So wild how life works.
Before this job I was searching for something, college behind me and nothing really sticking to my insides. When I saw the position open up in an online employment forum, I applied on a whim.
Since I’m more than a bit snarky and guarded, if anyone had told me I’d find this much entertainment or feel this connected to people fifty years older than I am and up, I’d have rolled my eyes and not believed them.
Yet here I am, happy to clock in every single day. I’ve had our residents doing everything from planting seeds in pots for local volunteer growers, to hiring carts we ride through the Botanical Gardens at least twice a month in, to creating scarecrows for the fall contest they held last year — all group events everyone can take part in.
It’s well known to the employees of Silver Linings that May is the matriarch to one of our city’s most famous families. I don’t know any of the other Cockers personally, as I went to schools in Decatur, then University in San Francisco, and they did not.
The only Cocker family member I care about is currently seated on her two floral-printed cushions she brings everywhere, her bright baby-blues suggesting she sees through your soul and if you’re lucky, approves.
“Well, someone upstairs must be smiling on me; I get you all to myself, May! Want more hot water for your tea?”
She smiles, “That would be nice, thank you, Diana. I was just thinking it was a travesty that my cup was empty and the machine is all the way over there.” As I take the offered tea-cup for a refill, transparent skin on her hand reminds me of a fragility her intellect makes me forget.
Will I live to be as old?
Will I be as adorable?
Doubt it.
One can dream.
I cross to the industrial-sized machine that lives on the far wall — medium-roast coffee, decaf, and hot water awaiting my choice. Something makes me glance to the clock where I pause, noting that it’s eleven-eleven — good luck and new beginnings.
While May begins sharing her story I choose a decaffeinated mint teabag and hurry back to take a seat, my attention fully hers.
“Jerald was in the Navy in World War II — a submarine planesman. We met before he left. I was barely seventeen and my mother changed her mind at the last minute, decidin’ to allow me to attend a dance I’d begged for, after all. I attended an all-girls catholic school and my parents were very strict. Thank you, honey. I’d never been to a dance where boys were in attendance, bussed all the way over from their school miles away. I was so excited I couldn’t decide which dress to wear. I changed nearly seven times!” Blue eyes go distant and dreamy as she pauses. Blinking twice, she returns to me. “I’d never seen Jerald Cocker before that night. He wasn’t supposed to be there, havin’ graduated the year prior. But his younger brother, Hank, was a senior and since Jerald would soon be leaving America, they made an exception out of respect to family and his service. It was clear to anyone lookin’ that he was a rebellious boy who hung with those just like him. And Hank was the same. They owned the room, everyone checkin’ to see what they were up to. Oh, we were so curious! One or two would occasionally leave to ask a lucky girl to dance. If they brought her back after one song, she’d be so disappointed it was hard not to empathize! My Jerald was above it all. He did not ask anyone to dance…until he came up to me. That was nearly an hour in, imagine that!” May’s fingers tenderly touch the top of my hand, skin cool compared to mine. “Diana, I watched that beautiful man with the most confident green eyes fixated on me as if I were the only girl there! And it was a big room! I almost ran, I was so excited. But I couldn’t. Have you ever seen in the movies where time slows down because something important is about to happen?”
My smile broadens. “Is that how you felt?”
She squeezes my hand, voice becoming a whisper. “This feelin’ came over me. I predicted my life was about to change, and change forever, and it did! My heart was thumpin’ so fast I didn’t know what to do. How I would talk to him! What I would say!”
“The dance must’ve been amazing.”
“Dance? Who could dance? I fainted! Dropped right then and there!”
I gasp, “You fainted?”
“Mmhmm. Woke up in his capable arms! I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming but I did not want to wake up if I was. Everyone around us was a blur to me because he was leaning close and asking if I was okay. The smell of him, I’ll never forget that smell, and his face near mine, those eyes! Diana, those eyes! I couldn’t answer him.” Her smile goes distant and white eyelashes fall toward the waiting tea.
“What happened next, Mrs. Cocker?”
Her fingers change their mind, releasing the cup. She frowns into the past.
Touching her back I ask, “May?”
“I miss him a little too much all of a sudden.”
An ache grows in my heart, uninvited. And I’m not the sentimental type, but the look on her face makes me grieve with her. “It isn’t fair that he’s gone.”
“No, it isn’t,” she sighs.
“I’d love to hear the rest whenever you want to tell it. Another time?”
“Yes, another time, Diana. I think I’d like to go to my room now.”
I help her stand and she waits as I gather her cushions, then slips her arm through mine.
In the hall she says, “We only had two children, my Michael who lives near here.”
“I’ve seen him come to visit you.”
Her blue eyes drift to admire the view as we pass by a large window. Spanish
