Stephen Dixon - Late Stories

He puts two rice cakes in the toaster and presses the lever down. Shouldn’t take long. The phone rings. He goes into his wife’s study to answer it. It’s his sister. “How are you?” “Fine.” “What’s doing with you?” “Nothing much, and you?” “The same,” and so on, when he smells something burning. “Hold it,” he says; “the rice cakes,” and he puts the receiver down and goes into the kitchen. The rice cakes are on fire in the toaster. Flames coming out of the slots that reach the bottom of the cupboard above them. He pulls out the toaster plug, presses the button to pop up the rice cakes, blows on the flames till the fire’s out, and then, with a potholder and dishtowel protecting his hands, holds the toaster over the sink and shakes it till the rice cakes fall out. Runs water on them till they stop smoking and are soaked, and puts them in the kitchen trash can. Now that could have been very dangerous, he thinks. Very. How stupid can he get? He goes back to the study; his sister’s no longer on the line. He’ll call her later, if she doesn’t call him first, but he won’t tell her why he suddenly had to get off the phone. She’ll say didn’t his smoke alarm go off? And then urge him to get one, at least for the kitchen. He looks inside the toaster. Nothing seems damaged. Cupboard seems okay, too. He puts two more rice cakes into the toaster and turns the timer knob all the way to the left. Stay here, and then when he thinks they’re ready, pop them. He got the idea for toasting the rice cakes from his wife. That’s how she always asked him to make them for her when she had cream cheese or butter or peanut butter put on them after they were warmed. It’d take about forty-five seconds. “Don’t let it burn,” she’d say. He likes them toasted more than warmed, even some of the puffy grains blackened, and it’d take a little more than a minute. Room still smells of burnt rice cakes. He turns the exhaust fan on. It makes so much noise, he won’t have any trouble remembering to turn it off. And remember, never leave the rice cakes in the toaster for that long again. Maybe a better idea would be never to toast them again. Let’s face it, it’s getting or gotten to the point where he’s beginning not to trust his memory that something’s in the toaster or oven or on the stove that needs checking into every now and then.

Puts a pill into his mouth, fills half a juice glass with water, gets a large container of yogurt out of the refrigerator, lets the pill dissolve on his tongue, swallows it with water, opens the refrigerator and starts to put the glass on the shelf where the yogurt was, realizes he means for the yogurt container to go back into the refrigerator but after he has a spoonful of it, puts the glass upside down into the dish rack, has a spoonful of yogurt, puts the spoon into the sink and the yogurt container into the refrigerator. Absentminded, that’s all. Not really a problem. Was doing too many things at once and too quickly; just didn’t think.

He goes outside for his daily run and longer walk. He runs first, just a quarter-mile or so. He can’t run like he used to not that long ago, which was about two miles every day. Then he starts walking fast. He feels his fly. It’s open; forgot again. Makes him even more worried about himself. Toaster, oven, stove, forgetting his keys when he goes out to drive the car. Goes back to get them and often gets distracted and when he leaves the house again realizes he’s forgotten his keys a second time. So: remember to check your fly every time before you go out. Remember, remember. Right. Check. Every time. Will do. At least solve that problem.

Goes to the market to shop, comes back, smells gas. Checks the stove. He left one of the burners on though no flame. How’d that happen? What was the last thing he did on the stove? Boiled water for coffee this morning. Turns the exhaust fan on. What’s he want to do, kill himself? If not by fire, then gas? Big joke. Funny. Knows it’ll never get that bad. If his wife were alive he’d tell her it. No he wouldn’t. And what was the joke again? Couldn’t have forgotten it that fast. If not by fire, then gas. She’d get frightened for him and her both. Concentrate more. Just concentrate on everything to do with what he does in the kitchen and his fly and what he needs to have on him when he takes the car. Though how many times has he forgotten his keys and wallet? Not much but enough. Maybe once every two months or not even that. Though maybe more. Keys aren’t that big a problem. Most of the time he knows almost immediately when they’re not on him. But sometimes he’s gotten to the market or wherever he’s gone to, felt his pocket where the wallet should have been, and had to drive back home for it, a few times from miles away.

He goes outside to get the newspaper by the mailbox. Picks it off the ground, takes the plastic sleeve off, starts reading the headlines as he walks back to the house. His fly. Why’s he think it might be open? He didn’t. Just checking. It’s open. Didn’t he tell himself to concentrate more on it? Zips it up. At least nobody was around to see it.

Turns on the light switch by the CD player to two living room lamps so he doesn’t have to walk to his bedroom in the dark. Done it several times before, and even though he walked very slowly and his arms were weaving around in front of him, he bumped into things and twice cracked his forehead on a door. After he turns on his night table lamp, he’ll turn the living room lights off with the light switch above the piano at the other end of the room. Both switches work for the same lights. He goes into the bedroom, undresses, exercises a little with two ten-pound weights, washes up, makes sure a handkerchief is on the bed and his watch and pen and memo book are on his night table, and gets into bed and reads. After about half an hour, he shuts off his light. A little light comes in from the living room. Forgot again. That one he does about once a week, or about every third or fourth time he makes it to the back of the house that way. He hasn’t figured out a way not to forget to turn the living room lights off before he gets into bed other than to tell himself when he first switches on the lights: Don’t forget to turn the other living room light switch off after you turn the night table light on.

So he’s worried. Or getting to be. Or just a little alarmed. Because what else will he forget? For he’s been forgetting so much the last few months. Actually, the last year, and probably more. It could even go back to sometime after his wife died, or it’s become worse since then, though he has no idea why for either. Truth is, he’s not sure when it began. Maybe there were inklings of it before she died, and because he was so busy with her, he never paid much attention to it. But stove, oven, toaster, lights, fly, pills, a couple of times his phone number and zip code, feeding the cat, not knowing if he let him in or out the last time he opened the outside door for him, more than usual: people’s names. What words mean but usually not their spellings. Music compositions and their composers. Hearing a familiar piece on the radio but can’t come up with its name or who wrote it. Well, he’s always had trouble with that, one or the other or both, unless it’s something like Enigma Variations or Pictures at an Exhibition or Appalachian Spring , which are played on the radio so often that, great works though they are, he’s sick of them. Recently, authors and their most famous works. Just the other day: Ellison and his novel. Okay, read it long ago, but it’s still written and talked about but he couldn’t remember his name or the book’s title the entire day. Tried, too. Then, when his last name suddenly popped into his head, the first name came right after and the book’s title. Also the other day: gazpacho. Bought a small container of it in the local market and was about to take it out of the refrigerator and sit down and eat it, when he realized he’d forgotten what it was called. This is a test, he told himself: let’s see how fast he can come up with its name. Knows it’s made of chopped-up tomatoes and cucumbers and peppers and onions and is served chilled and is of Spanish origin and the traditional way it’s made in Spain, or in some parts of it, and which he doesn’t do when he makes it himself at home, is with chunks of bread. He gave up, and as he opened the refrigerator to take it out, it came to him: gazpacho. With an “s” or “z,” he thought. Let’s see. He ran the word through his head. “Z.” He’s almost sure. Remembers looking it up in the dictionary, maybe two or three times, when he wasn’t sure of its spelling for something he was writing. Anyway: remember. What’s on the stove, in the oven, how long the thing should be cooking, or thereabouts, and so on. Cat, pills, toaster, fly. To wear a cap when he’s going to be outside, even when the sun’s behind clouds, to prevent more scalp lesions. To check his daily calendar book every few days to see what appointments and engagements might be coming up. People’s names he’s not sure he’ll remember next time he sees them. Use some memory device to help him remember. For instance, if the guy’s name is Tom, then “Tom and Jerry” or “Tom Collins” or “Tom-Tom,” but something like that. There’s a former grad student of his he seems to bump into a lot at markets and the two Starbucks he goes to and certainly at departmental parties he’s still invited to, whose name he always forgets. It’s embarrassing for both of them when that happens and he has to work around it to get her name, without appearing he forgot it, or ask someone else for it. So what is her name? Terry? Tracy? Teresa? He’s not even sure it starts with a T, but something tells him it does. T-a? T-e? T-o? T-u? Oh, he gives up. He doesn’t understand why he forgets some people’s names more than others and a few people’s names all the time. Knows her last name, a fairly common one, is the same as a well-known contemporary British writer, but forgets it now, too. Writes people’s names in the memo book he always carries with him. About a week ago during his early evening walk, he met for the first time his new neighbors from across the street. Both doctors. That came out in their brief talk. Also that they have twin sons. He saw them and introduced himself. So what are their names? They told him and he gave them his. He in fact asked for their names again just before he said goodbye and continued his walk. Might even have told them he’s bad at remembering people’s names, which is why he asked for theirs again. He thinks the woman said she is too and asked for his again. But are these going to be two more people whose names he always forgets? Because he’s sure to be bumping into them again. Johnny and Rachel? Or Rebecca? He thinks it’s Rebecca. He takes his memo book out of his back pants pocket, and pen he also always has with him, from a side pants pocket — he doesn’t keep it in his back pocket, which he used to do, because he knows he’ll eventually sit on it and break it and stain another pair of pants for good; he’s learned that much — and writes on the first clean page he comes to: “Johnny and Rebecca or Rachel; new doctor neighbors. Rebecca at Union Memorial, Johnny in private practice: pulmonology.” Last names? She has her husband’s: Mathews or Mathewson, and writes these names down. He’ll put on this same page the names of other people in the neighborhood he’s bumped into on his walks and exchanged names with, if he can remember theirs, and also new people he might meet around here, and look at them from time to time, or maybe only when he puts a new one down, so he’ll know their names next time he meets them. Let them think he has a great memory, despite what he might have told them, and don’t correct them if they say he does. Take it as a compliment, or just shrug.