Page 109 of When Lemons Give You Life

Her body tenses into an uneasy smile. “What did you say?”

My poker face, refined like my béchamel, holds steady. She leans in nearer; I give her my best dementia stare—vacant and unfocused. I wait until she’s so close I can smell the packet of cigarettes she’s had for breakfast, then I let rip. “I SAID I KNOW WHAT YOU DID, ALLISON!” I boom in the head chef voice I used when meals were late to the pass.

She scuttles backward out of her chair, shrieking expletives like they’re going out of fashion.

I level my voice. “I know you broke Beau’s viola on purpose. I know about how you cook the books in this place.”

The color drains from her face. “You . . . you can’t know that.”

“I can. Because the fact is, I don’t have dementia. I’ve been faking it.”

She shakes her head, offering a small, patronizing smile. “No. No. That can’t be right. You must just be a bit muddled today. Why don’t you go and tell Roberto all about it?”

“If I were confused, Allison, I wouldn’t have been able to spend the past year constructing a lie detailed enough to pass through your intake system, your care plan reviews, and your cognitive assessments. And the name’s not Greg, it’s Griff.”

That gets her attention. She stares at me, completely, utterly still. Then, without taking her eyes off me, she picks up the phone. “Dr. Owen,” she says, her voice clipped. “Are you still here? I need you to come to my office now, please.” She hangs up and looks at me like I’m an alien, or worse: a competent senior citizen.

The local GP arrives a minute later, cheerful and breezy, until she clocks Allison’s white face. “Everything okay?”

Allison doesn’t move. Just tips her head toward me like I’m Exhibit A. “Griff here. He’s . . . talking. He says he’s been faking it.”

Dr. Owen frowns. “Faking . . . what?”

“Dementia,” I say, looking the doctor straight in the eyes.

She laughs, a little confused puff of sound. “Wait, seriously?”

“Very.”

She glances at Allison, then back at me. “Allison, this is probably just a period of lucidity. You’re a nurse, you know how this disease works.”

I lean closer. “I assure you I’ve been lucid my whole life. I’d be most happy to recall any event over the last year. Perhaps you’d like me to start with the description of the river cruise that you offer your premium paying guests—”

“No! That won’t be necessary at all,” Allison blurts, face reddening. “But we’re going to need this confirmed,” she says, her voice crisp and snappy again, like she’s clinging to procedure out of sheer panic.

The GP stumbles into a chair, eyes wide. “Yes, by a gerontologist and I’d suggest the psychiatrist too.”

“I’ll answer any questions you need me to, doc.”

Allison closes the door. “We need to keep this under wraps until then.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” I say.

“B . . . but if this is in fact true, Griff, why on earth would you pretend to have dementia?” Dr. Owen asks.

“Because my partner, Beau, was here. And it was the only way I could still live with him.”

She brings a hand to her mouth.

“You know how he was when I left after visiting hours, Allison,” I say. “You told me it was normal, that he’d adjust. But he didn’t. He screamed. He sobbed. You sedated him so he’d stop. You called it management. I was the single person who could truly help him.”

Her arms fold across her chest, a flicker of discomfort on her face.

“I know the system is broken. That your hands were tied. There are no viable options for younger couples to live together when just one needs care. If I wasn’t sick, I couldn’t be here. So I got sick.”

Dr. Owen exhales, visibly rattled.

“I’m not proud of it,” I say. “I didn’t enjoy hiding the truth. I did it because I was watching the person I loved most vanish, and the only way I could hold on to him was by disappearing myself.”