Chapter 5
It started out as a beautiful fall Saturday morning. Jeff woke up early. Lying in bed, he felt a sense of relief that he would be getting away from the house today to go to town for his occasional shopping trip. He relaxed and glanced over at Lizzie lying next to him as she had done every morning with few exceptions for the past 55 years. After a lifetime together, he was still in love with his beautiful wife. Her gray hair didn’t matter. Her wrinkled skin still held a few patches of the pink beauty that he fell in love with many years ago. He loved to just listen to her breath. It didn’t matter that when he saw her without clothes, her sagging breasts had lost their battle with gravity many years earlier. He could only visualize them as beautifully shaped as they were in her youth. He didn’t know whether it was her vivacious personality or her understanding of human nature, but everyone who met her fell in love with her.
Jeff met Lizzie when they were in the first grade together at Heyward Grammar school. The old school had been torn down, but every time they drove by the site, they talked about one thing or another that happened to them there. They wondered what had become of their favorite teacher, Mrs. Mears. Their memories were golden and could only be appreciated by someone who had been there firsthand. Do you remember, “Mrs. Mears’ long morning prayers?” “Oh and remember the girls playing Ring around the Roses.” “How about, when Bootsie Crosby’s mother came to school and whipped him in front of everyone for talking back to Mrs. Mears.”
Jeff and Lizzie did all the things children normally did in school, but it wasn’t until they were eleven years old that they started seeing each other differently. As their hormones developed, Jeff started paying particular attention to Lizzie’s breasts and other feminine features. Soon they stole their first kiss. Lizzie knew that she was Jeff’s girl and they both foolishly vowed one day they would be married. The romance continued, and the bond became stronger. It was no surprise to anyone when it actually happened a few years later.
Lizzie was always a vivacious and spirited woman, but it was unusual for the couple to have a serious disagreement. Privately Lizzie always called her husband “Jeffy.” Jeffy this, Jeffy that, Jeffy I love you, Jeffy will you do this or that for me, Jeffy…Jeffy… Jeff reveled in the spoiling. Often when they had a disagreement, Lizzie had a tactful way of reprimanding, which usually resulted in both of them laughing at their childish behavior. When she was mad, she would say, “Jeff you are a mean man. I know you can’t help it though, ‘cause it’s just the ‘Kinsey’ blood coming out in you.” They had both heard Jeff’s parents telling stories of how mean his ancestors were on his mother’s side. Although the story had probably been embellished every time it was told, it was said that Jeff’s great-great-grandfather, Ransom “Rance” Kinsey, was the meanest man on earth. He was so mean that when he died, they dug his grave by lantern at night and unceremoniously lowered him in the hole because they were ashamed to invite the neighbors to his funeral. Anyone who ever knew him agreed that Rance was the meanest man in the Lowcountry.
Jeff was brought back to reality by a knock at the door. He knew it was Cyndi Cooper arriving as she did every day to help take care of Lizzie. In the kitchen, Cyndi started the familiar routine of cooking breakfast for the three of them. Cyndi had never been away from the Lowcountry and only on rear occasions had she ever been to Warrenton. Her whole life for the past five years since Lizzie’s mind had started deteriorating from Alzheimer’s disease was to help Jeff take care of his wife.
Cyndi was a very attractive 23-year-old black woman. In spite of her inexperience or economic ability to wear attractive clothes, she got plenty of attention from the opposite sex. Her skin was a honey tan, and her hair was long and smooth as silk. Her thin lips, small nose, and perfectly portioned facial features were uncharacteristic of most Lowcountry black people. Once when she was in grammar school, her light skin caused the other black kids to tease her. They called her a “Mulatto.” She had never heard the word and didn’t know a Mulatto was a person with one white and one black parent. She did know the way the kids laughed it wasn’t a nice word. When she went home crying, her mother explained what a Mulatto was, and that all people with light-colored skin, were not necessarily Mulattos. Her mother said, “Cyndi your tan skin comes from the apron of God, a tribute to your Geechee heritage and you can be proud of it.” As she grew older, she was proud of her tan skin. It and her other physical features made her more beautiful than any white or black girl around.
Jeff, Lizzie, and Cyndi sat at the table eating eggs, bacon and grits, the usual morning fare. Jeff loved Cyndi’s cooking and felt fortunate to have her help take care of Lizzie. He had an almost comical way of eating the perfectly cooked food. He would mix his eggs and grits and smashed them into a flat circle. Then he would rake the outside of the circle with the tip of the fork before putting it in his mouth. As he put the food in his mouth, his elbow extended unnaturally from his body. Being left handed, the breakfast ritual made him appear as though he was conducting a symphony. Before Lizzie’s mind went really bad, unknown to him, she and Cyndi would giggle at Jeff’s eating habits. Occasionally, they would tease him about it and all of them would have a laugh at his expense.
Jeff said, “Cyndi today is the day I go to town to shop for groceries. I probably won’t be back before mid-afternoon since the pickup isn’t running very good and I need to get it looked at. If you need anything get in touch with Shorty.”
“OK Mr. Jeff, me and Miss Lizzie will be fine.”
After Jeff had left, Cyndi cleaned up the dishes and made the bed while Lizzie sat at the kitchen table. Soon Cyndi was finished and sat down in the comfortable overstuffed living room chair to relax. Having been up late the night before taking care of her mother, who had the severe flu, she fell asleep within five minutes.
Unattended in the kitchen, Lizzie’s mind began wandering. She tried to recall the many times she and Jeff took long walks by the river. But her hollow mind could only grasp the parts when they saw birds and rabbits, and the beautiful yellow jasmine vines climbing the brushes. She loved the fall more than any other season. She loved to look at the foliage turning brown and wild animals foraging to store up food for the winter.
Her fragmented thoughts were fixated on taking a walk. Unable to grasp the unfolding danger, Lizzie said to no one in particular, “I want to take a walk in the woods to see the flowers.”
She got up from the table and walked out the back door. Excited, she stepped as lively as she had as a healthy young woman. Not a care in the world. She was just taking a casual walk in the woods, not aware of the looming gray thunder clouds building in the west. She had walked about a mile and a half, occasionally stopping to pick a white flower from a dogwood tree or a short vine of jasmine from a low hanging limb.
“Jeffy, look at the Robins. Jeffy hurry up we’ll be late. Jeffy, catch me if you can.” Then she ran a short distance and stopped to look around.
“Jeffy, I know you are there. You are hiding from me, I’ll find you.” Coming to a fallen tree across the foot-worn path, she detoured into the underbrush looking for Jeff.
She must have walked 500 yards before becoming tangled in the vines and low-growing bushes. At first, she just pulled, twisted, and tried to back away. She became disoriented as she frantically attempted to extricate herself. In her demented state, she felt that the forest growth was actually alive and her entanglement was a horrible spirit someone had placed on her. Fighting with all of her strength, she finally got free and began running… just running, not capable of thinking about a specific destination. Instead of returning toward the familiar path, she ran deeper into the wilderness of the swamp. Then she tripped on a root and her frail body sprawled to the wet bog. Laying on her side in a fetal position she turned her head and gazed upward, but all her Alzheimer-stricken mind could see were the treetops spinning around and around. They were alive
! The bushes, trees, ground, all swirling. As the raindrops began pelleting her bare arms and face, she started shivering. Her body was now so cold!
“Jeff help me, I am freezing.”
Lizzie’s mind traveled backward in time. She remembered the first game they played at recess in the First Grade. Holding hands, the girls would dance around a person designated as “it.” “Ring around the Rosie, Ring around the Rosie. Sit!” The last girl to sit was “it” and had to sit in the middle of the circle for the next round. Lizzie loved to play “Ring around the Rosie.”
To the west, the gray clouds had turned almost black by now, and the rain was coming down in sheets. Then there was a horrendous clap of thunder, accompanied by a blazing lightning strike as it hit a large gum tree within twenty feet of Lizzie. Her eardrums almost burst at the sound, and her body felt the electricity from the lightning bolt traveling through the ground. Her body jerked as she felt the strong, but not fatal electrical jolt. The rain kept coming down in waves one after another. Within fifteen minutes, Lizzie was lying in several inches of water soaked mud. She squirmed, but her mind was in a total stupor at this point. All she could do was to wiggle further into the mud.
As the rain let up somewhat, she blinked her rain-soaked eyes and spied a large cypress tree with a sinkhole between two roots at the bottom. Although her mind was unable to rationalize what was happening, her instincts gave way to survival. In a panic, she crawled into the hole. Still unable to comprehend what was happening, the partial shelter did, in fact, offer more protection from the elements than lying on the open ground.
Sitting with her back to the tree, she put her head on her knees and hugged them to her chest. She sat frozen in this position for what seemed to be hours, although it was only about thirty minutes of pounding rain, thunder, and lightning. The thunder and lightning stopped, but it must have continued to rain for another hour filling the hole where she sat. She was afraid to move and didn’t have the mental capacity to coordinate her efforts even if she had been strong enough.
As the water rose above her buttocks, Lizzie got colder and colder. It wasn’t long before she lost what little sense of reality she ever possessed. With full hypothermia sitting in she shivered fiercely in the 45-degree fall temperature. Finally, as her body temperature dropped to a fatal level, the loss of her physical senses made her feel warm and comfortable if only for a few minutes. Her last thoughts were of childhood play and her husband, who had never failed her. “Ring around the Rosie, Ring around the Rosie. Sweet comfort…, “Jeffy help me…Oh, Jeffy…My dear Jeffy…”
But this time Jeff didn’t help nor did Jeff answer her cry.