Short Story / In the Garden with Vanessa (Analysis)
Her doctor said, “No more Alcohol”. Of all the ludicrous things I’ve ever heard. She is 80 years old and it’s her only remaining pleasure. Every day, in the afternoon she has a gin and tonic, as she has for as long as she would care to remember. It is the penultimate ritual in a life governed by rituals.
She rises in the morning and the litany of pain begins. There is the act of simply rising. She doesn’t complain, she is too strong for that, but she can’t disguise the held breath, the slight groan, barely perceptible to me through the sheer strength of her will. Then dressing is a chore, eating is a chore, bathing is a choir – her only peace, her only sense of her old life her real life is her afternoon sitting in the lovely garden that is her pride and joy and sipping a gin and tonic as I read her poetry.
How can I deny her that and for what reason? So that she might life a few more hours of a life she no longer wants?
This garden is her one solace. It’s a place of incredible wonder and memory. Here, she spent cool spring evenings with some of the brightest minds of the time, Fitzgerald, Parker, they debated, discussed real issues, made up silly poems. There were children in this garden, her own and others, playing at birthday parties, dancing under the harvest moon, spooning one warm summer nights. When the wind is still, we can almost here the ghosts.
It’s a ritual, I don’t know how we came about it, but, perhaps the best rituals spring to life without any conscious thought. After lunch I wheel her, weather permitting into the garden so she can enjoy the sun. Then, I return, clean the dishes away and take down the silver tray. She insists on the tray, it makes things so much more civilized I make the drink and put the afternoon pills on the tray and take it out to her. She takes them one by one all five of them and sips the Gin and Tonic to swallow them. She can’t see very well, so she reaches for them, feels for them and counts them with her fingers. I know why she counts them, so I pretend she doesn’t do it. Then, she leans back and closes her eyes.
“What have you brought me today?” She asked wryly, for though her body is fading, the mind is still sharp as a tack.
I give her the name of the author and we begin to read. She loved Byron and Yeats, but her favorite is the Coleridge.
We idle a few hours and then I take her to the study, which is also haunted for her and I go to prepare dinner.
I empathize with her. There was a time when I was as trapped in this house as she was. My ex-husband is her grandson and, as the unemployed person, I got custody of Vanessa. We argued continuously, her and me and Brian and one day, I’d had enough. I packed my things and left this prison.
And yet, my thoughts always returned her. To her, sitting alone in the study with a woman paid for her attention, a woman who didn’t know Vanessa, never would. I was the only one left. That’s why she hates me, I think. Because I am the only one left. No family, no friends. Her husband died five years ago, all the others left before them, and younger people are too busy living to be bothered with the dying. Alone in this big empty house, and the thought was more then I could bear. And, as she reminds me so constantly, I needed a job.
It’s become more frequent. Each visit to the doctor, and there are many, brings another round.
“Did he give me new medication?” She will say.
I tell her.
“All we need it to up the dosage on my old medication. That would stop the pain. Yes, enough of a good painkiller with put an end to all suffering.”
My throat clenches, my stomach rolls. She senses my emotions and drops the subject.
We sit down to lunch; she’s having ground meat, ground vegetables, and nice, soft pudding. She says she doesn’t taste anything at all, but I know different. I have tuna and we sit in silence, watching each other across the china and lace table cloth.
“You know.” She says, as she brushes invisible crumbs from the cloth. “Life is too short to eat off plastic plates.” And she smiled, takes another bite of the mush.
“Yes, I know. It’s like a tea party; all we need are some teddy bears.” And she smiles more wickedly; this is another ritual, another litany. When you know someone, really know them, all the important things are left unsaid. I know that when she says this, every day, she is saying thank you as well as she can. She is reminding me that we are a team, a pair. That we share things no one else does. We are a secret society of two.
Like – I know she is wondering if I will be bringing out the gin and tonic this afternoon. She heard the doctor, though he talks about her as if she isn’t in the room. She heard, and she knows they are his orders. And she wonders how far our solidarity goes, but she’d rather be surprised by my decision, so she won’t ask.
I wheel her into the garden. It’s a magnificent day. I splurge and turn on the fountain, stone gods play under the splash of the water. I turn her toward the old, large live oak and the sun streams down through the leaves, dappling the well manicured lawn. The gardener has been by already this week. Lilac and Hyacinth fill the air and a cool breeze fights with the hot air against the skin. The ivy is so high and thick, you can’t see the walls around this haven, but rather a green thicket.
“Bring my medication.” She says. “All of it.” She adds and leans out of her wheel chair to pick a dandelion out of the grass and blow on it.
I wash the dishes quickly.
I take down the tray. I pour the Gin and then the tonic, a little stronger then usual. She deserves it.
I have never loved anyone as much as I love Vanessa. She has given me so much of her life in her stories and has shown me how to live a good life.
I take down the pills, and put the five on the tray. Impulse dumps the rest of the bottle of pain killers on the tray. I pick it up, and with great ceremony carry it out to the garden.
Earlier, I slipped the Coleridge on my chair. I realize this might not be impulse. This might be design.
I come with the tray and she smiled, she can see the glinting of the scrollwork in the air around her. She can see light and darkness and she is quite experienced at telling the difference.
“But darling, what will the doctor say?” She asked.
“Hell with him.” I reply and she blushes, laughs.
She reaches for the gin, takes a sip.
“It’s a bit stiff, dear.” She replies and puts the glass back down. She then reaches for the pills and counts, then stops. Her breath stops for a second and she looks at me, counting. Then she smiles again, and her face is so grateful. She reaches out and touches my hand, then slowly takes a pill and swallows it with some of the drink.
“So, what are we reading today?” She asks, calmly.
“Coleridge. I taught it might be a special occasion.”
“You’ll be the death of me..” She says, then stops and turns away. She takes another pill. When she looks back, I can still see the traces of the tears she wiped away. “I want you to have something.” She says. She reaches around her neck and pulls off her locket. It’s a family heirloom and over 200 years old. She has worn it every day of her life. It’s my inheritance, all I’ll get and all I want. “And the Coleridge, of course. So you can think of me.”
As if I will ever be able to not think of her. She is my friend, my only friend and I’m hers.
“In Xanadu, did Kubla Khan, a Stately Pleasure dome degree.” I begin and she leans back, takes another pill. She is timing it, if she takes them all at once, she might lose her decorum all over the yard. That would be inappropriate. She wants to be found with her dignity.
I want to go to her, to hug her and tell her that I love her and I’m sorry I couldn’t do more. Yet, I know it would rob her of some stateliness.
She turns to me again.
“Thank you, Beth.” She says. And then we fall into silence and I continue with the poem. “Did you know, this poem came to him in a dream, and he was interrupted before he could complete it?” She’s said this a thousand times, and yet I am so grateful to hear it one last time.
I read her Coleridge until she falls asleep in the beautiful garden.
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I liked this. The part about the doctor’s orders for her to stop having alcohol reminded me of when a nurse told my great grandfather to stop smoking. He’d been chain smoking since he was probably 12 and he was in his late 80’s at the time. He tried to quit for about two days before he took his walker and hiked the 2 or 3 miles down the mountain (he lived in the rockies) to the store to buy some cigarettes. Anyway, the writing was very good. There were a few typos (little things like a “one” that should’ve been an “on” etc.) and at least one case of inconsistent tense, but I think if you do another proofread you should be able to pick up on those. There were also a few confusing parts of the story. The part about someone getting custody of someone and someone hating someone is confusing. I couldn’t quite follow who was who and how the characters were connected. Other than that it was good, though. I like the end.
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I really like this, regardless of all the spelling and grammar problems.
It’s a tough subject to deal with, but I think you handled it with care, while still getting your point across.
I love the second-to-last paragraph, but I think you could rework the last sentence. It loses impact when you tack on “in the beautiful garden” at the end. How about, “I read her Coleridge until she falls asleep.”? I think you could even take out “Coleridge” and say “I read to her…” instead. Your call.
Favorited.
A very well written story. I can’t condone the action, but the story was well constructed.
This is a beautiful story. I love how you opened it with the doctor’s ultimatum and described why exactly it was so harsh to ask that.
Couple nitpicky things:
-So that she might life…so that she might live?
-spooning one…spooning on?
-She insists on the tray, it makes things so much more civilized I make the drink and put the afternoon pills on the tray and take it out to her…run on sentence. Perhaps put a semicolon where the comma is (tray; it) and a period after civilized.
-We argued continuously, her and me and Brian…bad grammar. We argued continuously…Vanessa, Brian and I?
-younger people are too busy living to be bothered with the dying. GREAT line. I love it!
-It’s become more frequent. Each visit to the doctor, and there are many, brings another round. What has become more frequent? Consider putting “and there are many” in parentheses? Brings another round of what? Pills?
-“Coleridge. I taught…I thought?
This is possibly one of the most touching stories I’ve ever read. It is simply beautiful and well written with great descriptions. Beyond words. Keep writing.
Nice idea which deserves to be explored. Most material dealing with the subect of this kind of assisted suicide will be “not acceptable” in most modern cultures, but it does not mean that writers should leave it alone. On a critical point, the spelling is the worst contender in this short story, it lets the reader down as stops the flow of the story overall, as one has to stop and take the surrounding context into account. (Did you use a spell checker? if so, try to avoid this as it does not always insert the correct word)More detail about the old womans life and the reason for the seeming trust and affection between the companions would help. Overall, good subject material which can be expanded upon.
The story line itself works well, but there are several problems that are distracting. The spelling errors (even within the Coleridge quote) pull the reader away from content, as does the switching of tense between past and present. I’d put it all in the present tense, and also look for cliches such as “sharp as a tack.”
This was a pretty touching little story you got here.
You really bring the two characters to life with some great descriptions and dialog. The story is very solid.
You do have some grammar/misspelled words here and there, such as:
“dancing under the harvest moon, spooning one warm summer nights” I think you meant to say on warm summer nights.
But other than that, this was a really good and well written piece. Keep it up.
I like this story a lot. It is not offensive to me at all. I can understand where the old woman is coming from. There were just a few typing errors but it has nice visuals.
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