Her squinty eyes are growing furry. Her face suspicious, with salmon lips pursed like crinkled wax paper. There’s a sustained wobble when she stands. At ninety-two she’s an orb behind the wheel, bobbing just below the surface. Chugging along to church in the morning. Dinner in the afternoon. Middle of the night awake, balancing across the floor of her ship, heaving sideways towards the lifebuoys, a table, or the back of a chair. Fighting to keep her vessel upright.

She’s the grocery cart walker.  Loading soft food with a hard, frozen scowl. Skinny, knobby legs.  Bright colors shuffling down fluorescent aisles, pushing forward and dragging behind. Flaccid skin gaunt on brittle bone. Less bathing. Less hair to comb. Back home again alone, buried in steam and dusty moths.

No more escapes. She’s fallen down too many slippery exits. Now Florence and the church crew come daily, in the front and out the back, like carpenter ants. They’ve taken over Willa Mae. The car is off limits. Stairs are off limits. Her house is dark with windows covered thick in cobwebbed canvas and weathered grime.  She sleeps long and deep. She barely moves.

Hoards of helping hands reach in. Cooking meals. Checking. Tucking. Fidgeting with the Innkeeper.  Watching watches and accounts. Long days drag into thoughtless moments and mistakes. The old stove’s flameless burner percolates. The guage is broken. The valve left open, hissing lethal and stealthy. Innocent and unaware, it fills the room. It fills the rooms.

Buster pads by on a long leash and whimpers worried.  Neighbors gather in whispers at the front gate. A fire truck looms large as sirens unwind. Head back and eyes closed, lying on a yellow cot in a massive haloed cloud, the firemen bring her down.