Things to Remember

Michael and George parked their hire car outside the Meadow Brook Care Home situated a thirty-mile drive from Shannon airport. It was their first time in Ireland, they’d planned to visit for some time, but this trip didn’t feel like a holiday.

A week prior Michael got the call that his Uncle Patrick had passed away. They’d never met in person. Yet since Michael was a teenager nearly twenty years prior, they’d become pen pals writing a letter a month back and forth. He was the only family member he spoke to on his father’s side. Through the years Michael opened up in his letters about his experiences at university, getting his first job teaching in a high school, his brothers’ problems with alcohol and subsequent passing, and meeting his partner at a school bowling tournament with who he now resides in the center of Leeds. Through the ever-changing commotion of life, the letters were a constant that Michael took comfort in. Michael intended to visit. He really did. When Patrick invited him and his partner to come and visit in the spare room, Michael kept promising he would. And when Patrick moved into the care facility, Michael was going to visit him for the first time this Christmas as a surprise. It was going to be a joyous occasion. After twenty years of sharing, advice, and support from his invisible father figure, the two would unite at last. Tragically, this never came to fruition.

The care home told Michael he didn’t need to come. That they could donate his things to a local charity shop. But Michael felt an obligation to come. He was the sole heir in his uncle's will, leaving twenty thousand euros to him. No other family or friends to share.

The first thing that Michael noticed as he walked into the reception was how quiet it was. So quiet he could hear George breathing beside him. Almost like there was little life left in the air. It felt bleak. The walls were grey, there were no paintings or plants, all-natural light blocked by thick blinds. A depressing thought crossed Michael’s mind. Is this where it ends?

A friendly nurse that beamed a constant smile contrasted the surroundings and took them through to Patrick’s room. She muttered something as she left through her thick Southern Irish accent that reminded him of his mothers. Michael politely nodded and the nurse left them alone.

‘This place is, well, sad,’ George whispered as though someone was listening. He nodded in agreement.

Through the afternoon they started to unpack Patrick’s life and put his things into boxes. One for the charity shops, another for items they’d take back and keep, and a third of things they’d give away or sell. They planned to be there for most of the afternoon but by two they’d already packed most of his things away.

‘Imagine having nobody at the end,’ Michael said as he sat at the end of Patrick's single bed. ‘I said I’d go to visit him every year, but I never did.’

George sat next to him and grabbed his hand. ‘It’s not your fault. He didn’t visit you either. Don't beat yourself up. You shared something. We’re here now and I bet he’s smiling somewhere, maybe laughing about how long it took’. He always knew the right thing to say.

‘He always had such stories to tell. It never crossed my mind that he must have been so lonely.’

He sensed George didn’t quite know how to respond. Instead, they sat holding hands for a prolonged silence. Consumed by the small, dull room where Patrick spent the last moment of his life. Eventually, George stood up and continued to pack the final things away, whilst he stayed at the end of the bed. He needed a little longer to digest, recharge.

‘What’s this?’ George was holding a briefcase, locked by a tiny padlock closing the zip. ‘Did you see a key for this?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Well, I guess there’s only one thing to do.’ George puts the suitcase on the floor and stands on the small lock. ‘Pull it.’

‘What? No. What if it’s something private?’

‘What if it’s not? We can’t just leave it. Go on, pull, it’s only flimsy.’

It didn’t take must resistance for him to get on board, he was just as intrigued by the contents of the briefcase. In one clean snag, the tiny padlock fell right off. George put his finger in the small gap and pulled the zip open.

‘What is it?’

‘It’s your letters.’ A wave of sadness suddenly consumed Michael from head to toe that he was flung back onto the end of the bed. George passed him the countless letters. Wrapped in an elastic band. He felt like he was crying floods of tears internally, but no tears surfaced, instead, there was numbness.

‘They must have meant a lot to him,’ George smiled at him thinking of it as something positive, a nice gesture. But instead, all he could feel was regret and sorrow.

‘Yeah, I guess so, he forced a smile back. Then, he notices something else in the case, ‘what’s that?’

George pulls out a small black notebook. No indentation or marks. Michael inhales the strength to stand up, and he opens the book. Things to remember.

‘Is it a diary?’

‘I think so. Or some kind of stories.’

‘Should we keep it?’

‘Yeah. I’ll keep it.’

----

By five they had checked into the hotel room after stopping by a local charity shop and grabbing some dinner from a café nearby. They were only staying for one night, George had to get back for work and they decided they didn’t want to prolong the trip any longer than they had to.

The book still intrigued him. Had he purposefully left this for someone to find? He thought of the title, things to remember. Maybe some kind of bucket list or memoir?

Unable to contain his curiosity he pulled out the book from the box of belongings whilst George showered.

There were scribbles. Some names he didn’t recognize, some quotes from books. He flicked through page after page, until around halfway through what appeared to be a story or a diary entry. It was titled ‘23rd March’. He skimmed through the first few pages. It was written like a story. The character in the story wakes up and goes to work at the local butcher's, something about saving up money but he can't make out the handwriting.

Then a paragraph catches his attention. He reads it and then reads it again.

A blue-eyed girl comes into the shop. I recognize her instantly even though years have passed. Her name is Dillon. We went to school together, but she never paid much attention to me. But I would give her all my attention. She was a few years above me. I know that she won’t recognize me, but then to my surprise, she does. She remembers a lot.

He’d heard the name Dillon before in previous letters, but he had always assumed that Dillon had been a guy friend. There was never any mention of anything romantic between them, yet Michael always got the sense that he cared for Dillion greatly. Patrick had always spoken so fondly of him, or now it seems, her.

He keeps reading on. On this particular day, Dillon and the narrator (who he assumes is Patrick) have arranged to hang out after his shift at the butchers. Michael doesn’t remember any mention of Patrick working at a butcher, but he assumes this could have been from years before he was born.

I’ve never laughed as much as I have tonight. I feel like my stomach might burst from laughing. We don’t do anything in particular, just chat, and laugh, and sit in silence. But it’s not awkward. There’s an unspoken knowledge between us.

‘An unspoken knowledge?’ Michael whispers to himself out loud after reading the line. He carries on reading.

We sit for a long time. Not speaking, but just basking in each other’s presence. At one point our eyes catch each other and lock, I cannot move away. I realize I’m sweating and start to flush. But she doesn’t laugh or look away, instead, she kisses me.

‘What does it say?’ George came out of the shower and jumped onto the bed.

‘I think that Uncle Patrick had a love.’

‘I thought you said he never married or had a partner.’

‘He didn’t. I don’t think.’ Was Dillon his uncle's love? Why wouldn’t he tell him? The story went on to say they spend the night together, but then after had never spoken again for some mysterious reason. What was missing here? At the end of the story, it reads, For Dillon.

‘Do you mind if we go back to the care home tomorrow on the way to the airport?’

----

The home seemed different the next morning. A little more bustle, more life.

A different nurse took them back to the room. It had been cleaned; the nurse told them the room has been assigned to a new resident due the following day. The fragility of life was never more dominant than to Michael at that moment.

The nurse stayed with them this time in the now empty room. He wasn’t sure quite was he was looking for. But something told him to come back one last time.

‘Did he have any visitors?’

‘Yes, he did. Some visitors. His old neighbor would visit every couple of months. And he had a friend from his job who would stop by now and again. Never any family I don't think.’

‘Anyone called Dillon?’

‘That name doesn’t spring anything to mind.’

‘Maybe we should go,’ Michael gestured to George and smiled at the nurse.

The trip was over, and Michael had said goodbye. He felt a little closer to this man with who he had already shared so much yet knew so little about.

Michael took one last look at the care home and they took off for the airport.

In the car, Michael opened up some of the letters his uncle had saved over the years. And for the first time since they arrived, a tear dropped down his cheek.

George pulled over right away, he always sensed when something was wrong. ‘Hey. Come here,’ he put his arm around his shoulder. ‘We can stay a little longer.’

‘I think it’s just hit me that I’m not going to get a letter from him this month.’

‘What’s that?’ In between one stash of letters was a clump of photographs. ‘Is that him?’ George studied some of the photos.

‘Yeah, that’s him.’ Michael flicked through some of the photos until he stumbled across something unexpected. An ultrasound scan. It was worn at the edges. He turned it over. Michael was scribbled on the back. He was looking at his own ultrasound scan. He’d never seen it before. Did his dad give this to Patrick at some point?

Just as he is about to show George, who is still looking at the photo. George says, ‘he looks just like you.’