Chapter Five - Shop Til You Drop

“I am so sick of superheroes!”

Henry’s friends chuckled while finishing up their lunches. The four teens huddled up at a food court table at the Galleria Mall on a Sunday afternoon within earshot of Neville, who occupied a lonely table, sipping his soup.

“It’s like that’s all you ever hear about anymore. All these movies coming out, all these TV shows – do they think we’re all into that kids stuff? ‘Look at me – I’m flying around in a cape and spandex!’ Big deal!”

 “Have your parents ever told you about Captain Horizon?” one of the teens interjected and others groaned. The name caused Neville to turn his head to better adjust his eavesdropping.

“Aww, man, please don’t start on that. I am so sick of hearing about that guy. Don’t you think it was just a media creation or something? Seriously, if there was this superhero who bit the dust long before any of us ever got here, why aren’t there any more?”

“And what kind of superhero just dies, anyway?” another responded. “Must not have been a very good one.”

Two the teens smacked hands while Neville smiled, turning his direction back toward the larger collection of tables. He saw a few of his fellow residents scattered around the food court, one or two still standing in lines trying to decide on what to eat for lunch.

Neville’s appearance at the mall was odd, to say the least. Normally, an excursion into the retail abyss  would rank last on his list of activities, even behind acupuncture and urinary catheterization. He preferred the privacy the home afforded and despised encounters with up-and-coming generations of disrespectful hooligans.

Nearly two hours earlier, as she has done a few times in the past, Carol knocked on the door prior to departure and, as usual, Neville refused the invitation.

“Well, hello, Mr. Ramsey,” Carol said cheerfully. “How are you doing?”

Neville cut eyes her way, took a deep breath and began.

“I suppose there could be worse things than a roommate like Mr. Cleary but I can’t think of any offhand,” he said. “I can’t even tie my own shoes and he’s asked me to drop and do pushups at least four times. He also does a pretty good impression of a frightened little boy when the lights were dimmed and he then asked me for the next twenty-some-odd minutes to come look under his bed for a monster.”

She froze her face to prevent a smile, while at the same time surprised at the amount of conversation.

“I know there’s a room that’s open – move him in there and out of my way!”

She couldn’t do it, not only for the reason she’d give but for a reason she wouldn’t give - Eunice was coming.

“Mr. Cleary isn’t in his right frame of mind, as you’ve discovered,” she said. “I moved him in with you so you can help keep an eye on him. He doesn’t need to be a private room.”

His blood pressure began to rise so he diverted his attention toward the television.

“There’s a group headed to the mall in a bit. The van will be out front if you’d like to go.”

He didn’t respond, still seething from the rejection of his request. Clenching his dentures, he stared at the television newscast, until the door shut behind her. The newscaster continued a discussion on Middle East foreign policy, but Neville’s eyes were glazed over, instead mentally scrapping with himself and weighing his options.

The bathroom door opened and Duncan emerged, dripping water from head to toe, soaking the floor beneath him. Without even so much as a towel, he stood completely nude, like a child escaping from a tub before the bath was over.

“I can’t find my underwear,” he remarked, still dripping all over the floor. “Do you know where Mom put it?”

It was precisely at this moment when a trip to the Gallery Mall seemed unusually attractive. Doing his best to completely ignore his exposed roommate, Neville gathered a few things, tucked in his shirt and made his way to the front lobby.

Several of his fellow residents were startled to see him boarding the van but none were quite as surprised at Carol, who also discovered an unusual feeling of pride. Perhaps her cajoling was paying off. Sure, it wasn’t a complete transformation but it was indeed progress.

Around a dozen or so residents made the outing. It was the type of activity that some managers relegated solely to other staff but Carol enjoyed seeing the residents reconnect with the outside world. It was refreshing to see them in normal surroundings. And she also really enjoyed smoothies.

Many had come to walk but a few had just come to sit and shop. While the group exited the van, Carol noticed Neville staring at her knapsack.

“No, it’s not a purse,” she said, knowing he wouldn’t ask. “I carry a few first aid items in here – bandages, medicine, even a portable oxygen tank if anyone gets winded. I’ve learned my lessons about that. I’ll tell you like I tell all the others – if you’re going to walk, don’t overdo it, especially with your bad leg.”

He wouldn’t dream of it. He was just hoping for a little peace and quiet away from the home and perhaps a quick visit to the bookstore. During his lunch, he deliberately sat as far away from the others as possible and still the annoying bubbly Clara and her friend Beatrice eventually landed nearby.

The two ladies carried on their conversation despite the obnoxiously loud teenagers Neville had eavesdropped on … until one of the youths lit a cigarette and began blowing smoke. Under hushed whispers, Clara asked her friend, “Is smoking allowed in the mall? I didn’t think so.”

Combating the smoke, Clara’s friend waved her napkin in front of her face. She tried to keep from coughing but the smoke was choking her a bit. Neville noticed this and brushed it off to theatrics.

Henry, the smoker, noticed it, too, and stood up from his chair. His shirt, advertising the latest industrial rock rage, was complemented by his multiple tattoos and piercings, framing him as a perfect contrast with the two matronly ladies finishing their meal. He stopped at their table, holding his cigarette. They looked up at him, smiling.

The encounter was being carefully studied both by Neville and Henry’s friends. The teens elbowed each other, giggling and commenting his conduct while Neville was curiously left with mixed emotions on who to root for. He strongly despised Clara’s sunshiney demeanor, but at the same time, he shared that intense disdain with uncultured modern teenagers.

After inhaling, Henry bent down and blew smoke in the middle of the two women before walking back to his table. His friends erupted in laughter and Neville’s eyes got wider. As Clara and Beatrice coughed and teared up, Henry suddenly noticed the scrawny old man staring at him.

“Hey, what are you looking at, old timer? You want a puff, too?”

Henry looked at his friends and smiled, taking another puff. He had gone too far to turn back now. He motioned for them to get up and leave the table. As he walked by Neville’s table, he kicked the old man’s cane across the floor and flicked what was left of his cigarette in the soup bowl.

Now Neville suddenly remembered why he never came to the mall anymore. He sat for a moment, stunned and humiliated, a prisoner within a shell of a body that couldn’t respond to such attacks. He wallowed in the pity of what could have been and what once was. Adding insult to injury, he noticed Clara walking to his table with his cane.

She smiled warmly, handed him his cane and said, “thank you!”

Could this day get any worse? 

An hour later, the group of elderly residents gathered at tables near the door, ready for a return to the home. Smoothie in hand, Carol counted heads and laughed with Bill, who had bought a new pack of candy to share with those who stayed behind.

Sitting in a chair near the group who waited on stragglers, Neville clutched his cane and hoped to go back and pretend this outing never happened. He grimaced when he observed Clara and Beatrice giving their dramatic presentations of what had unfolded earlier.

Beyond Carol, Neville noticed the young punk, Henry, and one of his friends standing on the outside of the entry, talking on a cell phone. He assumed the group had been confronted about smoking indoors and were now taking their cigarette break outside.  Or maybe they were seeking more elderly victims to harass.

A moment later, the final resident arrived and the group began its journey to the van.  As some of the residents exited the doors, Carol suddenly remembered she’d left her bag sitting in one of the chairs during the long wait. Caught between helping those to the van and the knapsack, she stood in the door and called to Neville, who was intentionally dragging behind.

“Mr. Ramsey, can you bring my bag?”

In true fashion, he glared, and yet still turned around to pick it up. With the knapsack on his shoulder, he turned to once again notice the troublemakers outside the doors.  Clara poked Carol’s arm, identifying Henry, who was still on his cell phone. He noticed Carol’s gaze and in turn made an obscene gesture. His friend giggled.

The two teens thought the entire group had all filed out of the mall when they were surprised to see Neville exiting by himself. Henry’s friend noticed a stack of bills in the old man’s right hand, which Neville began tucking into the knapsack, purposefully ignoring the duo. Henry’s friend whispered into his ear.  

As he stepped off the curb, Neville was suddenly pushed to the asphalt and the knapsack yanked from his arm. From across the parking lot, some of the residents saw it, alerting Carol, who was helping them into the vehicle.  She ran toward Neville, yelling at the two young men who were running to a car. Within seconds, the teens’ car had started and skidded out of the parking lot.

For the second time in a week, Carol saw Neville sprawled on the ground, except this time the fall occurred with extreme force. She bent over, pulling tissues from her purse to wipe blood from new wounds. Neville’s body throbbed in pain but he held his composure as much as possible. He was once again experiencing agonizing pain, this time even more compounded with helplessness. As recently as ten years ago, he imagined, he’d be able to take the teens in hand to hand combat. As he laid face down on the pavement, that time was clearly in the past.

In a normal healthy body, when one appendage fails, other limbs become stronger, as they pick up the slack. In Neville’s fragile state, he had exhausted every ounce of energy from his body, so he instead relied on his sharper-than-ever intellect that had been driven to madness with hatred. To him, it was a gift that had helped him outlive many adversaries regardless of age.

His newest victims were no different. From the moment the two teens grabbed the knapsack, they unknowingly had only minutes to live. Less than two miles away, barreling down the interstate, the oxygen escaping from the broken nozzle on the mini-tank would ignite with the open flame on the end of Henry’s cigarette, causing an explosion heard even on the other side of the median.  

Once again riddled with pain and stickered with bandages, Neville was propped against the window on the van ride home. When he spotted the fruits of his labor, a big black cloud of smoke erupting from a hollowed-out sedan, he decided that It really wasn’t such a bad day after all.