Madson family
Mrs Madson twitched with surprise when, despite her worsening hearing loss, her ears picked up so clearly, the ringing sound of her phone. Surprise instantly turned into concern when she glanced at the blank screen of her touchable phone, was her dementia getting worse?
“I must be going mad quicker than I thought” she concluded, as the sound was bouncing accross the walls of her living room in such a realistic manner.
She looked at Mr Madson's portrait on the coffee table, the same portrait she chose for his funeral 2 months ago.
“Come on Maggie, don’t go mad so fast” she urged to herself, while doing her best to mute the ringing bells in her head. If her children knew! They would take no time to sell her flat. Memories ending up in carton boxes or on display in some charity shop or god forbid, recycled as sustainable bags for young climate change activists.
“Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing”
“RIIIIIIIIIIIING”
Tears started to pour out of her pale blue eyes, tears of joy, once she realised the ringing sound was, indeed, reality.
Sitting next to Mr Madson’s portrait, the landline phone finally went silent as she picked up the receiver and aligned it to her left ear just above her pearl earring.
“Madson family” she said out of habit, painfully aware of how much she missed her husband Mark, while not giving a damn about her children. Thank god they are finally out of my house, she likely thought.
“This is an automated call from your council library.
Please note you have.
ONE.
BOOK. Past due its return date.
You must return it within.
SEVEN.
DAYS. To avoid additional charges. Thank you and goodbye!”
Mrs Madson was in an utter state of confusion. The last time she was in a library was for her school exams about 70 years ago and she was not that keen on reading, rather, focused on trying to kiss Mark buried in one of his… “Damn you Mark, you book worm!”
Mrs Madson anxiety propelled her legs as she left the sofa behind her, skating in her slippers, like a ninety years old olympic parquet skater.
“How much was the fine? Wait, did the robot lady even mention it? For sure it is going to cost me a fortune! Mark and his books are always making problems…” her thoughts were mulling around, like old socks in a tumble drier as she opened the wardrobe in their bedroom.
The smell of Mr Madson clothing bursted in her nostrils. Images of the years passed together with Mr Madson, flashed in her head until she heard herself asking Mark; where was this damn book now? All she could find was an alien version of herself reflected in the mirror: silver cottoned hairs, no lush blonde mane; dried pink lips, framed by wrinkles, replaced the blooming red petals of a garden rose, kissing a young man in the library.
Embarrassed that for a moment, she genuinely forgot she was an old woman, skating on her slippers, in an empty home.
Dementia is a blessing until you remember you have dementia.
It took her literally a full minute to recognise she was looking for a book in a wardrobe, how silly of her! She slowly turned around, unaware of one of Mr Madson ties defiantly dropping on the floor. Was she holding it against her little french nose? Did it just get caught in between her gold ring bracelets? So generously sized compared to her petite bone structure. A tingling sensation travelled from her wrist to her heart, thousands of needles pierced her lungs.
She stopped walking, catching her breath in between bursts of coughs, towering precariously on top of the worn persian carpet in the library. The room was lit by a lazy summer afternoon light, flooding through a generous bow window, overlooking Hyde Park.
The children will be millionaires the moment they will get rid of her and sell this place.
Mere hours after the death of her husband, they spent several days in the house screaming at each other, fighting over money, holiday houses, cars, watches… while she was drinking gin on the sofa, staring at her husband's portrait with millions of thoughts and not a word to share with her children.
One month of silence followed, until her late daughter, Carla, called one morning:
“Hello mom, I just remembered about the gold tie clip I got to daddy for his birthday last holiday in Brighton, remember? Think I was fifteen? It’s important mom, David wants to get dad clothing and accessories, but that clip was worth a fortune and was my present! Can you look for it in the wardrobe? Mom? MOM? You hear me?”She hung up. Since that last call, she promised herself to never talk to any of them and she was celebrating another month of silence, drinks to that!
The cough finally stopped, her heart still beating, still aching.
She scanned the old oak shelves looking for this mysterious book, distracted by the paintings and the quirky green wallpaper. She solemnly marched towards a big red velvet chair catching a holy light from the large bow window just next to it.
Thin silver strands of hairs, at the top of the tall backrest, were shimmering against the scarlet velvet. She instructed the cleaner to leave this room alone, like a sacred temple. Mr Madson spent his last weeks like the young student she fell in love with, reading on that chair from sunrise to sunset, he said his legs were too weak to walk.
She was now resentful at Mr Madson. He was apparently well enough to walk to the nearby council library while he stopped taking walks with her in the park. She would have given away all her jewellery for a last walk with him; holding his arm, laughing, eating some soggy fish and chips, looking out for starving seagulls gliding above an endless sunset, screeching on top of the rumble of the droning waves. Her naked feet sinking in the sand, kissed by the last rays of light as she is securing her shoulders, chilled by a northerly breeze, under Mr Madson's strong arm. He was so tall!
She kept cradling in her romantic thoughts, escaping her aching lonliness, until she spotted a book, standing out so obviously, on the red velvet chair.
Last Christmas, the children gifted him a plastic device full of internet books, apparently so he could avoid walking to the council library and also make the words as big as he liked. It was just a devious plan to sell his book collection for a few thousands pounds. She now stands in an emptied library filled with memories.
Memories, embodied by the dust suspended all around her. Dust, suddenly scrambling in a chaotic vortex when she finally gathered the strength to lean down and grab the book with her bony hands.
Flicking through the pages, unable to read any of the words, she found a bookmark with Mark handwriting. She almost went back to the bedroom to take her reading glasses, but soon she remembered her husband's handwriting was so terrible, she would not be able to decipher it anyway.
She decided was best to keep it in the book, in case the librarian could make out any of Mark's hand writing. She desperately hoped for a new memory to be gifted to her before all was lost.
Lost she was in Mayfair streets. Long shadows on the pavement as the summer sun was setting down in a hurry and the breeze was chilling her shoulders.
Luckily enough, as if guided by the wind, she found her way, amused to see so many identical bicycles with a red “Santander” marking. Most likely students from the same school are flocking to the library to prepare for their exams.
She was proud of herself for cracking the mystery of the cloned bikes, maybe her dementia was not so severe after all!
Her confidence evaporated and she quickly grew concerned about her umbrella with a gold metal tip. You may think she was concerned about looking silly, carrying around a big umbrella on a dry summer evening, but that was not the case, it was merely a surrogate of a cane as she refused to admit she needed one in the first place. Afterall, in London, you’re always allowed to carry an umbrella and no one passes you any judgement for that. It was the “SILENCE” sign presenting itself at the door causing her uneasiness, written in such big print, she could read it even without her glasses. She peered through the windowed door evaluating the fine chequered marble floor feeling certain it will transform the tip of her umbrella into a loud machine gun.
The threat of a hefty fine however was enough to motivate her to open the door and blast her machine gun to the demise of all…
…wait, how come the library was absolutely empty?
Not devoid of books like at home, no, deprived of students! And what about the bicycles then? Were they real?
"Was my umbrella really so noisy that everyone thought of a terrorist attack and hid under the… wait! Where are the desks?” She marvelled.There is no seating, just shelves, touchable screens and a curiously out of place set of bright plastic chairs and tables for little children…
Standing still, in the middle of the floor, she questions herself, Is this a library or an abandoned school? Why are there no teachers? She wonders! Where are my children? She thinks with growing concern.Did Mark send someone to fetch them? She pondered.
“We are going to be late for the theatre!”
She said out loud, almost shouting, boiling with anger. Urged to call her husband she grabbed the phone out of her purse with such impetus she had to stamp her umbrella on the marble floor to escape a fall.
Jerry, a lazy student just past his twenties, was so eager to finish his shift and enjoy an outdoor pint, when a delirant old lady made a theatrical entrée. Thankfully he got trained on how to deal with such emergencies, alongside stabbing and other terrorist attacks. That umbrella for an instant sounded like a firearm!
He got closer to Mrs Madsons, gently grabbed her wrist and couldn't fail to notice the beautiful gold rings bracelets. He bought something similar for his grandma, but these seemed ten times more expensive than what he found in tk-max, a delirant posh lady nonetheless…
Jerry took a deep breath and spoke slowly and clearly:
“MISS, DON’T, WORRY!”
He respectfully took hold of her phone and skillfully aligned Mrs Madson’s thumb with the fingerprint sensor. Unlocked!
Feeling like a cheap version of James Bond, he looked for the most recent call, poor old woman, last call was one month ago!
“I should give a call to my grandma, you never know if it’s the last one!” thought with a bit of guilt.
With a grave sadness in his voice, meant to comfort her, Jerry said:
“It’s going to be alright, I’m calling Carla right now!”
Mrs Madson broke in tears, she knew all was lost.
While talking on the phone, Jerry tried in vain to meet Mrs Madson’s gaze. Her pale blue eyes were looking through him as if he was not even there, not hearing a word of what he was saying.
Her memories, dumped on the marble floor. Every drop of salty water washes her consciousness away. The droning sound of the waves fills her head with white noise as the low tide of the winter sea is retiring from a cold, cold, beach with no footstep, no life left.
"He was so tall…"