I walked in to find the caregiver from my church holding my mother’s hand, sweetly cooing as she forced her to sign a paper that would give her everything.
She was supposed to be a saint, a blessing recommended by our own pastor to help with my mother’s dementia.
But since she arrived, my mother’s prized possessions started vanishing, and Mom grew more scared and agitated by the day.
When I confronted her, she just gave me a look full of pity. She told me I was stressed and that my mother’s failing memory was the real problem, using the disease as the perfect shield for her theft.
Her grand plan for a final score hinged on one last signature from an “independent” notary she chose herself, but she had no idea that I’d called that notary—my old college roommate—an hour ago to help me set the perfect trap.
A Saint in the House: The Phone Call I Dreaded
The phone buzzed against the surface of my drafting table, a furious, insistent vibration that cut right through the delicate lines of the corporate logo I was designing. I ignored it. Deadlines didn’t care about interruptions.
It buzzed again. This time, I glanced at the screen. NEIGHBOR – MARY ANNE. My stomach turned to ice. Mary Anne never called unless it was about Mom.
“Sarah, honey,” she said, her voice tight with a practiced calm that did nothing to soothe me. “Eleanor is over here on my porch. She’s looking for her cat.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, pressing the bridge of my nose. “Mary Anne, she hasn’t had a cat in twenty years. Patches died when I was in college.”
“I know, sweetie. She’s fine, just a little confused. But it’s getting chilly out.”
The half-finished logo on my screen seemed to mock me. I was a freelance graphic designer. My job was to create clean, simple, trustworthy images for other people. My own life felt like a chaotic mess of overlapping, bleeding colors. I thanked Mary Anne, promised I was on my way, and hung up.
I called my husband, Mark. “It happened again,” I said, no preamble needed.
“Is she okay?” he asked, the sound of keyboard clicks in the background. He was an engineer. His world was one of definitive problems and concrete solutions. My mother was a variable he couldn’t solve for.
“She’s fine. Mary Anne has her. But Mark, I can’t keep doing this. I have the Henderson project due Friday. I can’t just drop everything and run over there three times a week.” My voice cracked. I hated the sound of it, thin and frayed.
“I know,” he said softly. “We knew this was coming, Sar. Maybe it’s time.”
We’d been avoiding the conversation, but the word hung in the air between us: caregiver. The thought of a stranger in my mother’s house, touching her things, felt like a violation. But the image of my mother, alone and confused on a neighbor’s porch in the cooling autumn air, was worse.
“I’ll call the church,” I said, the words tasting like surrender. “Pastor Dave said he knew someone.”
The Answer to a Prayer
Carol Peterson arrived two days later, smelling faintly of lavender soap and quiet competence. She wasn’t what I expected. She was my age, maybe a few years older, with kind, crinkling eyes and a smile that seemed permanently etched on her face. She carried a Bible in her oversized purse, but not in a showy way. It just seemed like a natural extension of her, like a wallet or keys.
“The Lord puts us where we’re needed,” she said, shaking my hand. Her grip was firm, reassuring.
She walked into my mother’s house and didn’t flinch at the clutter—the stacks of old National Geographics, the collection of ceramic birds gathering dust on the mantel. My mother’s home, once so pristine, had become a museum of her own forgetting. Carol just smiled.
“Eleanor,” she said, her voice a gentle melody. “I’m Carol. I’ve heard so much about your beautiful garden.”
My mother, who had been agitated and suspicious all morning, seemed to unfurl. “It used to be,” she mumbled, looking down at her hands. “The roses…”
“We can look at them together,” Carol said, and just like that, the tension in the room dissolved.
For the first time in months, I felt a wave of profound relief wash over me, so potent it was dizzying. I could go back to my office. I could meet my deadline. I could have a conversation with my husband that wasn’t about the latest crisis. A tiny, sharp seed of guilt pricked at me—I was outsourcing my daughterly duty. But the relief was bigger than the guilt. It had to be.
Carol was a miracle. She organized Mom’s medication into little labeled boxes. She learned Mom liked her toast burnt just a little. She hummed old hymns while she tidied, and the house began to feel less like a place of anxiety and more like a home again. I could breathe. She was the answer to a prayer I hadn’t even realized I’d been screaming.
The Empty Velvet Slot
A few weeks into the new routine, I stopped by after a meeting to take Mom to a church social. The house was immaculate. Carol was helping Mom with her coat, a scene of such peaceful domesticity it felt like a painting.
“We should wear your pretty ring, Mom,” I said, heading for the antique jewelry box on her dresser. It was a family heirloom, a deep green emerald flanked by two small diamonds, a gift from my father on their twenty-fifth anniversary. It was the one thing she never took off, until her fingers got too swollen.
I opened the heavy lid of the box. The familiar scent of cedar and old velvet filled the air. I reached for the ring’s designated slot.
It was empty.
A cold dread trickled down my spine. “Mom, where’s the emerald ring?”
Her face clouded over instantly. The placid look was gone, replaced by a darting, anxious fear. “The nice lady,” she whispered, not looking at Carol. “She put it away. For safety.”
I turned to Carol. Her expression was a perfect mask of gentle concern. “Oh, dear. We looked for that earlier, didn’t we, Eleanor? She couldn’t remember where she put it.”
Carol turned her sympathetic gaze to me. “Sarah, this is very common. They start to ‘squirrel’ things away in safe places and then can’t remember where. It’s a self-preservation instinct. It’s a sign the disease is progressing, I’m afraid.”
Her explanation was so plausible, so textbook. It was exactly what all the brochures said. It made perfect sense. And yet.
“She said you put it away,” I said, my voice flatter than I intended.
Carol’s smile became a little pained, a little pitying. “I know she did. Her reality gets… jumbled. Don’t you worry. We’ll turn the house upside down together. It will turn up.”
I wanted to believe her. I needed to believe her. The alternative was an abyss I wasn’t prepared to look into. So I nodded, forced a smile, and helped my mother with her coat, my hand brushing against her bare, wrinkled ring finger.
A Whisper in the Dark
That night, my son Leo was at a sleepover and Mark was working late. The silence in my own house was a welcome change. I submitted the Henderson project, the “send” button offering a small, satisfying click of finality. But the relief didn’t last. My mind kept drifting back to the empty slot in the jewelry box.
I drove over to my mom’s. I let myself in with my key. The house was dark and still. Carol’s shift had ended hours ago. I found my mom not in bed, but sitting in her armchair in the living room, staring at the darkened hallway that led to her bedroom.
“Mom?” I whispered. “You okay?”
She didn’t seem startled. She just looked at me, her eyes lucid for a moment in the dim light from the streetlamp outside. “She has smiling eyes,” she said, her voice a dry rasp. “But her hands are hungry.”
My heart did a slow, painful turn in my chest. It was just the dementia talking, creating paranoid fantasies. That’s what the books said. That’s what Carol would say.
“Let’s get you to bed,” I said softly, helping her up.
About the Author
