No Visitors, Part Four: Orange Laces

He put his hand on my shoulder and patted it. “Sorry babe. I don't know what the hell is going on.” I reminded him in an annoyed tone why we were here. In that moment, I thought there still might be a chance that this wasn’t happening. I looked down and stared at his tennis shoes. White Reeboks with orange laces—his favorite. Not only did he say they were more comfortable than Nikes, he felt it was immoral to spend more than ten dollars on tennis shoes.

“Got a great deal, babe!” he'd report after a trip to Target. ”Picked up a great pair of Reeboks for $9.99. Let me know if you want some…Hey, by the way, what size shoe does your sister wear?”

Once he bought the Reeboks, he'd lace them with neon colored laces. Bright orange, red, yellow, green. I used to think it was hilarious that he did this but, after that moment on the driveway, the orange laces would always remind me of how harsh I was to him that day. Although he's often tried to piece together the timeline that led up to his being at Oak Knoll Assisted Living, he's never said anything that makes me think he has any idea that I was a shrew to him in his weakest moments.

Over the years, he periodically tries to solve the mystery that is his life, like a bumbling investigator. We'll be sitting in his room, watching CNN and he'll look at me with a severe expression, like he's about to confess that he's a spy. After he looks around to make sure no one is within earshot, he'll bring one of his hands up to his mouth the way people do when they're about to tell a secret and say, “One of these days, babe, we're gonna have to sit down and you're gonna have to tell me what the hell happened.” After he says this he stares at me like he's just dropped a bomb and waits for the explanation.

This is another thing that's changed---the explanation. It's gotten shorter and more concise. I usually tell him he just started forgetting things and we decided to move him closer to us so we could make sure he was taken care of. I never mention the day on the driveway or all the other painful details of his unraveling. 

The other day I was hanging some sweatpants up in his closet at Oak Knoll when I looked down and saw the Reeboks with orange laces, staring at me. I decided to show them to my dad to see if he had any kind of association with them. If he did, I'd finally get to apologize.

“Hey dad, remember these?” I held up the Reeboks.

“What the hell are those? They look like clown shoes!”

“You used to wear them. I think you thought the laces jazzed up the shoes.”

“I did? Jesus, if I ever want to wear something like that again, hit me over the head with a brick, will ya!” He laughs and snorts, mortified at his lack of shoe fashion sense.

He has no idea what those shoes represent. That his feet were in them the day his life started to melt. That we were together in that moment, when things got awful. Just the two of us. On this day though, we both laugh about how he doesn't remember. Another change. This is the way things are now. This is who we are and we are okay.

“Christ babe, what would I do without you? One of these days you're gonna have to tell me what the hell happened. Not today. But some day soon, I wanna know how the hell I ended up like this.”