And You Can't Make Them Stay
Hondo was taking longer than usual, which gave Rarity time to wander around the reception area. There was a square of sofa chairs arranged in one corner and an indoor fountain surrounded by bushy, long-leaved plants in the other. In the fountain, coins glistened like fish scales with each ray of the morning sun. There were a lot of coins. More than Rarity thought any resident would part with, which made her think visitors were the ones tossing them into the water.
“Do they?” she asked the receptionist who was typing at the computer.
The receptionist looked up. Rarity clarified her question, and the receptionist shrugged. “I guess they do. We used to prohibit it, because we were afraid the patients would try and take them. But then the visitors kept insisting on it.” She shrugged again. “It was before I started working here, I’m told.”
“Maybe they’re wishing for good luck,” Rarity said, tapping her chin. “Or fortune. Or change.”
“Maybe. I’ve always found that kind of odd, though, tossing coins into a fountain for that. How’s a fountain going to change things?” Rarity smiled, but she thought this receptionist was a bit too tightly wound for this place.
She returned to the fountain, observing the coins. Their metal branding reminded her of the ring held between her thumb and forefinger. It was an old ring. There’d once been writing engraved across the outer edge, but time and much rubbing had eroded it away, long before Rarity had come into possession of it.
The elevator dinged. Rarity slipped the ring off and put it in her purse. She endeavored to put all thoughts of it away as well, at least for the moment.
A nurse with pink hair exited, pushing Hondo on his wheelchair. He wore a navy floral shirt with white, yellow, and light-blue petals. It appeared pressed for the occasion. Age and too much sunlight had paled it.
Both smiled when they saw Rarity. “I hope you weren’t waiting long, Rarity,” the nurse said.
Rarity offered her own smile, shaking her head. “Not at all, Redheart. Allow me.”
She easily took over Redheart’s position, and Hondo lifted a frail hand to graze hers. “Thank you,” he said. “But you really don’t need to waste your time with me. I wouldn’t want to interrupt whatever you’d rather be doing.”
Rarity clicked her tongue. “None of that talk, now. This is exactly what I want to be doing.”
Outside, the path leading away from the double doors was coated with dry, multicolored leaves. Redheart came with them. They all made their way to Rarity’s car. “Front or back?” Redheart asked Hondo.
He didn’t answer at first. He looked at Rarity, his hand still atop hers. She gave him a warm smile. “Either’s fine.”
“I’ll take the front,” he said.
They helped him into the front seat, Rarity positioning herself in the driver’s to firmly pull him up while Redheart hoisted one foot at a time over the floor mat. Hondo grunted, but did not complain, even as his forehead leaked sweat. His shirt dangled limply from his shoulders. He seemed stronger this time around, stronger than he’d been last week, and when Rarity glanced at Redheart, she saw that the same thought had occurred to her.
Redheart folded the wheelchair and put it in the backseat. She waved goodbye to Hondo, then walked around the car to Rarity’s side and said, “He took his medicine and he has a clear schedule for today, so there’s no need to rush back. But if anything changes—”
“I know. Thank you.”
Redheart’s gaze turned downward for a moment, landing on Rarity’s hands on the steering wheel. It didn’t look like a deliberate action, but Rarity still tried to look nonchalant. “Is it just you today?” Redheart asked.
Rarity nodded. Her hands tightened around the wheel.
Then Redheart stepped back, a hand offering a farewell. “Could I trouble you to keep the window down?” Hondo asked Rarity. Her fingers relaxed at the change in focus.
Ten minutes later, the window remained down, the autumnal breeze gently whipping Hondo’s brown mustache back with the gentleness of a schoolyard lover. It was shorter these days, less impressive, less stately. Still, he’d been proud of it, and while in the past, Rarity had found it a bit unseemly, over time she’d started to appreciate it, such that now, she found herself missing it.
The turn was not her own doing. She had Applejack to thank for that.
Rarity drove them through a road surrounded by sighing oak trees, the orange leaves falling around them. She had the radio on low, to some station that was just barely playing a song. A glance to her right told her that Hondo had closed his eyes, but it was unclear if he was asleep or listening. When he was like this in the car, he slept differently than when he was in bed. She had an urge to pull over and place a hand on his cheek, and then his forehead, like she was checking to see if he had a fever—just how he used to act when she became sick—but the urge passed with the leaves.
Soon they entered town. The lush forest faded and the noisy streets rudely announced themselves via screeching tires and abrasive horn honks. Hondo awoke with a start, his blue eyes momentarily roaming and wild. He reached up, found the seat belt wrapped over his torso, and ran his hand over it as though confused by its function.
They were at a red light, then. Rarity reached over and touched his shoulder. “It’s okay,” she said, “you’re okay.” It was a smooth phrase, practiced to the point where she could believe it. She smiled, massaging a thumb across the bone.
Hondo turned to look at her hand, then at her, and then unfolded his body with a sigh and a smile. The green light fell upon his face, and Rarity resumed the drive.
Their first stop was a small corner bakery. It was nowhere near as flashy or popular as Sugarcube Corner, but that was the reason Rarity had chosen it. She could count on not seeing anyone she knew here.
She parked the car and helped Hondo get back into his wheelchair, and together they wheeled up the sidewalk to the entrance. The smell of freshly baked goods greeted them with a whiff of nostalgia. In a flash, she remembered high school, then college, then life after. Then life after even that. She remembered the mornings waking up in their new home to the smell of a fresh breakfast, and the way the light would be caught in the flush of wheat-golden hair that fell gracefully across toned shoulders, the way it’d hold still, like the light wanted, as she stepped down the stairs, for her to pay attention, to keep this moment until it became a memory.
There were other moments like that. But there were others that were more painful, filled with shouting and regrets. These were less clear, but were just as striking, if not more so, and they always came to her in apparent contrast to the happier ones. Rarity closed her eyes against them all, then opened them to return to the bakery.
After they’d ordered, they stood in the corner of the shop. While they waited, Rarity observed Hondo. He sat dutifully, his hands folded in his lap, his face barely twitching as he examined the café. He looked completely at ease, and Rarity found herself thinking she should take a picture—not necessarily because it’d be a good shot, but because later, she knew, the reminder might be necessary. It could be something she could pull out in those late-night hours when Hondo would be whimpering pitifully in his sleep, or when he awoke with a violent start and grabbed at phantoms only he could see, crying about old nightmares he hadn’t had since he was a child. In such moments, Rarity would need to be reminded that, on occasion, there was peace.
But she did not take out her phone. She did not take a picture. She looked for a long while, and then made herself look away.
They got their orders and returned quietly to the car, Hondo getting into his seat much easier this time. Rarity drove on, taking a right and beginning to exit the busy part of town.
Rarity drove over a road that, midway, transformed into a bumpier one, but Hondo, holding his bag of pastries, was unbothered. Eventually the road smoothed over one more time and they were now driving past another wooded area, one with graying sycamores swaying on the banks of a great lake. Rarity spotted a few faces walking up and down the sidewalk. Some were familiar, but she was driving too quickly to be recognized.
She turned into another parking lot. Getting out, keeping her drink close to her, she unfolded the wheelchair. Hondo did not need her help, though; he slid easily into it, the only sign of exertion being a quick exhalation of breath. At two in the afternoon, the sky was as clear as a summer’s day, and the sun beamed down onto Hondo, lighting his skin and rejuvenating every line, every wrinkle, every crevasse, exposing his crow’s feet, illuminating how his profile must have been forty or so years ago.
She pointed this out to him. “Goodness. The sun really is doing you some good.”
Hondo winked. “You’re bound to make an old man blush.”
They walked along the path. They passed under the branches, and Hondo, from time to time, would point out a bird or a squirrel to her, and he could tell her what species they were and why they sounded the way they did. They passed joggers and bikers and other old men and women who wore matching tracksuits and tennis shoes. On the other side of the lake was a person fishing, and Hondo pointed to him and laughed like a boy. “Think he knows you can’t catch anything here but baby guppies?”
Eventually, they came to a stop on a dirt bank facing the water. There was a wooden bench covered and surrounded by leaves. The lake curved and bent around other banks, and in the distance sat a small island with a single tree growing out of it, and a large boulder keeping it company.
Rarity placed Hondo next to the bench. Then she cleared the bench of leaves and sat down. They were both watching the lake. The breeze sculpted gentle waves that disrupted the water’s surface, and as the sun beamed down on it, the light took on white, slightly elongated circular shapes, reminding Rarity of the coins in the fountain. Only here, nobody had thrown them into the water but the sun itself.
Hondo opened his paper bag and retrieved what he’d gotten from the bakery: two puffy buttered croissants.
He offered one to Rarity, and she took it gratefully. She bit into the pastry. It was still warm, still soft, melting in her mouth. She let out a sigh. “Oh, you have made an absolutely marvelous choice, if I do say so myself.” Hondo looked pleased.
They sat for a time, eating and, in Rarity’s case, sipping her latte. As they ate, Hondo began to talk. “You know, this place reminds me of a wedding I went to.”
Rarity was still.
Hondo nodded. “One of those countryside weddings, where the venue took place in an outdoor area. There wasn’t a lake per se, but there was an orchard to the south, and you could see the entirety of that season’s harvest from the hill that the ceremony took place on. It was incredible; I’d never seen so many trees, so many signs of life. You know,” he laughed, “there was a time in my life where I seriously thought about becoming a farmer. Can you imagine that?”
“I can,” Rarity murmured from behind her cup. “It’s a terribly romantic notion.”
He didn’t appear to hear her. “It was a beautiful occasion. Made even more so by the clothes the bridesmaids and groomsmen were wearing. The bride designed them herself, I think.” He smiled at the lake, and kept chattering.
Rarity wasn’t listening fully. She closed her eyes. She finished her cup, lowered it, and looked at the lake as well. There, in the distance, the tree stood, and its leaves fanned out like a bridal veil. The rock may as well have been a lonely altar.
Hondo was still talking. “... and my darling Cookie said, ‘Why didn’t we do this for our wedding?’ And I told her that she had a whole list of requirements to fulfill before we even talked about it. Firstly there was the fact that she wanted us to date for ten years, at minimum, which was fine. But then second there was the fact that she wanted a sign that this would be a good idea. So she suggested a little after our tenth anniversary that we go down to Las Pegasus for some fun. She felt she was on a lucky streak and told me that if she won it big, it was the go-ahead sign we both were looking for. And then she did! And that’s where we got our rings. A little pawn shop just outside of the casino, and we immediately spent our winnings there. I never told my daughters that part; they already thought Las Pegasus was a romantic enough place for a proposal. If they knew that it happened almost on a whim, well…” He chuckled. “There are some things, I imagine, that my daughters simply cannot tolerate from me. But that’s all right.”
“It is,” Rarity mumbled. “Besides, it’s not the place. It’s the rings that matter, yes?”
“Why, yes!” His eyes brightened. “And they were special. We got matching engravings. They read…”
Hondo had lifted his hand up to inspect the ring, but his voice faltered when he saw his bare fingers. He gazed at them with visible confusion, his mustache twitching errantly. He flipped his hand around as though thinking he might find the ring hiding somewhere between the thin ligaments and aging liver spots.
Rarity said, “To memories, old and new, to share forever between us two.”
Hondo nodded slowly. “Yes… Yes, that’s exactly right. How on earth did you…”
He looked at her. His smile was that of an embarrassed child’s smile. “Ah... I’ve told you this before, haven’t I? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to bore you with the same old story.” He shrugged, then returned to looking at the lake. He seemed smaller now. Diminished. The light would not bring him back.
She gazed down at his hands folded in his lap. What did that matter, she wanted to say. Tell her another story, why don’t you. Tell her all the stories you have. What did it matter if she’d heard them all before? You could not take them with you. You had to give the stories up sometime.
Her hands clutched her purse so tight that her pale skin turned even paler. Shakily, she unclasped it, the mouth partially opening. From inside, the ring gleamed dangerously, and her hand fell upon it. It seemed so much colder than before. She felt an immense urge to take it out and give it back to him; she could imagine the act, the sheer simplicity it would entail. Should she do it now? Was it the proper time? He was rather lucid—was that a sign?
She closed her hand around it.
A shadow fell over them. Rarity glanced up. It was a cloud.
When Rarity looked back at him, Hondo was frowning slightly. Tension rose in Rarity’s shoulders, but she forced herself to remain outwardly calm.
Hondo looked at his hands, wrung them out, then clutched at his shirt, pulling the bottom out to examine the stripes. Rarity withdrew her hand and slowly stood, her breath and voice caught in her chest. Hondo’s chin wobbled, and he looked around, as though seeing the lake for the first time. Then he looked at Rarity, and his eyes were wide and confused.
“Miss?” he asked. “Who… Do I know you?”
Rarity attempted a smile. She stood, ignoring the shakiness in her legs as she walked around to face his front. She knelt slightly, still holding her purse partially open. “You do. Of course you do. It’s me. It’s Rarity.”
His face barely moved. His lip trembled. For a moment, she thought that it was trembling with her name, but in the next, he said nothing, and a vacant bewilderment settled over him.
Then he leaned forward. His head landed on her chest, his arms folding around her. His breath wetted her blouse. She would have felt embarrassed, would have worried what this would look like to others—this old man and this pretty young lady, the way he fell against her without modesty—had she not also registered that a gentle keening was coming from him. A sob. A child’s confused and scared sob.
Hondo didn’t say anything. He did not ask for anything more than this touch. Rarity, finally recovering, reached around to rub his back, whispering comforting nothings to him, words that would soon be lost, until they were not words at all, but mere sounds without meaning.
Then Hondo settled back into his wheelchair. His blue eyes were red and the eyelids puffy. He was no less bewildered-looking, regarding Rarity with cautious timidity. Her heart froze in her chest; her skin prickled; her voice clutched a word in her throat and would not release it.
But she put on a smile again. She reached back into her purse, felt the ring one more time, then dug out a few napkins and handed them to him. He wiped his face dutifully.
He didn’t look into the purse. She shut it, her hands shaking.
Then she said, “It’s time to go.”
“Is it already?” he mumbled, but did not put up much more of a fuss.
They returned to the car, and Hondo had a considerably harder time getting back into his seat. When he did, he struggled with the seatbelt, and Rarity had to help him. “The window,” he said, and at first Rarity thought he was asking her to keep it open. Instead, he pressed the button, and the window rolled up. On its surface, Rarity could see Hondo’s reflection, the deep, downward V of his eyebrows painfully obvious as he struggled to make out his face.
The drive back was quiet. Rarity even turned up the radio, but neither of them were listening. Hondo was in his seat, and Rarity wished she could offer him—something. But what was left? What was left to give but herself, and even that did not seem sufficient? She used to have more. Used to, used to.
At the home, Redheart was waiting. She smiled at the two of them before helping unfold the wheelchair and assisting Hondo. “Did you enjoy yourself?” Redheart asked him.
He might have nodded. He might also have been jostled by the slight bump the uneven grooves in the sidewalk made in the lead up to the entrance. Rarity didn’t know, and she didn’t want to ask again.
She followed them, her hands clasped in front of her skirt. Her blouse was still damp from where Hondo had cried.
When they were inside, Redheart asked, “I’m assuming you’ll be here again next week?”
Rarity nodded. It was suddenly a lot easier than speaking. Redheart took hold of the handlebars to the wheelchair. “I’m sure you’re tired, Mr. Hondo, so we’ll bring you back to your room and you can settle yourself down for a nap. Doesn’t that sound nice?”
He answered, but Rarity didn’t quite hear him. She waited by the entrance as Hondo and Redheart entered the elevator, watching until the doors closed.
Her eyes fell onto the receptionist’s desk. The receptionist was busy writing something down on a piece of paper. Amazing, Rarity thought. Amazing how a set of papers could mean the end of a life, of a promise, of memories. Of the future. The papers that had taken hers weren’t even a week old. Knowing her, she’d probably left them on the table where they were served, forgotten while she focused on Hondo and today—and there they would likely remain, into next week, and the next, and the next.
She turned, intending to walk out, but stopped. She looked at the fountain and the coins. She looked for the one she’d tossed months ago, when she first brought Hondo here, but now the coins all looked generally the same. It was impossible to tell which ones had been wasted on a wish and which had yet to take up one.
She reached into her purse and pulled out the ring, pinching it between her thumb and forefinger. She thought about tossing it into the water. There wasn’t much point in holding onto it. It no longer had much use, except as a reminder of what once was. But what would she wish for, if she did?
All she ended up doing was twirl it a few times. She thought about the night Hondo had given it to her, when she was thinking of how to propose, and with what. “You’ll make better use of this than me,” he had said. Hollow words. If he had known how things would end, would he have said the same thing?
She thought about the papers again. The way they had crumpled in her hands. The silence of the kitchen. The silent tears that ran down her face as she read and reread: “Divorce Settlement.” Applejack slipping the ring off and placing it on the table. It had made no sound, but somehow Rarity could imagine it falling like a hammer. Applejack’s face was forever blurred in her mind, because she could never bring herself to look at it. Was she upset? Relieved? Was Rarity? Did it matter to know?
More memories. Applejack’s footsteps fading into distant thuds. The closing of the door. The light falling away. The smell of the orchard being the last thing to leave. Holding herself against the fountain, Rarity twirled the ring. Its surface had smoothed over, but she could still feel where the inscription had been engraved. She tried to make it catch the light. Once, twice, a dozen times.
It would not.
