The Little Girl in the Radiator: Mum Alzheimer's & Me (19 page)

AS MUM BECAME more and more a part of the
Charnwood House furniture, she seemed to gather about her a large circle of
intimates, some of whom drifted away as others joined the little band. There
was a hard-core membership of around half-a-dozen who sat with mum constantly,
and Heather and I referred to them as ‘Mum’s Little Gang’.

Because the symptoms of Alzheimer’s are very
individual to the sufferer, each member of Mum’s Little Gang had their own
peculiarities and idiosyncrasies. At times, these would interact well with the
personalities of the other members; at times, they would make a crashing
contrast.

I remember on one occasion, Heather and I
had come to visit mum, and the gang were all there in the lounge together.

‘You two can fuck off!’ shouted one of the
ladies as we entered.

The rest of the ladies rolled their eyes and
tutted their disapproval.

‘This is Richard and Wendy,’ announced mum,
introducing us to everyone. ‘My brother and my son’s wife.’

‘Hello Dick!’ shouted another of the gang,
an ancient specimen of womanhood sitting in the corner. ‘How’s your dick?’ And
then she began to shriek with laughter. ‘How’s your dick, Dick?’

The others raised their eyes to the ceiling
and they all tutted again.

‘Pay no attention to her,’ suggested mum.
‘She’s very common.’

One of mum’s pals got out of her chair and
made her way unsteadily around the furniture to where we were standing.

‘You mustn’t be upset by that old witch,’
whispered this lady. ‘She’s a bit gone in the head, so you have to make
allowances.’

‘We will, don’t worry,’ replied Heather.

‘I mean, she’s not all there,’ continued the
lady, waving her index finger in circles next to her ear and raising her eyes,
in the classic playground sign for ‘loopy’. ‘A bit gone in the head, she is.’

‘I understand,’ I said.

‘I mean, she doesn’t really know what she’s
saying most of the time,’ continued the lady.

‘Yes, we understand,’ I assured her.

‘A bit gone in the head she is,’ repeated
the lady again, and started to wave her finger around in circles next to her
ear again.

‘Sit down, Joyce,’ said mum, catching this
lady by the sleeve. ‘They don’t want to be hearing all that.’

‘I was just saying she’s a bit gone in the
head,’ remarked Joyce, and away went her finger again.

‘Fuck off and sit down, you stupid cow!’
shouted the lady who had first greeted us.

Joyce rolled her eyes towards the ceiling,
and then went back to her chair.

One of the gang had a collection of
children’s wind-up toys on the table. She was hunched over the table winding up
each toy and then letting it go. A little red duck waddled across the table.

‘Weeeee!’ shouted the lady. ‘Look at that!’
and she giggled so loudly that many of the others laughed as well.

Then the lady with the toys wound up a small
plastic dog and let it go.

‘Weeeee!’ she shouted again, laughing as the
dog ran across the table.

‘Fuck off with them stupid toys!’ shouted
the first lady again.

Joyce struggled up and came back round to
us. ‘Don’t mind her with those toys, she’s a bit gone in the head, she is.’

‘Oh, Joyce!’ shouted someone else. ‘Sit
down!’

‘I’m having a chat with Dick!’ shouted back
Joyce. ‘I’m telling him something very important!’

‘How’s your dick, Dick?’ screamed the
ancient lady again, and then roared with laughter.

‘Fuck off with that fucking dick, Dick!’
bawled the first one.

There was another lady at the table who had
done nothing but whistle since we had arrived. She whistled the same four notes
over and over, without ever stopping for breath. We later found out that this
lady rarely spoke a word to anyone, even when asked a direct question; all she
ever did was whistle the same four notes in the same order, endlessly. She had
been in the home, whistling the same four notes over and over, all day, every
day, and almost all night every night, for the past four-and-a-half-years.

My admiration for the staff here, and their
endless patience, knew no bounds.

‘Fuck off with that whistling!’ shouted the
first lady, as everyone rolled their eyes again.

‘Never mind her whistling,’ whispered Joyce.
‘She’s a bit gone in the head, she is. You have to make allowances.’

‘We will,’ assured Heather.

‘Because she’s a bit gone in the head,’ went
on Joyce, revolving her finger again.

‘Let’s go to your room, mum,’ I suggested,
as I knew we were never going to have any time with her while she was seated
with the others.

Mum stood up, waved goodbye to her friends,
and walked towards the door with us.

‘Fuck off, the lot of you!’ shouted the
first lady as we went.

Joyce was waving her finger around her ear
again and mouthing
‘She’s a bit gone in the head,’
to me when I looked
back.

‘You mustn’t pay any attention to that lot,’
said mum, as we invaded the peace and quiet of the corridor.

‘That’s all right,’ I said.

‘Joyce said to me that some of them are a
bit mad in here,’ whispered mum, ‘but don’t tell anyone else I said so.’

‘No we won’t,’ Heather agreed.

‘I like to talk to Joyce,’ said mum. ‘
She
knows what’s going on.’

As we walked down the corridor, suddenly
from nowhere a little old man wearing baggy trousers, a string vest and a red
bandana over his head joined us. He held mum’s hand without saying a word, and
mum didn’t say anything either; nor did they look at each other or acknowledge
each other’s presence in any way, they just held hands as we walked along.

When we got to mum’s room we opened the
door, and mum and this man went in. Mum waited by the door as the man walked
over to the bed, stooped very slowly down and looked carefully under the bed.

‘He’s gone,’ announced the little man, slowly
standing up.

Mum nodded and went and sat on the bed.

‘What was all that about?’ I asked. ‘And who
is this?’

The little man in the bandana was now
sitting on the side of the bed with mum.

‘I want you to write a letter for me,’ said
mum, ignoring the question.

Mum and the little man nodded their heads
together vigorously.

‘There’s some paper and a pen in the drawer
over there,’ she said, pointing to one of her bedside tables.

I knew I wouldn’t be able to get any focus
out of her until I did what she wanted, so I got the paper and pen.

‘Someone keeps hiding under my bed,’ began
mum, ‘and when I’m asleep, he sneaks out and steals my chocolates.’

The little man in the bandana was nodding
his head furiously.

‘How do you know this?’ I asked.

‘I can hear the sweet papers rustling in the
night,’ whispered mum, ‘and when I do, I pull the covers up tight under my chin
and pretend I’m asleep.’

I sighed.

Dear Sir,

I am writing to protest in the
strongest possible terms about the man who hides under Mrs Slevin’s bed at
night, and comes out when she is asleep to steal her chocolates. This is a very
unsatisfactory state of affairs, and is causing deep distress to Mrs Slevin,
who values her chocolates above all other possessions.

I think it would be a very good idea if
you informed the Sweetie Police about this matter, so that steps can be taken
to apprehend the villain without further delay.

Yours faithfully,

Martin Slevin.

Mum and the little man nodded their heads
together as I read the letter out. The little man wiped away a tear from his
eye.

‘Wonderful,’ he said. It was the first word
he had spoken to us.

‘Now don’t be getting yourself all upset,
Frank,’ said mum. ‘Richard has written a letter now, and it will be dealt with,
don’t you worry.’

‘This is Frank?’ asked Heather, grinning.

Mum nodded, and Frank smiled.

‘Frank’s a fighter pilot,’ announced mum
proudly. ‘We’re getting married.’

The door opened and Joyce came in. She
walked up to me and whispered, ‘Don’t take any notice of that lot, Richard.’

‘Because they’re all a bit gone in the
head?’ I said.

‘You’ve noticed it too?’ whispered Joyce.
She rolled her finger around her ear. ‘They’re all a bit gone in the head.’

‘Come on, Freda,’ called a nurse who had
followed the lady into mum’s room. ‘Come on out of there and let Rose have a
visit in peace.’

Joyce, a.k.a. Freda, left the room quietly.

‘And you, Cecil,’ called the nurse.

Quick as a flash, the fighter pilot took off
and was gone, shooting out of the room as though someone had shouted,
‘Scramble!’

‘Sorry about all that,’ said the nurse.
‘I’ll leave you in peace with mum now.’

She shut the door behind her.

‘We’ve brought you some chocolates,’
announced Heather, handing mum the box.

‘Did you manage to get them back?’ asked
mum.

We must have looked puzzled.

‘From
him
!’ mum whispered, indicating
the space under her bed.

‘Er… No, they’re new ones,’ I said.

Mum nodded. ‘I’ll hide them when you’ve
gone.’

‘Is everything else okay?’ I asked. ‘I mean,
apart from the man under the bed.’

‘People are very kind here,’ said mum. ‘I
really do appreciate it.’

The door opened again and the whistling
woman came in and just stood there whistling. (I call her ‘the whistling woman’
as I never did discover her real name, or anything else about her at all.)

‘Hello,’ I said.

The lady stood in the doorway with her hands
on her hips. She looked directly at us, and continued to whistle her four note
tune, over and over again.

A sleeve appeared in the doorway belonging
to a nurse’s pale blue uniform. The hand at the end of the sleeve grabbed the
whistling woman’s cardigan and gently pulled her backwards out of the room; as
she disappeared, the whistling carried on uninterrupted.

‘She’s very nice,’ said mum, when the
whistling woman had gone. ‘She used to be a professional singer.’

I never discovered if that was true or not;
it didn’t matter much to me, anyway.

‘The grounds are beautiful here,’ observed
Heather, looking out of the window and changing the subject.

‘I often go out there,’ said mum. ‘The
gardener fancies me.’

She seemed to blush ever so slightly as she
spoke, like a young schoolgirl.

‘Does he now?’ said Heather.

‘But he’s very respectful,’ continued mum.
‘He always says, “Good morning, Mrs Slevin, and how are you today?” and “You’re
looking very nice today, Mrs Slevin”, and things like that.’

‘Maybe Old Frank has a rival, then mum,’ I
ventured.

‘He’ll have to keep on his toes, won’t he?’
said mum, and we all laughed.

‘I like Frank’s bandana,’ I said. ‘Very
trendy.’

Mum beckoned me to lean forwards, this was
her signal that something very important and confidential was going to pass
between us. I leaned forwards.

‘He’s just had his brain taken out and
cleaned,’ whispered mum. ‘He has to wear that scarf thing until the scar on his
head goes away.’

‘Oh, I see,’ I whispered. ‘Why did he have
to have his brain cleaned?’

Mum shrugged her shoulders. ‘How should I
know? Maybe it was dirty.’

The simple, straightforward and yet slightly
faulty logic of Alzheimer’s.

The door opened yet again, but this time a
very smart, middle-aged lady in a dark business suit and small gold-rimmed
spectacles came into the room.

‘Hello,’ she said brightly, striding across
the room with her right hand outstretched for someone to shake. ‘I’m Mrs
Porter, and I’m the manager here. I’m very sorry I haven’t made myself known to
you before now. I was away… Bit of a family crisis.’

We all nodded that we understood, and shook
hands with her in turn.

‘We’re very pleased with Rose, here at
Charnwood House, aren’t we?’ said Mrs Porter looking directly at mum, who
beamed a great big smile. It was like she had just been praised by the Head
Teacher in front of the whole school. ‘There are some papers I need you to
sign, Mr Slevin. Could you drop by my office when you have finished?’

‘Certainly,’ I said.

When the manager left, Heather and I showed
mum some of the ornaments we had brought from home to make her room more
personalised. We brought some pictures of her grand-children, Rebecca and
Daniel, and a few little knick-knacks that had sentimental value to mum in the
past. She didn’t recognise any of them, and thought the ornaments were all new.