October 2nd, 2008
MASH was one of the few shows I didn’t watch on late night TV growing up. All the other old re-run shows were more interesting to me, I Love Lucy, Beverly Hillbillies, Andy Griffith and so on. I wasn’t big on war time shows so I always skipped over the classic war comedy. But when you’re up at 3AM with an old army veteran, you get to know Radar, Hawkeye, Margaret and the rest of the troops. Bill always got up at the witching hour for a snack, a walk, a couple episodes of MASH and then back to bed before the 730 AM breakfast. Tonight was no different, I had done my 2 AM rounds and had settled in with MASH awaiting Bill’s arrival. A selection of potato chips, animal cookies, a banana, and a peanut butter sandwich was already laid out for his choosing. Bill was a walkie talkie and his mind was still sharp enough to know what he wanted. I figure they only stuck him in the dementia unit because they knew he was a lifer with a not so great memory, but he would have been fine outside of the locked doors.
At least half of the residents on this 16 bed dementia unit were walkie talkies. Meaning they could still communicate alright and ambulate well enough to not need assistance. Even dementia patients could tell you when they are hungry, sleepy, or needed to piss, depending on the level of dementia.
Not all 16 beds were full, just 12 right now. So rounds were easy unless someone had been digging in their shit filled briefs, which thankfully wasn’t tonight. A few minutes before three I got up and got the now frosty milk carton out of the freezer that I had stuck there 30 minutes ago. I lined it up on the counter next to the selection of snacks, because no matter what snack he chose, there was always milk to accompany it.
At 3:03 AM I heard, on the hall monitor, the room door unlatch and saw Bill coming out of his room on the TV screen. He shuffled up the hall in his khakis and button up shirt and gave me a small wave as he entered the dining area.
“Mornin’” he said gravely, Bill was not a cheerful man.
“Good morning Bill, did you sleep well?”
“Fine, fine, but I’m a little hungry,” he answered in his serious tone.
“Help yourself, let me know if you need anything.” I turned MASH up a little louder because I knew he would have trouble hearing it. His assigned table was in the far corner and he never strayed from it, not even when the rest of the diners were absent.
Bill chose animal crackers tonight and sat quietly while he ate the little cookies and drank the milk. When he was done he came up and asked if he could go to the courtyard for a walk. Technically the courtyard was closed between the hours of 9pm-6am but it was guarded all the way around with a 8 foot tall brick wall and there was nothing out there to get hurt on. I always let Bill walk when he wanted, because these people have so few joys in life. Bill never had family come and see him, most of them don’t. They get dumped here, to live out the rest of their days while their families decide how best to spend the inheritance.
I flipped the lock switch and gave an over exaggerated arm gesture to him as he passed, I got a ghost of a smile for it. Bill walked 3 laps, I stood pretending to watch TV, keeping an eye on Bill, just in case.
“Falls coming”, Bill said in a sure voice. He took a seat in the best recliner and settled in for an episode of MASH. Afterwards he got up to go back to bed, I wished him a good night and said I’d see him tomorrow. He tipped his head to me and repeated it back to me. 4:15 the clock read, time for me to go and lay out clothes for the ones needing help with dressing. The sun rose with no great fanfare, I did shift change and went home.
Many nights on the dementia unit are the same, you’ll occasionally have a bad sundowner or fall but with the usual residents, it’s the same every night. This next night was all routine. 2:20 am, lay out snacks for Bill, put him a milk in the freezer. Turn on MASH and wait. 3:06 AM Bill walks in and chooses half a peanut butter sandwich tonight. He took his cow juice to his table and sat snacking.
I had a Dr. Pepper and sat with my back to the big picture window that faced the courtyard, watching TV. Bill came over and paused, watching with me for a moment. He turned towards the door to go enjoy the still, warm Autumn night. I had already unlocked the door knowing he would want to walk on such a nice night.
“Who’s he?”
When you hear something that is out of the ordinary the first emotion you feel is confusion. You get that run of thoughts that jog through the brain. I thought, ‘Who’s he? Who’s who? Is Bill having a bad night? Could I have left someone outside for 6 hours?’ This was followed by, ‘No of course not’. Then sometimes before you clear up the confusion you will get another emotion, depending on what caused the initial confusion. Mine was fear, irrational or not, I felt a cold wave of fear wash over me.
It had only been a few seconds since Bill had asked the two word question. I decided that no matter how lucid Bill normally was, he was seeing things tonight.
I kept my voice still and asked Bill, “Who’s Who?”, as I stood and pivoted to stare out the big picture window. Relief washed over me as I looked and saw nothing but the normal courtyard items. A streetlight was flickering right outside the wall and casting strange shapes and shadows that probably created an image in Bill’s mind.
“Him, the man on the wall”, Bill replied in a more serious tone than usual. I ran my eyes over the wall looking for a man that only Bill was seeing. I noticed that the cold wave of fear had washed back over me, spreading dread in icy sheets from the nape of my neck down to my feet. It seemed silly, there was nothing there, dementia patients saw things all the time and said things that made no sense.
My eyes traveled the length of the wall, once, twice, and on the 3rd pass maybe saw what Bill was seeing. A shadow, probably from the tree, when the light flickered just the right way. I focused my eyes and watched. It looked like a shadow, but how was a shadow illuminated against the sky like that? I took two steps forward and put my hand on the bar to push the door open.
“Don’t. Don’t do that.” Bill’s tone was different, a hoarse whisper. It reminded me of a time when I needed to scream but all I could do was a mostly muted yelp. I risked a look at him, he was pale and frozen, the look on his face frightened me even more.
I frowned and looked back at the wall and oh my God. What the fuck is that. What is that. I was frozen now. The icy fear had hardened me into a still form of terror. I saw him now, plain as the bench seats under the gazebo. It shouldn’t have been terrifying, it looked like someone had taken a black piece of cardboard and cut it out into the shape of a man. A man that was crouched, almost like a frog, his hands and feet perched on top of the wall. He was watching us though and even though you couldn’t see his face, he was laughing, he was laughing at our terror. The lights started flicking faster and his head began to shake, not slowly with a momentum build, but just all of a sudden, quick, like he was having a seizure but only in his head. And his mouth opened, where you couldn’t previously see his face, now you could make out eyes and a mouth. The eyes were blacker than black with a bunch of tiny red dots, like a million eyes in his eyeballs, they all blinked at the same time and rapidly. The mouth was wide, laughing, rows and rows of razor sharp teeth filled it. Blinking and laughing and shaking. Blinking and laughing and shaking. It saw me, not just me, the outward me, but me, into me and it laughed. Blinking and laughing and shaking.
I don’t know how I did it, but I reached up and flicked the lock on the door, a silly defense against something that obviously played by different rules. I grabbed Bill’s arm and pulled him into the dining room, out of sight of the window. We stood there for a moment, filling the silence with our unspoken terror. I had chills everywhere but I was also sweaty and clammy. I was afraid if we looked out the window, the thing would be standing at the door; blinking and laughing and shaking. Demon or monster or whatever it was. Blinking it’s eyes within eyes, shaking its head while it’s body stayed still, laughing silently with a mouth so full of teeth that there wasn’t space for anything else.
“Bill, why don’t we go to the hallway, we can open the door to the rest of the building and chat with the other nurses.”
“I’m going back to bed, I think I’ll go check on Ray and sleep until the sun comes up.” Bill was already heading towards the hall, making sure to not look at the window. I hoped he would forget about all this come morning. I slipped through the door, keeping the window to my back and went to the locked door at the end of the hall. I went to open it but had an awful thought and froze. What if I opened the door and the rest of the night time skeleton crew was dead? Carved up by the mouth full of pointed teeth. What if it was waiting for me?
I held my breath, punched in the unlock code and slowly pushed the door open. At the desk sat the night time nurse, a lazy older woman who I usually despised. Right now, I was so glad to see her that I could have kissed her. Beside her sat another CNA, charting and eating something out of a bowl. When the door opened they both looked at me, the other CNA smiled.
“I need to run to my car for something, could you watch the unit for a second.” I addressed the other aid directly and returned her smile, hoping it looked normal. She came over, I let her know everyone was in bed and I would be back in a few minutes.
I went towards the front of the building but stopped in the rec room, the blinds were down and I sat on the couch, breathing deep. How was I supposed to come back tomorrow? How was I supposed to go back out at night? Did I imagine it? Did Bill and I share some weird mind trip? I went to the fridge and got out an apple juice, I drank it quick. It was sweet and cold, and I wondered if my blood sugar was low. I closed my eyes and saw it in my head, Blinking and laughing and shaking. I jerked my eyes open, it couldn’t have been real, but didn’t it seem a little familiar? Was this something I had dreamed before tonight? Was tonight a dream?
“What are you doing?” Tina, the lazy nurse, was standing in the doorway looking at me.
“My sugar was low and I needed to sit a second. I drank an apple juice and I feel better now.” I half waved the empty container at her and tried to lie with ease I didn’t feel.
“Well it’s time to go back to work if you’re done sitting.” Tina turned and walked away, I tried to glare at her back but didn’t have it in me.
I slowly got up and walked back to the the unit. I punched in the code and went in. The aid was not in the hallway, so I slowly made my way to the nursing station. “Sarah?”, I called out the aids name quietly. No answer. I took a few more steps and said her name again.
“Hey! There you are!” She said as she popped her head out from the doorway. I walked on down to the nurses station and very quickly glanced out the picture window. Nothing, nothing except the things that were supposed to be there.
I thanked Sarah and walked her back to the hall entrance. When she was gone I took a chair and put my back to the locked doors that separated the halls. I sat there until the morning relief came.
I was able to come back the next night but I made sure to close the oversized blinds before the evening shift left, I would go on to do that every night I worked. Lock the door, close the blinds, even the door had blinds. Bill continued to get up at the witching hour but he never asked to go for a walk again. Life went on, but some nights I would awaken with a start and at the end of my bed would be standing a blinking, laughing, shaking nightmare.