Read Online Fastball by V. K. Sykes - Free Book Online Page B

with a good twelve inches between them,
he felt her stiffen. “Sorry,” he said. “I’ll understand if you
don’t want to talk about it.”
    She kept walking, clutching the lapels of his
jacket. Then she glanced at him from under her lashes before
looking straight ahead again. “My mother has Alzheimer’s. She was
diagnosed about four years ago. But I’d noticed signs for quite a
while before that.”
    Fuck. “I’m sorry, Maddie. I really
am.”
    Her gaze remained fastened on the pavement in
front of her. “It wasn’t just the forgetfulness. Sometimes, Mom
would dress herself in totally wrong clothes, things that didn’t
match or were meant for a different season. Then she’d get really
angry if I suggested she change. That’s when I knew, and tried to
get her to see a neurologist.”
    “I’ll bet she resisted, didn’t she?” he said
gently.
    “Big time. It was almost a year before I was
finally able to get her to go, and even then I practically had to
tie her up and carry her in.”
    “She knew, didn’t she? That’s why she
resisted.”
    She hugged the jacket tight to her body, as
if seeking comfort. He wished he could give it to her, wished he
could take her in his arms and cradle her slight form against
him.
    “I’m sure she knew something was terribly
wrong, and I guess she couldn’t face having it confirmed,” she
replied in a flat, thin tone, nothing like the laughing voice of a
few minutes ago. “By the time I finally convinced her to see the
neurologist, he told us we’d waited too long. The disease was so
advanced that the drugs wouldn’t be able to help slow its progress
much, if at all. It was a devastating prognosis, even though I
pretty much knew it was coming.”
    Jake couldn’t resist putting a gentle hand on
the back of her neck. Surprisingly, she didn’t shrug it off. “How
old is she now?”
    “She’ll be seventy in July. Getting
Alzheimer’s in your sixties isn’t very common. It just seems like
the rottenest thing that could happen to someone who should have
had many more good years. Years to spend with me, and maybe even
with her grandchildren, someday.”
    He heard so much sorrow and longing in those
words that it tore him apart.
    “Within a month of seeing that doctor,” she
continued, “Mom had to be moved into a full-care facility. Now, she
can barely speak any more, and when she does it’s usually
gibberish. I’m not sure how much she recognizes me, either.
Sometimes, I’m sure she does. Other times, she’s completely in
another world. I can hardly remember the last time she called me by
my name.”
    With a jerky motion she reached into her
purse and extracted a tissue, dabbing at her eyes. “I try to get to
the facility up in Massachusetts as often as I can. It’s hard with
my job, though I usually manage to get there at least once a month.
But I hate not being able to spend more time with her.”
    Jake nodded, encouraging her to talk. Not
that she noticed. At this point, Maddie almost seemed to be talking
to herself, like she was working something through.
    “Both my aunt and my cousin have been great.
They go over to the home several times a week and help her as much
as they can—buying her things she needs, just visiting with her and
making sure she’s okay. That sort of thing. It really helps.”
    She stopped and exhaled a shaky breath. She
lifted her gaze to his face, her eyes deep wells of sorrow, and he
felt the tragedy of the situation with striking force. To lose her
father at an early age, and then her mother to the ugliest disease
he could imagine—the injustice of it made him want to smash
something apart.
    “But I still feel guilty that I’m not there
more,” she said quietly. “Sometimes I feel like I should just quit
the Post and get some kind of job in Worcester, or at least
in Boston. That way I could take proper care of Mom. Be there every
day, or almost.”
    He opened his mouth, not sure what he wanted
to say but knowing he