Suzie’s House 398 : Walter’s Nightmares

Walter woke up screaming. It had happened so many times over the years that no one bothered to check on him anymore. He lay in the hushed dark, panting and in a cold sweat, but not so much as a shadow flickered. Still, he reached across the bed with one hand, seeking a wife who had died long ago.

The pain of loss loomed, threatening to take him down a rabbit hole, then broke, leaving him annoyed. How many times would he have to grieve over something that happened so far into the past? If he had to lose his present, couldn’t he land in happier times?

Not that he could be sure of anything. It was just a feeling. It was all just feelings.

Like the nightmare that woke him. You’d think he’d be reliving Viet Nam, the way he had for so many nights after returning from the war. Instead, what put him in a cold sweat was remembering the nursing home.

There was a kind of logic to that. There was no chance he’d ever be going back to Viet Nam, but the possibility of ending up in the nursing home again never quite went away.

Not that it had been a particularly bad place, so far as those things went. Sure there was some petty theft, but mostly by other inmates…. No. He was supposed to think of them as residents.

You got used to the smell. The stench of old people couldn’t be helped. Same for the stench of disinfectant. Like mosquitoes in the swamp, fighting it just drove you crazy.

What about when they tied him to the bed? He couldn’t remember doing anything worth getting strapped down for, but everyone knew his brain was Swish cheese. Paranoia told him they used it as an excuse to keep an old man out of their way.

When he woke up, he was reliving that moment when Ned came to visit. He had no idea how many days he’d been strapped to the bed, but it had been long enough for the sht to pile up. Literally.

The look on Ned’s face brought home to Walter the pain and humiliation of his predicament. He didn’t mean to make it worse by crying. The tears flowed down on their own. He’d tried to wipe them away, but couldn’t raise his arm because of the straps. That put him over the top, broke him down, and left him sobbing.

An hour later he was cleaned up and sitting in Ned’s car in front of Ned’s house.

“Grandpa. I can’t promise you anything. I have to work, and your condition isn’t going to get better. But for as long as I can, I’ll keep you here with me. Do your best to keep out of trouble for me. All right?” Ned stuck out a hand to shake.

“Deal.” Walter took the hand.

He looked at the hand he had extended to the ceiling as he remembered that their agreement and the nursing home was over a year ago. If he kept messing around, he’d end up back there, telling himself the smell of death and loss of self didn’t bother him.

He rolled over in bed. There, on the nightstand, sat one of those new fangled phones that you could carry around in your pocket. He picked it up, held it close, and fell asleep.

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