Me Again by Keith Cronin Page A

conversational skills, I reflected.
    “But I think their mashed potatoes are the instant kind,” Rebecca said. “And their fish sticks are nasty.”
    Being rather partial to the hospital’s fish sticks, I remained silent.
    “After lunch, can you help me with something?” she said, pausing to taste her tomato soup.
    “Sure. What is it?”
    Rebecca put down her spoon. “I need a guy’s opinion. You’re a guy.” Again her quiet, level voice made this remark hard to read, but I’ll admit to being somewhat pleased to have had my gender noted and acknowledged.
    “I could have asked Bruce – you know, my PT coach – but he and I don’t talk much. And your coach always looks like he wants to have sex with me.”
    One thing I had been learning from my brief encounters with Rebecca was that she tended to speak her mind very directly, with little regard for how others might react to her words. From my study of strokes, I had learned that this lack of self-editing was one of the many after-effects a stroke could cause. The thing was, I found her directness rather endearing. And for whatever reason, her quiet, deadpan delivery heightened the effect.
    I smiled. “Leon looks at most pretty women that way.” My God – had I actually managed to compliment her in a moderately smooth way? Perhaps there was hope for my linguistic neurons after all.
    But rather than smiling at me, Rebecca simply looked puzzled. “You think I’m pretty?” she asked, clearly surprised.
    “Yes,” I said, and then decided to elaborate. Speaking carefully, I said, “I think you’re very pretty, Rebecca.”
    This got a smile – that nice, simple smile. I assumed it was in response to the compliment, but then she said, “I like it a lot when you say my name like that.”
    Resisting the temptation to begin endlessly repeating her name, I instead managed to say, “How can I help?”
    Rebecca’s face grew serious again, and she leaned forward.
    “I was wondering if you could come by my room after lunch.”
    It would be both cliché and accurate to say that my heart leapt.
    “I’ve got two new outfits that a friend brought me from home,” she said, “and I want to know which one you think looks best.”
    My heart now mounted a trampoline and began to execute a flawless series of back flips.
    “My husband is coming by this afternoon, and I want to surprise him by being all dressed up for him,” she concluded.
    My heart fell into a kitchen garbage disposal.
    “I’d be glad to help,” I lied.
    * * * * *
    Rebecca’s room, which was on the next floor up from me, was configured just like mine. A narrow bed lined the left wall. In the right rear corner, a bulky armoire housed a narrow closet, dresser drawers, and a small TV with a built-in video player. Completing the ensemble was a small writing desk along the right wall, adorned with several framed photos.
    While Rebecca adjusted the curtains to let more light into the room, I drew my wheelchair up beside the desk to examine the photos. Each showed Rebecca with a tall, athletic man smiling confidently at the camera. I hated him instantly.
    But then I noticed how different Rebecca looked in these photos. Her hair was a lighter blonde, and she wore a lot of makeup, though it was expertly applied. And her smile, wide and toothy, had a forced, almost manic zest that matched her husband’s. Nothing like the quiet little Mona Lisa smiles she occasionally graced me with. I decided I liked her new smile better.
    “That’s Big Bob,” Rebecca said from behind me. “My husband.”
    “He looks... big,” I said, having resumed my normal level of conversational incompetence.
    “He says he’s six foot five,” Rebecca said. “But I think he may only be six three.”
    I gave a neutral nod, not feeling like getting into my “math issues,” as Leon called them.
    Pointing to one of the photos, Rebecca said, “That’s us at an awards banquet that our church has every year. Bob’s very active in