Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 87771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
I reached my sister’s room and looked inside. Her bed was made with a row of stuffed Disney characters sitting up against the pillows. She sat in her wheelchair next to the window, staring out at the trees that lined the property. She held a pink unicorn plushie to her chest.
“Hey, Lils, brought you some snacks.” I lifted the plastic bag I was holding. My sister looked at me and smiled so widely her glasses almost fell off.
She was happy to see me, but I couldn’t avoid the sting of sadness I felt at seeing her. Not because I was upset that she was happy, of course, but that she had to be here in the first place. My sister was twelve years older than me and had always had some learning difficulties and issues growing up. My parents had done their best to try and get her help, but both of them were working-class folk with shitty medical insurance and a weak grasp of science. She was always well cared for and even had some independence as she got older. She’d watch me sometimes if my parents were busy working, and she loved to play board games with me. Jumanji was her favorite. On days we weren’t playing games, we were dancing in the living room to some of her favorite music, almost always salsa.
Then our father passed away from a heart attack, right in front of her. That moment completely broke her. Her mind became warped, thoughts turned dangerous. She started to think people were poisoning her water or that someone was coming for her in the middle of the night. Sometimes my mom and I would find her standing outside the house with a kitchen knife in her hand, still wearing her pajamas, saying she was keeping watch.
She was diagnosed with schizophrenia and early-onset dementia shortly after, triggered by our dad’s death. This was around the time I was a freshman in college. I was staying in a dorm that was a thirty-minute drive away, and my mom was getting older, and her arthritis was getting worse. She couldn’t take care of Lily on her own, so she had to make the decision.
At first, my sister was on a heavy cocktail of drugs that turned her into a husk of herself. She didn’t even understand she wasn’t at home anymore. I remember the first days of seeing her like that, knowing that my sister would never be the same, that our lives would never go back to the simpler days of board games and loud laughter. I nearly got into an accident driving away from the care facility because of how badly I was crying.
It killed me. It felt like we were abandoning her. It took me a while to accept the fact that this was necessary. That the sister I’d grown up with was fading away right in front of my eyes, and there was nothing I could do but stand by.
The first year or so was extra difficult. There were multiple trips to the hospital, different specialists and medical concoctions, all meant to sedate and numb her. She started losing weight from hardly eating and developed multiple different gastric and lung issues that required more intense care.
Things got relatively easier as time passed. The doctors found a good mix of drugs that didn’t knock her out completely, and she began to feel more comfortable at the nursing home. She made friends with the nurses and a couple of other residents, and I could see that she was doing better. But some days, all the progress would seem to disappear, and she’d fall into spells of angry rage. She weighed a total of six wet shih tzus on a good day and couldn’t harm a fly, but she could end up hurting herself.
It was on those days that a nurse would call me, and no matter what I was doing, I’d drop it all and head straight to the nursing home. Because it wasn’t until Lils saw me that her anger would dissipate. It was like my presence was a soothing balm over a harsh sunburn for her.
“Did you see the flowers that the nurses left you?” I asked, setting a cup of Jell-O down next to a beautiful yellow orchid.
Canary yellow.
Eli would love those.
“Yes. Pretty,” she said, her voice low as she wheeled herself toward me. I bent down and gave her a hug. They must have just bathed her because she smelled like Dove soap, and her thinning white and gray hair appeared extra shiny. I handed her the Jell-O and a spoon. “And Mom?”
The question wasn’t a new one, but it still knocked the breath out of me every time she asked.
“She’s good,” I said through a tightening sensation in my throat. “I saw there’s a board game night coming up. Are you going to play?”