The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey - By Walter Mosley Page 0,34
holding back her anger, “but that don’t mean I’ma put him in my tea.”
“You got germs in here?” Ptolemy asked.
“What?” Church said.
“You got them gloves for germs you say. That mean I’ma get sick in here?”
“No,” Antoine said in an exaggerated, almost yawning, tone.
“Then why you got them gloves on?”
“Why are you here, Mr. Grey?”
“I ...”
It was like falling into a dream for the old man. He wanted Coydog McCann to fish with, and Reggie smiling naturally in his grave. He wanted to show the children how to fly kites and sing songs that Jesus might not want to hear.
Ptolemy sat there in Church’s uncomfortable metal chair, thinking that he’d like to move without his joints aching and to have one full thought all the way through without stumbling over the words and getting distracted by the slightest thing. He didn’t want people to call him old man anymore or for social workers like Antoine Church to have power over him.
He wanted a job and driver’s license and a hard-on with a girlfriend like he was sure that boy Beckford wanted with Robyn.
Before Robyn came to stay with him, before Reggie came and before Sensia died, Ptolemy might have said these things. He might have talked about going to the bathroom and having sex. But now he just sat there, lost in the jumble of ideas. He knew that somebody like Church wouldn’t understand his words.
“Uncle wanna go to the kinda doctor help him remembah how to think,” Robyn said.
She was wearing her charcoal-gray dress with the high hemline and black hose under that. Sporting a hint of makeup, she carried a small red purse that was too small for her fighting knife.
“Your nephew came to see me a few months ago,” the social worker said. “He told me that you were having trouble with your memory and communication skills.”
“Reggie’s dead.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
The tone of Church’s voice jabbed at Ptolemy’s mind like the cut of a rusty chisel. It made him want to sneer and spit. He wanted to tell that man that he was an idiot, a stupid fool.
“Are you still having trouble thinking?” Church asked.
“No. I think just fine,” Ptolemy said. “It’s just that I got some trouble rememberin’ things I used to know. I mean, I know you got them gloves on ’cause you think there’s a germ in here. I know that this girl here is my granddaughter. But I don’t remembah where I put things a long time ago, an’ I cain’t, I cain’t . . . things I need to find.”
There was so much he couldn’t do. Sometimes he’d stand over the toilet for five minutes waiting to urinate. Sometimes when the phone would ring he’d go to the door and ask, “Who is it?” and when Robyn told him that it was the phone he’d get so embarrassed that he’d go into the bedroom just so he wouldn’t have to see her feeling sorry for him.
“Well,” Antoine Church said, smiling. “The reason I dropped by your house and left that card was because I found out about a man who might have just what you’re looking for.”
“What you laughin’ at, boy?” Ptolemy asked.
“I’m not laughing,” the grinning man said.
“Yes you are. Are you laughin’ at me?”
“No,” Church said, managing to approximate a sober look.
“You gonna be old too,” Ptolemy told him. “You gonna be sittin’ in this chair and a young man gonna be tellin’ you sumpin’. I got a family needs me and I cain’t walk down the street wit’out this child here to he’p me. I’m just askin’ for that, for that. That, that thing.”
Church scribbled in tiny script on a small slip of paper, which he handed to Robyn.
“Call this doctor and tell him that I referred you,” the prissy man said. “And if you have any problems you can call me. Maybe we can work together to help your uncle.”
“Thank you, Mr. Church,” Robyn said, smiling.
Mothahfuckah,” she whispered when she and Ptolemy were a few steps down the hall.
Dr. Ruben, who answered his own phone, said that he didn’t have a free appointment for three weeks.
“I’m traveling to India,” he said, “to Mumbai for a conference, but I’d be happy to see Mr. Grey when I return.”
Robyn didn’t argue with him. She made the appointment and then sat in the lawn chair that Ptolemy wouldn’t let her throw out.
“Do you want me to move back to Aunt Niecie’s house now that yo’ place is clean?” she asked her