Forgetting Grace (A short story)

Forgetting Grace

Day 1 -

I awoke to a room unfamiliar to my mind, it was white, nearly too white which with the sun proved far too bright. The curtains, like a specters rapacious palms flailed in the air, was this a figment or reality? I escaped my recumbency and scanned the room, still twas unfamiliar to my eyes; a subtle 'ting-ting' remained periodically sound from another room, as if a band whose instruments consisted solely of silverware performed a chorus from the kitchen. Adjacent to the bed was a night-stand with a glass of water, and a minuscule jar of pills which were prescribed to a Thomas Connor. I was unaware of a lot of things, including exactly what I was unaware of; I did not know who I was, where I was, nor why I was, and as this surreal environment grew brighter, I decided I would not wait for whoever held me captive and called aloud. My voice was hoarse, from what I assumed was old age (as the crenulated wrinkles of my arm be told), and without a moment's interval for effect, footsteps began pattering in a slow bashful shuffle; and surely enough around the corner peaked an elderly woman whose face showed nothing less than excitement to see me.

- "Good morning Thomas, how did you sleep?" she spoke, the intonations of her placid voice arose and fell like the changing of spring, I was unsure of who this woman was but for the first thing I was sure of this morning was that if she had told me she in fact was not born in a garden among the daisies, I would have not believed her. She had eyes like a gypsy's crystal, which be told the fortune of love which struck me not mere moments ago, some of her hair still withheld its russetness while other strands faded into a scintillating silver as though a mischievous fairy had dumped a pot of unicorn blood upon her head. Her lips stretched out like withering rose petals that began to sag at either end, the warm rivers of blood beneath her cheeks allowed them to glow incandescently. I asked this courteous daisy as to where I might be, and she told me I was where I have always been, home. Then I proceeded to ask who she was, she said her name was Grace, and that she was my wife; how lucky was I? Have you taken your pills yet, she asked, I said no and that I do not wish to; and without refusal she simply smiled and told me that I didn't have to, as that was the same answer, I gave each time before. I could not remember those days, though felt no anguish as they did not matter, only today mattered while I was graced with this woman. She helped me out of bed and planted me on the support of what I quickly discovered to be precarious knees. She led me into the kitchen, a very rustic room with wooden varnished oak counters, doily-like makings with knitted pictures hung on the wall, and various portraits scattered among the capacious dining area. She sat me down at the table, and soon in front of me laid the culprit of that silverware band; the ample eggs and sausage breakfast.

She then sat down next to me, cupped her hands and with a face of sunken beauty lost to the tides of time, began to admire whatever I looked like, from two acutely dimmed braziers of blue fire. We had barely crossed the threads of morning, and I had already been surfeited with inquires, and so I begged. How old am I I asked, she replied with eighty-four, and how old are you I begged, eighty-two she replied; which I felt to be an insubstantial thought for the soft trenches of skin that ebbed above her cheekbones appeared not a moon over forty. Are we married, yes; how long, fifty-three years, through some decaying process of thought I failed to count, evident to Grace through falling brows she said when you were thirty-one. Although my mind failed to acquire even a single light of my life's precedents, the question of what else would she be and why else would she be here proved her claims more than likely. We married a tad late I commented, we didn't have time before the war she said, but you came back to me. War, I asked, with whom? The Germans, I repeated it in my mind, Germans... Is that why I cannot remember? She shook her head, alleged natural causes, how unfortunate. She pointed beyond my shoulder to a portrait on the wall, that's you there she told me, but through blurry pigments of a obsolete vision I could not discern the point in question. Grace helped elevate me, then held my shoulder as I sidled over to the photograph. There, colored by the beauteous vintage lineaments of an old camera, was painted a tall and stout man who lacked my hunch, he had a clean face with smooth cheekbones, his hair shrouded by a beret. Adjacent to his erect posture rested a rifle attached with a bayonet and scabbard. I could not ascertain the hue of his eye, and hardly believed that could have been me, and so I asked if he was, and Grace confirmed. It was after basic, before deployment, I was twenty-four in the photo she told me, how long ago that was, astonishing. I asked her how long I was gone, six years she went without my face, my body and my voice, how terrible that was for me to do that, and you waited for me I asked? Of course, there is only one you, she said; my heart blushed, and my soul chuckled. I enjoyed this photograph of the past which I could not remember, and asked her if there were anymore, quietly she nodded and led me askew into the living room.