Places and persons, times and lies. They sometimes change back ... but other times they change forever. I, Angeline Woods, New York psychiatrist wasn't about to be easily cracked.
In fact, knowing that my grandmother wasn't all there in her head made me feel superior and more responsible. It must be as simple as dementia, I figure, relating to a trauma that happened January 1999. That would be nineteen years ago when I was age six. It makes me think back in horror. Maybe January Jane did try to set me on fire. Suddenly my life makes sense.704Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYMTQSidJcW
I grab the shotgun from her, since she occupied herself with mumbling nines to herself, foaming at the lips.
I check the gun and with relief, I scoff. "Grandma. Jesus. This wasn't loaded."
She titters, "Took you long enough."
"Where's the ammunition?"
"A magician never tells her secrets."
"All right, January Jane, you --"
Her face turns sharply at me, her hateful eyes shining in the cobwebbed closet. She almost slaps me, but misses, hitting a wall. Dust scatters. She points a finger at me and hisses at me as if I threw salt at a wound, "Say that again, Marigold. You know how it sets off my temper."
I hold my tongue, thinking better of it. I feel pity for my mother. No wonder she sent me. Ignoring January Jane, I glance around the closet. This wasn't here before. I close my eyes, imagining that I am back in the hallway. We must be in the hallway, if the door remains unchanged. I open my eyes, realizing these webbed walls are in the way.
Before I get to thinking how to tear one wall down, I realize someone has put the closet here. Who? Subtle Stanley?
Is he keeping my crazy grandmother here? That monster. Of course Jane Mint has no ammunition; she is in her own world. I look for anything sharp or heavy to tear down the wall with. I see black cookies, static, gray delivery bags, flickering lights, and a white corded phone. My eyes widen. That's right, my mother received a call, didn't she?
I pick up the phone. A working dial tone.
I dial 911. Nothing changes. The dial tone drones on. I dial my mother's number. Dial tone. I slam the phone. It's fake. The tone is just a recording. Subtle.
The television shows us outside as 2018. That's all the proof I have that I can maybe snap Jane out of it. I yell at her to see what's happening. She squints, gasps, and says, "Oh I've always wanted to see that movie... It came out just this month... What was it? Stepmom, You've Got Mail, and Shakespeare in Love! Aah what a time to be alive!"
I give up on January Jane and her 1999 crap. I exhale like a flattening balloon. Something has screwed her up, completely past the point of my piecemeal psychiatrist help. I am on my own. I continue my search for a way to tear down that wall.
The windows of course are fake. I peer closely and see back-lit paintings of Chicago. Subtle.
I check the drawers. Black and white plastic, and flimsy. I yank out one drawer pouring all the useless crap and drag the empty drawer into the closet. I position it so the corner aims right at where I want it to hurt. I am about to jam it until Jane appears, "Don't break my wall!"
"Grandma, have you ever left?"
"I don't need to," she shrugs her long silver hair. "I got everything I need when I need it. I'm perfectly taken care of right here."
I stare. "When's the last time you left?"
"1999." She mumbles nines.
"Let's go for a nightly walk, Grandma, Angie is outside. She is waiting for us."
"Eh. I don't walk," she shrugs. "Go get her."
"Show me the door."
She struts in seven circles, then shrugs again. She sits before the television as it shows 2018 live. She falls asleep. I jam the drawer into the wall, and the drawer breaks apart to pieces. The wall is perfectly strong; there is no dent, no scuff. I jam my phone into it. I do it again and again until I get tired. I jam my side into it and bruise my shoulder. I kick. I look for thick red bullets, hoping for a miracle to blow this ersatz closet away.
I find nothing. Empty cupboards, empty shelves, and empty refrigerator. These bare walls. My stomach feels punched It was a horrible office and tomb. I glance at my grandmother. She looks dead. I check her pulse. She is dead. She dies here. Stanley has starved her.
And I'm next. I cry, realizing I am trapped behind brick and mortar. I remember the elevator. I should have just left.
After my good cry, I get angry. Okay, Angie Woods, think. I try not to but I strut in circles. I try not to look at dead January Jane and her static television. I try not to look at 2018 outside, for I fear I would lose my mind. Click click click. I follow the sound back to the kitchen. The cupboards are stocked with food, some dry, some frozen. I put the frozen in the refrigerator, prep the kitchen, and cook myself a meal. I survive.
Think, Angie. I circle. My grandmother was kept alive here eighteen years? That's what screwed her up. But what screwed Stanley up? Before I could wonder why, I go back to finding a way out.
I look at the ceiling and see a vent big enough to crawl through. There. I bring the table over and stand tall enough to reach the vent. I take off the grate. I can crawl through. And I do.
My head and hands and elbows and knees and feet slam against shuddering metal. I breathe shallow air, slowly as possible. I turn a corner and keep on crawling.
Another grate comes up. I silently peer through. It's the hallway. I see the elevator. My god. I am about to kick the grate off but the elevator doors open. Stanley strolls down the black carpet and tries to listen through the walls. I'm sure he will hear nothing like the room 419 is unlived in. His face frowns. I am not there.
He laughs and assumes I'm sleeping. He returns to the elevator and goes down. I kick the grate off. I jump down into the hallway. I take the stairs, bolting down floor by floor, leaping over skipped steps. I reach the parking level, panting out of breath, and see beyond the empty garage a rectangular opening of daylight. The outside. 2018.
I run laughing. I make it out into the Chicago streets. The grimy snow, the smog, but at least there is the clouded sky. I run until I see my mother. Marigold Woods. She is red-haired, dressed in charcoal too, and stepping into an attorney''s office. A lawyer? Numb, I follow her. What is she doing here? A few blocks away from the Silver Score hotel? I enter quietly while my mother and the lawyer yell.
"That is illegal!"
"Listen to me," my mother says. "I have thought this through. I trust Stanley. He took care of my mother. He can take care of my daughter. If Jane dies, everything Jane owns is given to Angie in her will."
My heart stings. I bite back tears.
My mother continues, "If Angie goes mad in there, for let's say I give it nine years, six if we're lucky, I can get her to sign everything to me."
The lawyer looks at me. So does my mother. I cross my arms. I tell them both that they're in big trouble.
My mother laughs.
"No one would believe you," she says.
"You're right," I tell her. "I'll just tell the police January Jane is dead. And I'm here, ready to inherit everything."
My mother runs at me, roaring and sharp nails out, clawing and swiping air. The lawyer holds her back. She screams at her carefully laid plans falling like ash through her hands.
I walk out, with a smile, and I never look back.
These days when I float in my pool and sip my iced tea in the sunshine I just look out to the sea and think of January Jane. How brave she was. How happy she was. How sad it is I loved my grandmother more than anything only too late, after she was gone. But she was right. What a time to be alive.
THE END
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