What do you see when you look at me? Do you even bother to look, or am I just that old man in Room 22 in your busy life?
You come every morning, chattering away about what you did, how the kids are playing up, how worried you are about whether your husband will be laid off work . Worry, worry, worry.
What about my worries? The ones I never get the chance to talk about, because I’m just a silly old man at the end of his life, not worth the trouble of listening too?
I was young once. Just like you. I had kids and a life. Where are they now? Gone away to live somewhere else I suppose. Can’t remember the last time I saw them. Last Christmas was it? Maybe the Christmas before.
And my love, Sheree. The woman I spent sixty years cherishing. What has become of her? Why did you take her from me? Snatch her from my arms in such a cruel way?
Yes, she couldn’t look after herself. I know, I know. But I did a good job, didn’t I? Fed her, cleaned her, cuddled her as we sat watching TV.
But you took her from me, put her in a home five miles away where I can’t see her. Might as well have been five hundred. Do you even wonder how painful that was for me? How it sucked every last meaning from my life?
Sixty wonderful years. Years of sharing, closeness and warmth. Snatched away by some overpaid busybody in a floral dress and ingratiating smile.
It was a wonderful journey we had together, wasn’t it Sheree? A journey filled with love and laughter. And I grew to love every part of you. Every little crease in your face, every strand of hair that flopped across your forehead.
We always liked journeys, didn’t we, you and I? Portugal, China, India. Even when we got old we’d wobble our way along the top road, looking out over the sea, watching the nesting buzzards searching for food, gliding their way across the firth on the warm spring updraughts.
I always imagined it was us up there, floating over the sea, born aloft by our love.
But little by little you were taken away from me, my love. Memory by memory. Silently, as though somebody had crept into your mind and made off with you, leaving behind someone I no longer knew.
And now I have another journey ahead of me and I want to share this one with you too.
I need to feel your reassuring hand in mine this one last time. I need to look into those bright blue eyes once more and remember what a grand love we shared.
It’s taken me a long time to get here. Along the corridors, down the stairs - I don’t trust lifts anymore. The lights have been dimmed because it’s night-time. At least that’s what I tell myself, not wanting to admit my sight is not what it once was.
The door was a struggle to open, my weak, vein-marked hands no longer up to the jobs they once performed without a struggle. But the key I took from your pocket when you helped me sit up in bed to drink my tea was the right one.
Here I am, on the cusp of the greatest journey of my life, and I’m terrified of being alone when I make it.
The night is bright and crisp. The snow cleared from the drive, heaped in sparkling ridges along the sides, lighting the way to the main gate - so near, so far.
Yes its been a long, long journey, my life, with just five miles to go.
Five miles is not so far. I used to walk that every day, hand in hand with you my love.
If I just take it slowly, pull my dressing gown tighter about my shoulders —