Today's Reading
She put the last of the eggs in the pan, gave them a quick stir, then jogged up to the bedroom, where his hearing aid charger was supposed to be plugged in on his bedside table.
To her dismay, though not her surprise, the charger was AWOL again. Now it was off to the various other locales where he liked to relocate miscellaneous items. Never mind that she'd told him time and again that the bedroom was handiest. "The Lone Rearranger strikes again," she muttered as she checked his bathroom, which looked like it had been hit by a small tornado and smelled like a middle school boy's locker room. Next she looked in the den, where CT kept an odd assortment of unrelated bits and pieces and piles of books he'd once read and liked to imagine he would read again someday. She quickly sifted through a basket of charger cords, dead batteries, and a dysfunctional wristwatch and was about to hit the storage room under the stairs when she heard the smoke alarm going off.
The eggs!
She dashed back to the kitchen and turned off the flame beneath the now-blackened eggs, which were solidly adhered to the pan. She opened a window, then flipped on the exhaust fan, attempting to ignore her frantic husband as he hopped around, yowling and flapping his arms like a crazed chicken. "Make it stop!" he cried, covering his ears and wearing the anguished expression of a frightened four-year-old.
"Go outside." She took him by the arm and directed him toward the back porch. "Check on your bees." She nodded toward the stacked boxes of hives and led him outside. She wasn't a big fan of bees, but for some reason CT adored the buzzy little beings. He used to call his hives his peaceful place.
He nodded, clutching her hand and groaning with each step as he ambled down the porch stairs. On solid ground, he began to mumble. "My bees...yeah, bees don't burn down your house. Coming, bees, coming."
"Right." She watched him weaving slightly, as he made his way to his beloved hives. Reassured he was okay, she went back inside. The kitchen was still smoky and the alarm still blaring. She got out her stepladder and, stretching high, reached for the smoke alarm, balancing precariously as she pressed the red button and waited for it to stop screaming at her. As she climbed down, she felt a bit shaky. This was something her big strong husband used to do for her. A lump swelled in her throat, but she reminded herself this little event was not tear-worthy. Better to laugh...when she could.
Still, it was hard to let go of some things. Her can-do, capable husband used to handle so much for her. CT, at six-foot-six, was a man's man who could build almost anything, repair almost anything, hunt wild game. Like a country boy, he could survive. The man could plant and grow and dance a pretty good two-step. He even managed the bills and knew how to file tax returns, something she was still grappling over. But after their checking accounts got seriously messed up a few years back due to CT's disease, she'd taken over the business end of things and let him take over the simple things that hadn't overwhelmed him at first, like replacing light bulbs or smoke alarm batteries or taking out the trash.
But those days were gone now too. CT always forgot which day the garbage truck came. Sometimes she'd go racing out in her bathrobe, running the can down their driveway, waving to the truck driver to stop. Ladders messed with his balance. Tools were dangerous. And unexpected noises like a smoke alarm were unnerving. Even if he could've handled the noise and scaled the ladder, he'd probably forgotten how to make the smoke alarm stop blasting by now.
Honey sighed and scraped the burned eggs into her clean white sink, staring for a moment at the blackened ugliness as she washed it down the garbage disposal. Then realizing the skillet would require more attention, she decided CT would have to settle for a peanut butter sandwich after all. Along with a big glass of milk and a banana. He'd have forgotten about the eggs by now anyway. One benefit of FTD.
She carried his breakfast into the clean outside air and found him investigating something by the barn. Feeding the barn cat? She doubted it as she whistled for him, waving him over to the picnic table. She watched as he attempted to insert more spring in his step, but he still walked like a man two decades older than his years.
"That's what I want." He pointed to the sandwich. "Peanut butter 'n honey. Honey from my Honey." He grinned at her. "And from my bees too."
"How are your bees?" She watched him ease himself onto a bench.
"Happy. Happy bees...happy honey." He looked up with adoring eyes. "Bee honey is sweet. Not as sweet as my Honey."
She patted his shoulder. How many times had she heard that line? And yet she never really tired of it. "CT is sweet too."
"Is the house burned up?" His creased frown revealed he was dead serious.
"No, dear, the house is fine. The kitchen is fine."
"You be careful. Stove is hot. Dangerous."
She remembered when she used to tell him that very thing, back when he still thought he could cook. Now she just removed the knobs when she was done cooking. She was tempted to point out that she'd been on his errand, off looking for his missing hearing aid charger, when the stove got dangerous, but why bother?
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