I knew it was wrong, and wouldn’t solve anything, but still I couldn’t force myself to open my eyes and greet her. Perhaps it was pride. After all these years, I did not want her to see me this way. I was much like a little child, like Teddy when he was young, thinking that if he put his hand over his eyes I wouldn’t be able to see him. Foolish notion, but somewhere in me there was the thought that I couldn’t let her know how bad off I was—that if she knew she would close up the house, pack Edward and Teddy off to some sort of facility—perhaps even this one—and then return to her life in California. The thought of Teddy in a place like this, languishing with the infirm, unable to enjoy our walks, to feed the fish in the creek and the stray cats, to spend hours in the garden, was unbearable. A change of location would destroy what was left of Edward. The familiarity of the house on Blue Sky Hill Court, the consistency of our routines, was the thread that kept him from slipping off into a place so vast, and dark, and deep that neither of us wanted to consider its bottom.
