us to visit.”
Becky smiled as she reached for the door handle. “We’ll keep the door slightly open. Wilma also becomes agitated if doors are left open wide. She seems to feel more secure when they’re closed.”
I nodded as Patrick and I entered the room.
Unlike the rooms we’d passed, the curtains were drawn and the only light was coming from overhead. The television was playing an old episode of a sitcom from the 1980s. My attention went to the patient lying in the bed.
Sparse short white hair covered her head. Her small frame was covered by a bathrobe with a nightgown visible beneath. Blankets covered her legs, and her wrists were attached to the sides of the bed with what appeared to be a Velcro restraint. Hanging from the bed frame was a large bag filling drip by drip with her urine.
The bed was elevated so she could see the television across the room. She didn’t seem to register our arrival. Her eyes stayed fixed on the rerun.
“Wilma,” Becky said, “you have visitors.”
Wilma didn’t move.
My certainty of her identity from before began to fade.
How could this frail woman be the monster of my past?
“Wilma.” Becky touched her arm. “Remember, I told you visitors were coming.”
Wilma’s head shook. “Where’s Billy? When is he coming?”
My gaze snapped to Patrick’s. He’d told me that her brother William was deceased.
“Lewis will be here,” Becky said.
Wilma’s head shook. “I want to see Bill. He said we’d see a movie.”
“Today, Mr. and Mrs. Kelly are here to see you,” Becky said, pointing our direction.
I took a step forward. “Hello, Wilma.”
She looked up, her nose scrunching. “I don’t know you.”
“My name is Maddie.”
“No, I don’t know a Maddie. You have the wrong person.”
“Did you ever go by the name of Miss Warner?” Patrick asked.
Her head shook. “That’s not my name. Go away.”
Becky looked at us pleadingly.
“Wilma,” I said as calmly as possible, “I had a friend named Cindy. Do you by chance remember her last name or where she went?”
Her eyes were focused back upon the television.
I looked at Patrick with a shrug, no longer certain this was the same woman. The clues were there, but now seeing her, I couldn’t be sure. “Maybe we’re wrong. We should go.”
“Don’t know no Maddie or Cindy,” Wilma mumbled.
“Maybe it would be best—” Becky began when Wilma interrupted.
“Go. Now, girl. Walk faster.” Her voice grew louder. “On. Move, girl.”
My body began to tremble as she turned my way. A penetrating stare focused on me.
“Go on upstairs.” Lines formed around her eyes as she squinted my direction. “Did your ass heal?”
Patrick wrapped his arm around me. “We need to go.”
“This is what I