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Hard Luck Woman

October 2022.

Cyrus marveled at his handiwork. Another lawn was neatly mowed, with a perfect diamond pattern of crisscrossed cut lines through it, and bushes trimmed up. The fall air was mild, and a cool breeze helped cool the big blonde wolf with fire red hair. His cutoff t-shirt that bore his landscaping business name was soaked in sweat, as was his boonie hat atop his head. The afternoon sun was hidden behind a clutch of golden Ginkgo trees, the sky a deep blue with patchy white and gray clouds. Cyrus glanced over to see his eighteen year old nephew Freddy tying up the last trash bag filled with trimmings that were raked up. Hopping back on his mower, the buff tattooed up wolf fired the engine up and engaged the shifter to drive it back to his truck. He turned around and drove up the metal ramps sitting on the tailgate of his white Sierra dually. The truck bucked to the weight as he drove into the bed and parked. Cyrus hopped down and stowed the ramps away, as Freddy loaded the bed up with the bags of leaf litter. He slammed the tailgate closed and walked over to grab his clipboard from the cab of his crew cab 3500HD.

Standing at six foot two, Cyrus Filton was the leader of his family landscaping business, "Filton's Finest Landscaping Company". A former wrestler in high school, Cyrus still looked it at age thirty-four. His frame was beefy and strong, adorned in yellow blonde and tan fur. Cheerful bright blue eyes peered out through his polarized sunglasses that took on a rainbow tint. Both his arms were ripped and adorned in black and gray sleeves that ran from his shoulders to his wrists. Parts of his chest tattoo poked out from his soaked shirt collar. He had long red hair that was tied into a Viking inspired, braided ponytail, to reflect his Anglo-Irish and Norwegian roots. It was neatly braided and fell to his mid-back, his brilliant red hair dampened by sweat. His muzzle bore the same fire red hair, trimmed into a thick red chinstrap beard and goatee. The top of his head was protected by a dark blue boonie hat. Glistening in the sunlight were his lip piercings, two silver snakebite piercings on his lower lip.

Filling out his paperwork, Cyrus signed the invoice and walked over to turn it into his customer, a regular he personally took care of. "Good work, Freddo!" Cyrus greeted as he walked by his nephew, who looked like a slender clone of Cyrus, but with a shorter ponytail of thick brown hair that poked out from the back of his baseball hat.

Going to the front door, Cyrus gave it a friendly knock. With a few seconds, little old Mrs. Johnson appeared. An elderly wolfess in her late seventies, she handed Cyrus thirty dollars and he gave her a copy of the invoice. They took a moment to talk, a cordial conversation about what was new in their lives. Mrs. Johnson always reminded Cyrus of his grandmother, the mercurial Norma Filton. Saying goodbye, Cyrus waved and walked back to hop into his truck with Freddy. He fired the big Duramax up, popped it into drive, and the mid-2000's Sierra took off for home in Hanover.

"Another job well done!" Cyrus said to his nephew, who handed him a bottle of Gatorade. Cyrus twisted the cap off and took a deep swig while he drove.

"I like her." Freddy remarked. "She's a lot nicer than the fucking bitch from the last house."

"I think we're gonna tell her to find herself another landscaper..." Cyrus grimaced.

Departing Newark, Cyrus took the on-ramp to hop onto Route 16. Putting his boot into the accelerator, he got his heavily loaded 3500HD to merge in with the flow of traffic. The turbodiesel burbled under the hood as he engaged the cruise control and settled down for the twenty minute drive back home. Downtown Newark passed by on the expressway. Cyrus and Freddy listened to some music and conversed to pass the time.

With Newark just starting to thin out past the former Longaberger basket, Cyrus noticed traffic starting to build up, with cars merging around a very slow car in the distance. Cyrus had to apply the brakes and he slowed up, watching his speed go from sixty-five, down to fifty, and soon, a crawling thirty miles per hour. People honked horns in frustration while they crawled at such a ridiculous speed. Freddy and Cyrus just looked at each other briefly.

"Grandpa Taters taking forever." Freddy smirked with his usual sarcasm.

Seeing an opening, Cyrus floored it and began accelerating past the line. As he came up to the car causing the huge slow up, Cyrus saw that it was a mid nineties Buick Skylark, a silver sedan, driven by a fail little old woman. Cyrus realized that it was his eighty-four year old grandma, Norma, slowly making her way home in a rare moment of driving out of town.

"What the fuck is Grandma Norma doing out here?" Freddy asked Cyrus as he peered into the tow mirror at her car slipping away from them.

"Yeah, what is Grandma doing on the highway? This is not like her..." Cyrus fumbled his brow.

"What the hell~" Freddy remarked. "Didn't we tell her about this before?"

"Grandma's gonna do what Grandma is gonna do..." Cyrus shook his head with a chuckle.

A few miles up the highway, Cyrus stopped at the red light and made the left turn onto Marne Road, which led him to Licking Valley Road, his route back to the little township of Hanover Ohio. It was the little village that the Filton family had called home since the 1910's. It was a community small enough that "you blink and you're through it". There wasn't much in terms of infrastructure in the community; a single pizza shop, a Marathon gas station, and a small grocery and hardware store, run by a family friend, the Bradleys. Cyrus made his way to the intersection in the middle of the community and made another left, to head back to his landscaping business HQ.

---

Dropping off his riding mower and other gear at his headquarters, Cyrus spun his truck around to go see his grandma. The Sierra crunched on the gravel lot as he got back onto the main road to head into Hanover.

"I'm just curious to what Grandma was doing on the highway, Freddo." Cyrus remarked as he drove. "It's not like her to go into town."

"Usually one of us takes her." Freddy shrugged. "Something's up."

"I'm afraid something really is up because Grandma's been kind of worrying me lately."

"Oh yeah?"

"She seems kind of forgetful at times and repeats questions some, plus she's had some health issues lately."

"She's also eighty-four and a blatant alcoholic." Freddy shrugged. "Scotch for breakfast?"

"Brandy for dinner." Cyrus laughed cynically. "Fuck, I could use a Scotch and soda right now~"

"Same here." Freddy snickered.

Cyrus leaned back into his seat and enjoyed the cool air flowing in through the open windows. As he drove he thought about his frail grandmother, the irritable, one-of-a-kind, Norma Merle Filton. She was where he got his Irish roots from; Norma Merle Murphy was born in Ireland, in the city of Clifden. A fiery redhead like himself, Norma got her personality from the rough upbringing as the daughter of a poor peat miner. She became a mother at the age of fourteen in 1952, the victim of a sexual assault by a priest. Her first born son, christened Neal, was given up for adoption, and Norma was sent to live with relatives in the United States, who happened to reside in Hanover. That is how Norma met Gary Filton, eleven years her senior, after graduating from high school in 1956. They married a year later, and started a family, and were married for almost sixty years when Gary died of a stroke in 2015.

Norma was their loving grandmother, but she was a very temperamental, contrary, and difficult person to deal with. It was "my way or the highway!" as Cyrus recalled in his mind. But he wouldn't have it any other way. Norma was brutally honest and told you how she felt, verses his other grandparents, who were the quiet and reserved first generation Norwegian-Americans who lived in Wisconsin.

Hanover was a tiny community built around a five way intersection. Everybody knew everyone. Cyrus pulled up to the intersection and stopped at the stop sign. Cyrus stuck an arm out and waved to his younger brother Ed, who was refueling his truck at the Marathon. As he took off to make the second right, he waved to his older brother, Darryl, who came to the stop sign in his white Ford F-350 dually. Going into the neighborhood, Cyrus passed by the home to his friend, Marty Millis, and made another left at the dead end, to reach his Grandma's road, Brown Street.

Norma's home was a little single story ranch, nestled amongst a bunch of colorful trees in the back yard. Dingy white metal siding covered the home, which had dark green shutters around the windows, and a dark green shingle roof. Autumn flowers bloomed in the garden and around the light pole near the driveway. Cyrus turned the wheel and slowly pulled into her gravel driveway, directly behind her Skylark. Cyrus and Freddy both hopped out and walked to the front door to ring the doorbell.

After a few seconds waiting, the door opened to reveal little Norma. Cyrus always felt like he towered over his five foot, five inch grandmother. Norma was a gray wolfess, with light and medium gray fur and now silvery-white hair that was neatly permed. Some fur around her muzzle was white with age, and she looked frail at eighty-four years old. A faint scar graced Norma's forehead, from a successful surgery to remove skin cancer five years prior.

"Cyrus!" Norma greeted, a smile lighting up her face. Her gravelly voice had a thick Irish drawl to it. "Freddo! What brings you here?"

"Oh, just checking up on you, Grandma." Smiled Cyrus.

"Come on in! Come on in!" Norma exclaimed as she pushed the screen door open. "You two look so sweaty and messy!"

"Work, Grandma Norma~" Freddo quipped as he stepped inside her cozy little home. Everything inside was neat and tidy, the home adorned in light earthy colors that made the small living room feel more open. Cyrus took his cowboy boots off and walked over to sit at her dinner table while Norma answered the ringing phone. Cyrus glanced up to see Norma talking to what was most likely a spam call. She talked for a few minutes, and Cyrus and Freddy just glanced at each other with sarcastic gazes.

Norma finally hung up the phone on the wall. "I get all these calls all the time! People from... Pakistan or something...asking about benefits."

"Aren't like Medicare stuff done through packets or something?" Freddy asked.

"Oh I don't know~" Norma shrugged. "Lemme get you boys some water."

"Don't you have your Medicare stuff already taken care of, Grandma?" Cyrus asked as he accepted his ice water that was in a light green Coca-Cola glass.

"Yeah."

"Then why talk to them?"

"Oh, just wanted to hear what they had to say~" Norma shrugged as she went to grab Freddy's glass. Cyrus just glanced over at Freddy with a confused gaze.

"Hey Grandma, what were you doing on the highway?" Freddy asked.

Norma paused and had a look of confusion on her face. The seconds passed by and Cyrus had a puzzled look on his face. "What was I doing... what was I... oh, oh! I went to the grocery to try and pick up a few things... what was I getting... oh, hmm..."

Freddy looked confused at Cyrus as well. "Don't you usually go to Bradley's to get small stuff and then we take you to Kroger on Saturday?"

"Well I tried... and my card got declined there... they must have some kind of computer problem today... you know I just don't understand computers, Freddo. So I tried to go to the grocery in Newark... and my damn card got declined there too! I tried four times and the fookin' card wouldn't work!"

"Did you try and talk to the bank?" Cyrus asked.

"GOD DAMNIT!" Norma shouted. "I forgot about that! ...you know my brain just doesn't seem like it wants to work anymore!"

Norma started to say something when the phone rang again. She quickly walked over to answer it, which sounded like another spam call. Cyrus tapped his fingers on the table as Norma rambled on to another call about benefits before hanging up.

"You know, these Pakistanis are so nice!" Norma remarked as she sat down at the table. She grabbed a short tumbler that sat inverted and poured herself a glass of bourbon from a crystal decanter and took a sip. "Such formal speaking people on the phone~"

"Grandma, why do you talk to spam callers?" Freddy asked curiously. "Just hang up."

"Yeah Grandma, just hang up." Cyrus reiterated.

"Well, I don't know." Norma shrugged.

"If you already have your benefits all set up, why speak to them? And that sounds shady... please tell me you didn't give out any of your information."

"Of course not, Cyrus. I'm not dumb you know~"

"I didn't say that, Grandma. Spammers prey upon the elderly."

"Well I'm elderly!" Norma protested. "I've been taking care of myself and your grandfather for over sixty years! I think I know what I'm doing!"

"Alright, Grandma, alright~" Cyrus motioned sarcastically.

Norma took another sip of her drink. "I miss your Grandpa, Cy."

"I miss him too, Grandma."

"When did he die again?"

"He died in 2015."

"Seems a long time ago." Norma nodded. "I remember the day I met him... that was a long time ago."

"Sixty-six years ago." Freddy nodded in return. "Well before our time!"

"The world's changed so much since then. I don't like it." Norma shook her head. "Everyone's so cold and mean anymore. Back then, simpler times."

"Well you had the same messed up people like today, you just didn't have news to amplify it constantly." Chuckled Cyrus. "I'll take today over the fifties honestly. I can just be me without the hassles."

Norma shrugged. "I suppose."

"Well I gotta get going here in a bit. What do you need, Grandma? I'll get it for you." Cyrus offered.

"Oh don't worry about it. I'll just do it tomorrow." Norma assured.

Cyrus got up and went to put his boots back on. "Grandma it was nice to see you!"

Norma got up and went to gave big Cyrus a tight hug. "It was so nice to see you! Get cleaned up and relax!"

"Well it's time for the weekend, it's me and Ben time." Cyrus chuckled.

"It's the weekend?"

"Yeah?"

"I thought it was like Wednesday?"

"...No?" Cyrus fumbled his brow.

"Oh wow. I'm all outta whack." Norma muttered. "I better check my calendar!"

"Yeah. You best do that~ See you later Grandma."

Norma stepped out with Cyrus and Freddy to send them off. "Cy, when are you gonna get a new truck?"

"Why replace something that's not broke?" Cyrus remarked as he opened the door up to climb in. "She's all paid off!"

"That's an old truck now!"

"So is your old ass car, Grandma?"

"Hey easy on the old." Norma laughed. "I ain't getting any younger!"

"One day." Smiled the wolf. "Grandma, you take care."

Norma took a step back as Cyrus fired the engine up and backed out. He rolled out onto the street and took off with them waving. Norma stood in her yard and waved with a smile on her face.

Hitting the back roads again, Cyrus and Freddy finally made their way home. They had a ten minute drive back to Cy's home out in the countryside.

"Boy Grandma seemed all out of whack?" Cyrus remarked to Freddy, who nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, she seemed really... 'off'..." Freddy responded. And her phone fucking was blowing up constantly!"

"I've noticed that too, and she keeps talking to them." Cyrus rolled his blue eyes. "Her constantly yakin' her jaw at these motherfuckers is why that phone keeps blowing up, and I explain it, and I explain it, Dad has explained it, Aunt Becky has... and what does she do?"

"Do you think maybe Grandma Filton has Alzheimer's?"

"I mean, she is eighty-four..." Cyrus shrugged.

"Something seems off, Cy."

"I agree."

---

Turning off the county road, Cyrus rolled up his long gravel driveway, through the tree line. Emerging through the trees was his humble farm home, a two story residence sheathed in bright brown cedar siding, and a old slate roof of mottled grays, surrounded by two miles of woodland in the back. The driveway terminated at a large two car garage, where Freddy's silvery gray Silverado sat at. Cyrus spun around and backed in next to his nephew's truck.

Grabbing his cooler, Cyrus marched back inside with Freddy. The interior of his farm house was rustic Americana, with walls adorned by old gray barn wood, knotted and rutted by age. Portraits of farm life hung up on the walls, along with photos of family and friends. Towards the kitchen and dining room, huge picture windows provided a beautiful view of the back deck and big spring fed pond, with all the colorful woodland providing a breathtaking backdrop.

Doffing his boots, Cyrus walked into the kitchen and sat his cooler on a small round table. He stood for a moment and just thought about his time with his grandmother. Something was bugging him. Something didn't feel right. The wolf turned and walked to his big computer desk that sat by the window. Sitting by his dual monitors was an old Bell telephone, molded in red plastic. He picked the phone up off the handle and dialed the number to Bradley Supply, the little grocery store in town run by his ex's family. There were three rings and an elderly woman's voice greeted him, Phyllis Bradley.

"Bradley Supply! Phyllis speaking, how may I help you?"

"Hi Phyllis! It's Cy."

"Cyrus! So nice to hear from you. How can I help you?"

"Hey Phyllis, did my grandma stop in today?"

"Well yeah, she stopped in around maybe... two o'clock? Hey Dale!"

Cyrus could faintly hear Phyllis ask Dale Bradley about Norma. He barely heard Dale say "yeah".

"Norma stopped in around two o'clock and attempted to buy some stuff, but her card got declined."

"Any kind of POS issues?"

"Not that I could tell. Everyone had no problems today."

"Huh, I was just wondering because her card got declined at Dollar General in Newark as well."

"Well I have to admit that your Grandma seemed a bit off today, Cyrus."

"Yeah, I was noticing something too. She seemed kind of... confused?"

"Yes. She was a bit confused. She seemed a wee bit lost? And she was talking about something about a priest and a young boy she saw."

Cyrus fumbled his brow. "Huh... that's different. Hey, by any chance, is Talon at the store?"

"Oh yes! He just showed up a few minutes ago!"

"Could you put him on please?" Cyrus asked with a smile. Phyllis agreed and handed the phone over to her grandson.

"Who's this hot piece of ass calling?" came the teasing voice of his ex-boyfriend, Talon.

"Well hey stud~" Cyrus smiled. "Got any plans this evening?"

"Well Ronnie and his son is coming over to spend the weekend."

"Why don't you bring your hot ass biker boyfriend and come on over this evening for a nice bonfire and some food?"

"I think we could do something like that."

"Bring the kiddos too!"

"Sure!"

"How about around seven? Marty and Jason will be here along with Ben. Awesome stuff man, you take care, bye-bye now."

Cyrus hung the phone up as Freddy stepped into the kitchen fiddling with untying his ponytail.

"Well I spoke to Phyllis, and Grandma was at the store. She seemed kind of lost according to her."

"I think there's a problem, Cy."

"Yeah. Maybe I should say something to Dad."

"Why don't you get cleaned up first~" Freddy suggested.

"Okay!"

---

The late evening air was cool as the sun finally retreated beneath the horizon. The crisp air was scented by smoke, the scent of burning wood and leaves in Cy's fire pit by the pond. Freddy dropped another big log into the flames, sending up a stream of orange embers that fluttered in the bluish smoke.

On the deck, Cyrus packed his big cooler with ice and drinks. Bottles of ale and some cans of pop were set in the ice, and then covered up by a second bag of ice. Freddy helped Cyrus carry the heavily laden cooler down to be near the fire pit and some chairs. The glow of the deck's string lights helped provide extra light with the fire.

Going back inside to grab some meat that was seasoned and resting on the counter, Cyrus heard the doorbell ring. He ran over to find his friends Marty and Jason at the door with Jason's young daughter, Megan.

"Evening!" grinned the wolf. "Come on in!"

"Hi Cyrus!" greeted Megan, who gave the burly wolf a hug. Cyrus hugged her in return.

"How are you lil princess!" Cyrus asked with a friendly smile.

"Good~" she smiled in return.

Stepping in first was Marty Millis. At fifty-two years old, Marty was an imposing looking red Doberman, with a rough, rugged face, and a stubby Mohawk of graying auburn hair. He was an ex Hells Angel and still looked like the rough n' tough outlaw biker that he once was many years before. Taking his jacket off, Marty's beefy arms were sleeved like Cy's, with tribal and biker themes inked down to his wrists. Jason Greene was Marty's boyfriend, a slender red Dober at forty-two with medium brown hair, and his right arm adorned with a sleeve design that incorporated some tropical flowers with a tribal pattern. He wore khaki pants and a hoodie.

"So what's new?" Cyrus asked as he walked back to his kitchen.

"Same shit, different day." Chuckled Marty.

"Hey I know that feeling." Cyrus nodded sarcastically. "What about you, Jason?"

"Well making another step closer to my lawsuit against Coshocton county."

"Oh yeah? You gonna clean their bank account out?"

"Pfft, well not that far." Laughed the Dober. "But we've been able to successfully show in court that they were targeting me for termination on account of my sexual orientation when that whole hullaballoo exploded last year."

"Take 'em to the cleaners!" Cyrus grinned with a hearty laugh.

"Eh, I would like my back pay, and anything else is a plus." Jason shrugged. "I simply want what is fair and what is right~"

"You should also fart on them!" Cyrus exclaimed, which made Marty roll his eyes.

"Cyrus, stop talking about farts." Chuckled the older dog. "There is nothing funny about farts!"

"Marty, you're no fun." Cyrus frowned jokingly. "You just hold your farts in until they come out like a burp!"

Marty looked at Jason and just pointed at Cyrus. "This motherfucker is just starting. I just know it! Fart jokes all night!"

Cyrus grinned big and nodded excitedly.

"Unbelievable~" Marty shook his head. Jason just closed his eyes and chuckled at the absurdity.

Cyrus glanced at the clock and pondered about where his boyfriend was. Ben was undergoing flight training at his job, and was probably running late. A few minutes after Marty and Jason arrived came his friends, Talon and Ronnie. Talon was his ex-boyfriend from several years ago. He and Ronnie were tattooed up red Dobermans; Talon had short auburn hair and goatee like Marty, while Ronnie had long wavy hair that flowed down to his mid-back. Their kids, Emily and Colt ran ahead of them as Cyrus opened the door up.

"Hello!" Cyrus greeted as he gave the kids a hug. "Come on in!"

"Sup!" Talon grinned.

"Hey!" Cyrus grinned in return. "Hey Ronnie!"

"Yo!" Ronnie smiled.

"Come on in!"

"Where's your boyfriend at?" Talon asked.

"Ben's probably running late. He's on flight training duty today."

"Ah."

"Come on in! Let's get something to drink and I'll get some food ready!"

Everyone stood around in the kitchen as Cyrus and Freddy got some vegetables from the fridge to cut up for hamburgers. Cyrus and Freddy joked with their friends as they waited for Ben. Finally around 7:30, Ben came running in through the door. Ben Reynolds was a young tan and beige husky, aged twenty, with brown hair that was braided in a ponytail similar to Cyrus'. Ben's youthful face bore a dark, jagged scar, a reminder of a brutal gay bashing that almost killed him when he was sixteen. His face bore the consequences of the wound, with some paralysis that twisted his smile a bit. Ben wore sneakers, jeans, and a red and gray hoodie. "Sorry I'm late! Boy do I have a story for ya!"

"There's my cute lil' cumdump!" Cyrus laughed as he got a kiss from his boyfriend.

"Wild day today." Ben laughed in return as he greeted everyone.

---

The cold of early night was kept at bay by the warmth of the fire. As the fire crackled and spat embers into the smoky air, everyone sat around eating and talking about their adventures while the kids ran around and played with each other in the dim light from the house and fire.

"So today I got to take the Electra up for a practice flight." Ben explained as he juggled a beer in his grip. "We took off, perfect, fine, and just as we leveled off for a flight towards Cleveland? The number one engine took a shit on us. Managed to shut it down and we turned around and limped it back to Columbus."

"Kill two birds with one stone." Cyrus joked. "You get to practice an engine failure and emergency landing!"

"Ha, I guess." Ben chuckled. "Jake wasn't very happy about having to take the Electra out of service for an engine change."

"Could have been worse~" Marty pointed out.

"True."

"Could have been like my friend Eddy and our engineers who were blown up in the DC-3 midair." Ronnie quipped with a grimace.

"Wow." Everyone muttered.

"So how are you liking ole' N'ERK!" Cyrus asked Ronnie jokingly.

"It's different than Chicago, let's put it that way." The Doberman chuckled. "Good and bad. I mean, it's quiet and slower paced than Chicago, but dude, so many methheads wandering about."

"Newark is meth-mania!" Cyrus exclaimed.

"I've seen more fucked up people in Newark, than I ever did in Chicago." Ronnie rolled his blue eyes. "So many people ask if I have a cigarette or money to loan them."

"Sounds about right." Jason chuckled. "I work downtown, and it's like a bunch of zombies just drifting around. Like do these people not have jobs?"

"That's... probably why they're methheads." Ben quipped.

"Right." Jason laughed.

"Who wants to try this bottle of champagne I bought!" Cyrus asked. "I think it's chilled down now!"

"Sure!" Everyone agreed.

Cyrus got up and ran back to the house to grab the bottle that sat in a bucket with ice. He had forgot to put it in the fridge when he had bought it. As he fiddled around with grabbing some paper cups in the cupboard, the telephone rang. Cyrus walked over to the closest phone, his old Bell telephone on the desk, to pick it up.

"Hello!"

"Cyrus, it's your Dad!" came his father, Dan Filton.

"Hey! What's up, Dad?"

"Cyrus, do you have a moment?"

"Yeah, what's up?"

"Hey, look, I gotta tell you something, your Grandma is fucking nuts or something. There's something wrong, and I gotta call her doctor Monday... I think your Grandma's mind is slipping."

"Yeah?"

"She called me maybe ten minutes ago, all in a panic... something about... a priest and a little boy... and she had to protect the little boy, and now she can't find him. Oh Cyrus, this is just gibberish to me!"

"Funny you mention that... I was talking to Phyllis Bradley earlier, and she said Grandma was at the store, and she said something about a priest and a child too, and that her card got declined."

"That's the other thing. Mom asked me to look at something about a bill that came in, something about insufficient funds, and I think there's something wrong with her bank account. So I'm gonna have to go the bank too with her and see what's going on, and that stupid damn phone of her's is blowing up! All those goat fuckers calling and harassing her!"

Cyrus just shook his head. "Dad I think there's a problem with Grandma."

"I think she's starting to get Dementia, Cy, to be honest with you."

"That's what me and Freddo were saying too. Like we went over there because we saw Grandma on the highway causing a huge traffic jam... and she didn't remember at first why she was in Newark, and forgot to go to the bank because her card got declined at the dollar store. Something seemed really off."

"I'm gonna call her doctor Monday. She's upset at me for bringing that up, saying nothing is wrong, but Cy... what I heard? Something is wrong."

"Yeah. Absolutely. Uhh, keep me posted Dad."

"Will do, Cy. Have a good night."

"You too. Goodbye."

Cyrus hung the phone up and stood for a moment, looking concerned. Something was wrong with his Grandma, really wrong. She was at that age too, the risk for Alzheimer's. There were these nagging signs he had noticed over the past couple of years, but now it seemed like his worst case scenario was coming true.

Returning back to the bonfire with his friends, Cyrus sat the bucket with the bottle of champagne down and quietly doled out the paper cups. Everyone noticed the subdued body language and expression on the big wolf's face.

"Everything okay, Cy?" Ben asked.

Cyrus popped the cork on the bottle as he began pouring drinks for everyone. "Dad called me... He's going to call the doctor on my grandma. I think there's a huge problem..."

Everyone leaned forward in their chairs, looking concerned. "What's going on?" Marty asked.

"Dad said Grandma was talking about crazy stuff... a priest and a boy... gibberish as he called it, a hallucination or something."

"And when we were over there, she seemed kind of out of it?" Freddy added.

"Wow." Jason muttered.

"That's not good." Talon said, pursing his lips.

"Yeah, I gotta say Cy, I saw your Grandma walking up the street one morning and when I said hi to her and we talked, she got her directions back to her house wrong, and seemed to repeat herself a lot." Marty added.

Cyrus grimaced as he handed off the paper cups with champagne. "Old age sucks."

"Hey you're telling me." Chuckled Marty.

"Old fuck." Ben teased with a grin.

"I'll take you back inside and show you what this old fuck can do!"

"I wouldn't say no!" the husky grinned with a snort. Everyone else chuckled. Even Cyrus had a little chuckle as he sat back down to sip at his champagne.

"Well I guess maybe this is just something that was inevitable with old age... since Grandma is eighty-four."

"Yeah. I get it." Jason nodded.

"Time to play damage control, guys~"

---

Monday morning was cloudy, a sad, low hanging sky of tumultuous looking clouds, colored like slate. Working from home, Cyrus sat at his desk in just shorts and a t-shirt while he worked on his desktop, printing off some work documents. His laser printer hummed on the desk behind him, spitting out page after page of documents the wolf was working on. He swung himself around in his swivel chair, got up and fetched the paperwork from the printer. His footsteps on the wooden floor were muffled by his socks. Cyrus hated this time of year, as he prepared paperwork for the seasonal furlough of some of his employees. Business would be slowing down, and outside of a core set of workers to tend to winter tasks like snow plowing and Christmas light decorating, his landscaping business would come to a near halt by late November.

As he collated, stapled, and paper clipped each packet, Cyrus had an eye on the clock. His Grandma's doctor's appointment was scheduled for eleven o'clock, and Cyrus planned to meet them at the doctor's office in Newark. He signed each packet with his signature with a blue pen, and stuffed them into manila envelopes, which he taped shut and signed for each worker. A look of sadness was on his face as he prepared the furlough packets.

When the time came, Cyrus changed into a pair of blue sweatpants, and a blue and gray hoodie. With his packets of paperwork tucked under his arm, the wolf stepped out and ran down the steps of his front porch. He sported a gray baseball hat with his ponytail poking out the back. Climbing into his Sierra, he fired it up and took off for the road, to head to his headquarters, then Newark.

Hopping on the highway, Cyrus engaged the cruise control and settled down for the commute into town. As he drove, he couldn't help but think about his Grandma. As he thought about her, an upwelling of sadness dragged his heart down. A frown graced his face. They were always close; whenever Cyrus had a problem as a kid or a teenager, his grandparents always stepped in to help. Norma always took care of her grandchildren. When Cyrus came out at twenty-one and his family was less than happy with having a gay son, it was Gary and Norma who accepted him without question. Even when he lived in Dayton, his "exile years", Cyrus spoke to Norma and Gary multiple times a week on the phone, and frequently drove back to visit with them. And after Gary passed away, Cyrus always helped to take care of his grandmother. Feisty Norma, who was fiercely independent, but needed his help with the heavier things. Now it seemed like maybe he didn't have much time left with her.

Norma's doctor had his office in a new facility in downtown Newark. Squeezing his truck into a parking space, Cyrus hopped out and went inside. Immediately he knew where his Dad and Grandma was, by listening to the argument unfold, with the thick Irish drawl that his grandmother had.

"Mom. There is a serious problem, and maybe you believe that? But it's happening."

"I don't think there's anything wrong with me, Dan!"

"Mom, you're talking gibberish. There is no priest, there is no little boy! None of that is happening but inside your head!" Dan snapped.

"Well I think there is a priest and a lil' boy, Daniel!"

"That's the problem!"

Cyrus watched his Dad and Grandma argue. Dan Filton was his hard-nosed, military man dad in his early sixties. The blonde and tan wolf still sported a military flattop of brown hair that was graying. Dan was a no-nonsense kind of guy, a stoic family man.

"Okay, okay, okay. Let's calm down everyone!" Cyrus exclaimed with a smile. "Good morning, Grandma~"

"Oh, morning Cyrus!" Norma smiled. "Your father here... wanting to think I'm crazy or something!"

"Well you are talking crazy!"

"Hey!" Norma protested.

"Okay, we're in public here!" Cyrus laughed, glancing over at the uneasy eyes of other patients in the lobby.

"Tell your father I'm not crazy! You don't think I'm crazy?"

"I don't think you're crazy, Grandma. I think there is something wrong with you." Cyrus calmly stated. "You could have the beginning signs of dementia, a tumor, something."

"I don't think there's anything wrong with me, frankly. I think you're all overreacting."

"Jesus Christ Mom..."

The argument picked right back up where it left off at. Cyrus just shook his head and chuckled cynically.

When the nurse called for Norma, Cyrus went with his dad back to the doctor's exam room. Norma sat on the patient chair covered by a strip of paper, while Cyrus and Dan stood off into a corner. After a nurse took her blood pressure and asked her a few questions, her doctor appeared. Dr. Pastorius, a big gray and white malamute in his sixties, stepped in wearing his white lab coat over a polo shirt and slacks. He checked Norma over, asked her some questions, and had a nurse technician draw a couple vials of blood from her arm. He asked her about her hallucinations, and Cyrus watched Norma try and explain what she saw. She explained about trying to protect the "little boy" from the priest, who stalked them. Cyrus pondered if this was a manifestation of the traumatic experience in her youth, and the "little boy" was her mind's manifestation of her first-born son, Neal. The doctor nodded, made a few notes on his notepad, and proceeded to send Norma with the nurse technician to go provide a urine sample. As Norma departed the room, Dr. Pastorius gently closed the door and looked at Dan and Cyrus.

"She's a feisty lil' thing isn't she?" chuckled Dan.

Pastorius just smiled and chuckled, with a soft "yeah". "Mister Filton, I can't say for certain until we do the CT scan, but I think Norma is beginning to show signs of dementia, and hallucinations are one of the symptoms of dementia that is advancing. I should have maybe said something a year or two sooner, because I have noticed a bit of a change in Norma's personality, going back to at least 2019 at the earliest. But given the pandemic's chaos here, it got lost in all that."

"Oh I understand." Dan nodded.

"Your Mom is medically incompetent I would rule. I also notice she has lost like thirty-five pounds since her last visit."

"Oh man..." Cyrus muttered.

"I have a suspicion that she is overmedicating herself because she keeps calling in about the thyroid medication, and it's a ninety day supply..." Pastorius remarked. "I really think you will need to start giving her the medication if she is overmedicating herself unknowingly."

"I understand." Dan nodded.

"I won't know more until the CT scan in a month's time, but it's clear that there is a problem, and in light of the hallucinations, I don't want Norma driving. She is a danger to herself and others on the road."

"Okay. I'll take care of that." Dan quipped as he glanced over at Cyrus. Cyrus nodded.

---

Returning back to Hanover, Cyrus pulled into the gravel driveway of his grandma's house. Hopping out, Cyrus fumbled for the key, and let himself inside her house to wait for his Dad and Grandma to return. He closed the door and stood there, taking in the silence and looking at the scenery of Norma's living room. Taking his shoes off, Cyrus walked over to examine the pictures on the wall. Photos of loved ones who had since departed graced the eggshell colored walls.

After her sexual assault back home, Norma was sent to live with relatives of her mother, who happened to live in Hanover. The Byrd family was practically the only immigrant family that lived in the backwater community. They were gone now; the elders had passed away many years before, the descendents moved away. Last Cyrus had heard, they now lived in West Virginia and Florida, of all places. Happy photos of the Byrds, with a young Norma were neatly framed and displayed. Some were in black and white, some were in now faded color. A photo of Norma when she was twenty-two, taken in 1960, was in brilliant Kodachrome. Norma was posed against an emerald green background. She wore an emerald green dress with a red carnation pinned to it. Her bright red hair was neatly permed and coifed atop her head. She was a very beautiful woman in her youth. Another photo showed a young Norma with a younger Gary Filton, right after they got married. His happy grandfather, who had always said he "was the luckiest man in the world for marrying Norma". The pictures brought a smile to Cyrus' face.

As he looked around at her cozy little abode, his smile faded. The thought of dementia loomed on his mind. How long would Norma be able to stay at home, before her condition got too critical? How long could they take care of her? Could they muster that? The thoughts were suffocating to him.

The front door swung open to Dan and Norma, in the middle of an argument. Cyrus turned around to see Dan and Norma in a heated yelling match over everything imaginable.

"Mom, you have problems!" Dan shouted. "You heard your doctor! You heard the bank!"

"I don't have problems!"

"You don't have problems? HOW DO YOU HAVE NO MONEY IN YOUR BANK ACCOUNT!?" Dan yelled. "You got hacked!"

"I don't know how they got my information!" Norma yelled.

The telephone rang.

Dan glared at Norma the whole time as he stormed over to pick it up. "Dan Filton speaking." He paused for a second. "DON'T YOU EVER CALL THIS FUCKING NUMBER AGAIN, FUCKING CAMEL JOCKEYS!"

Dan slammed the phone down.

"HEY!" Norma yelled. "What the fuck was that over?"

"THAT IS WHY YOU HAVE NO MONEY IN YOUR BANK ACCOUNT!" Dan screamed. "Look how often your fucking phone rings, Mom!"

"I can't be rude to them!" Norma protested.

"They're spammers!" Dan shouted. "Why the fuck would you talk to someone about Medicare benefits when you already have them set up! And it's not done over the damn phone, it's done through a package sent by the government!"

"How would I know?"

"You've been doing it for twenty years now, Mom!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Easy!" Cyrus stepped in. "Dad what happened?"

"I went down to the bank with your grandma to figure out what the hell is doing on, and I'm glad I did because your Grandma got hacked! Someone managed to get her information and transfer all her social security payments to an account located in Springfield."

"Wow... What!" Cyrus exclaimed.

"They had everything. Her social security number, bank routing numbers, check card numbers, everything! The whole smack!" Dan exclaimed. "Mom? What the hell?"

"I didn't give my information out!"

"Then how did they get it Mom? Like all your financial shit sitting right by the phone, eh?"

"That's where I always keep it at!"

"No you don't! Mom!" Dan shouted.

"I've taken care of my money for over sixty years now!"

"Well not anymore, Mom. That's it. I'm taking charge." Dan announced. "And that reminds me..."

Dan marched over to the kitchen and threw open the cupboard where Norma kept her medicine at. "Mom, what the fuck!?"

Cyrus ran over to see Dan taking down pill bottles that were nearly empty. Norma looked upset at Dan's fumbling with her prescriptions.

"Those are my thyroid pills!" Norma protested.

"Yeah!" Dan shouted. He held up the three large bottles. "MOM! This is a ninety day supply! You got this like... three weeks ago... and it's almost empty! A ninety day supply! Mom! What the hell did you do?"

"Well I just took one pill each!" Norma shrugged. "Isn't that what you're supposed to do?"

"Grandma, you're supposed to take just one pill from one bottle... that's a ninety day supply in three bottles... thirty, thirty, and thirty."

"...oh."

Dan shook his head. "Oh my god, Mom. You're lucky you didn't die. That explains the weight loss, and maybe... the hallucinations."

"I hate that you call them hallucinations!" Norma yelled. "You make it sound like I'm insane or something!"

"Well it's not normal!" Dan shouted.

"Dad, calm down!"

"Shut up, Cyrus!" Dan brushed him off. "Mom, this is a new normal now. I'm taking charge, of the money, and your medicine! You can't do it anymore!"

"I did it for sixty years, Daniel!"

"Not anymore!" Dan pointed. "And I'm sorry! I'm taking the keys away."

"NO. No! No! No! No!" Norma yelled as Dan grabbed and yanked them off the desk. "No! No! No! No! Daniel! No! NO! NO! THAT'S MY CAR!"

"You heard the doctor!" Dan explained as he stuffed them into his shirt pocket.

"You can't take my car away, please! I need it!" Norma exclaimed. "How am I going to get around places!"

"We'll be taking you now."

"No, no, I need it..." Norma said, tears welling up in her eyes. "Daniel I need that car so bad..."

"I'm sorry Mom. Doctor's orders."

"They don't need to know... please let me have it... please... please..."

"No, Mom. I'm sorry."

Norma sat down on the couch and started bawling over everything that transpired. Dan looked mentally exhausted at Cyrus, who stood with pursed lips. Dan sighed, shook his head and turned to leave. Cyrus quickly excused himself and apologized as he ran out the front door.

Dan walked back to his black Tahoe, and leaned on the hood. He put his head down momentarily and shook it in a frustrating manner. "Jesus fucking Christ, Cy..."

"It's worse than I thought." Cyrus muttered.

Dan looked up. "She's in complete denial about this whole situation. God, what am I gonna do..."

"So they got all her money, eh?"

"No. the IRA's and CD's are safe. They got her social security payments... like eight thousand dollars."

"Fuck."

"Newark Credit Union spoke to the SS office, and they said that about three months ago, a gentlemen with a foreign accent called in and had all her information, and that they were requesting her payments to be rerouted to a bank account located in Springfield Ohio. They had everything. Her name, date of birth, social security number, bank routing numbers! The whole sha-bam."

"Are they going to try and get her money back?"

"Yeah." Dan nodded. He reached into his coat and pulled out a folded up packet of paper. "When I get home, I gotta call the Sheriff and file a report about the theft. Cyrus... she can't take care of her money anymore..."

"And she can't take care of the medicine."

"That too, Cy. God... I know she gave her information out... those fuckin' spam callers!" Dan growled.

"We should get her telephone number switched too."

"Good idea."

"I'll get on the horn about that." Cyrus offered.

"Okay. I'll talk to the Sheriff." Dan nodded. "Let's convene a family meeting this evening. It's all hands on deck for your Grandma."

"Okay."

"Be there around six, Cy."

"Will do."

"I'll let your brothers know."

"Thanks, Dad."

---

After work, Cyrus arrived to his parents' home, where the driveway was packed with vehicles. Cyrus pulled in and parked behind his brother Ed's red Silverado. He and Freddy hopped out and were greeted at the porch by his Mom, Linda Filton. She was a gray wolf, aged sixty, with salt and pepper fur. Wavy red hair flowed from her head, graying in places. Linda gave Cyrus and Freddy a hug as they were welcomed inside.

Sitting around the dinner table were Dan, his brother Ronnie and his wife Becky, a heavy set gray wolfess. Ronnie was Dan's older brother, aged sixty-four, a lanky blonde wolf with a tousled mop of gray hair that was once brown. Years of drug and alcohol abuse aged his face and a couple of teeth were missing. Becky wore a t-shirt and sweatpants and had a coifed hairdo of black hair that had gray streaks in it. Sitting opposite of Ronnie and Becky was Cy's older brother, Darryl Filton. Darryl was stocky, with wavy ginger hair that was a tousled mess poking out from under his oil soaked NASCAR hat, and a beer belly poking out from his t-shirt and jeans. Darryl's girlfriend Hanna, a gray wolf, tended to their young daughter Jennifer, who waved at Cyrus and Freddy. Standing and leaning against the wall was Ed Filton and his wife Vanessa with their three kids. Ed looked almost like Cyrus, having tattoo sleeves and long hair that was braided. While Cy had bright red hair, Ed's hair was a deep reddish-brown, a deep brick color of straight shiny hair. Cyrus and Freddy grabbed some chairs and sat down with everyone.

Cyrus glanced around the table at everyone and thought about his family. The Filtons were at best, a lovingly dysfunctional family. For many years, the Filtons had a long-running feud between Dan and Ronnie, which began with the death of their younger brother, Donald, who Cyrus resembled personality wise. In the summer of 1983, Ronnie and Donald were racing their motorcycles out in the backcountry when Donald was struck by a car in a blind turn and killed. He was only twenty-one. Gary and Dan blamed Ronnie for the death, which in turn drove Ronnie to his years of alcohol and drug abuse that ruined two marriages and his children, half of whom sit in prison or as burnouts around Ohio. The rift was only made worse when Gary died, leaving the family business in limbo until it was finally torn in half with Cyrus' return.

The family dysfunction spanned in other areas too. Dan did not get along with his oldest son, Darryl, who he thought was "fucking retarded". Darryl was a "big dumb hick", a simpleton, a "brawn over brains" kind of guy. Darryl made a series of bad life decisions, knocking up women, being an absent father to his son Freddy, and causing mayhem with incompetent landscaping work. Cyrus coming out at age twenty-one added another rift, which lasted for nearly a decade. During that time, Cyrus took his engineering degree and worked for ODOT out of their Dayton office. He later returned in 2017 and his return finally tore the landscaping business apart, with Dan's side now becoming Cy's business when his father semi-retired after back surgery. There was no skirting around them being dysfunctional, with multiple family brawls, screaming matches, and mayhem. But they were family. And around the table, the gravity of the situation was evident.

"I brought all of you here because Mom has a major problem." Dan started. "They're going to be doing more testing, but it's clear that most likely she has dementia starting."

Everyone quietly nodded.

"We're gonna have to start helping her more and getting ready for the next steps. I'm going to take care of her medication and tend to her money, and I would like to see her stay comfortable at home for as long as possible."

"What about a nursing home?" Aunt Becky asked. "Those are expensive."

"Yeah." Ronnie nodded.

"I'll have to look into that, Beck." Dan nodded. "I want to make her as comfortable as we can at home for as long as possible. But I'm going to need everyone to help."

"Well yeah." Darryl spoke up. "I always try and help Grandma."

"She's gonna need all of us to step up."

"It's gonna take a whole village." Cyrus remarked as he leaned back into his chair.

After their family meeting, Cyrus went back home for a little while. But something nagged at him deep down. Grabbing his jacket, Cyrus ventured back out, hopped back into his truck and drove to his Grandma's house.

Hanover was dead at night. A few lonely streetlights glowed with their yellow glare, and homes sat with soft glows from the covered windows. The Sierra's headlights peered into the night as Cyrus drove into Norma's neighborhood and pulled into her driveway. He quickly hopped out and knocked on the door.

Slowly the door opened to reveal a dejected looking Norma. The elderly wolf opened the screen door, which Cyrus held open as he stepped inside. Norma shut the door behind her. Her living room was dim, with only the light of two lamps just filling in the shadows. The old tube TV glowed with a game show on it.

"I can't believe they took me car away, Cyrus." Norma frowned. "I love that car! Why would they take the care away, Cyrus?"

"Oh Grandma, I understand completely. But they did that because they need to figure out what's going on with you." Cyrus explained, mustering a smile for her.

Norma frowned and turned away a bit. "Is it really that bad, Cyrus?"

"Yes, Grandma." The big wolf nodded. "It's not normal to have hallucinations."

"I don't think they're hallucinations?"

"Grandma, you're seeing people that don't exist. There's no priest, or little boy anywhere here."

"But it seems so real. I can see them, but I can't communicate with them..." Norma frowned.

"That's why we gotta figure out what's going on."

"Do you think I'll ever get my car back?"

"I don't know, Grandma."

Cyrus gave Norma a tight hug, which she accepted. She put her frail arms around him and held him tightly.

"I don't understand how I got hacked. How did they get my information? You know, Cyrus, I bet its someone I know who did this..."

Cyrus just kept his smile. "No Grandma, I don't think so. Everyone is at risk of getting hacked. They prey upon the elderly because you're vulnerable. You've never experienced such a thing like this."

Cyrus walked over and sat down on the couch with Norma sitting down beside him. Cyrus leaned back into the corner a bit to get comfortable.

"Grandma, we're all going to help you. Me, Ed, Darryl, Mom and Dad, Uncle Ronnie and Aunt Becky. We're all gonna help take care of you."

"I don't need help, I've been doing this shit for over sixty years now."

Cyrus chuckled. "Grandma, I don't think you can do it anymore."

"Now, Cy, I have taken care of finances for over sixty years! All those years your grandfather had me take care of it!"

"Grandma, that was sixty years ago, when you were in your twenties. Now you're eighty-four, and you have health issues. Potentially cognitive issues. You're gonna need help from us."

"I don't see that there's a problem with me."

"I believe there is." Cyrus smiled. "Grandma, on a serious note. We need to potentially get some ducks in a row in case they diagnose you with something."

"Why?"

"Let's say you are diagnosed with dementia. You might not be able to have the legal capacity to make decisions. If you have to go to a nursing home, they could take everything for payment."

"Oh no. I don't want to go to a nursing home! I'd just die!" Norma exclaimed.

"It may have to come to that point, Grandma. I don't know. But the point I'm making is. I think it's wise if you me, and Dad go get some financial and legal paperwork in line with the attorney and make sure that this is the plan that you want, before it's too late. Plus, I think it's important that you have a financial and medical power of attorney."

"Why? I have taken care of my money for sixty years!"

"You may reach a point where you can no longer make medical decisions. That's in relation to what I said earlier."

"What's that?"

Cyrus pursed his lips. "The whole topic of legal capacity, Grandma."

"Oh, right."

"Many years ago, I knew someone in Dayton who I worked with. Older gentleman, really nice guy, didn't have a family, nothing. He had a medical event happen to him that left him incapacitated. He was brain dead, and was kept alive on machines."

"Well they should have just let him go, so he wouldn't suffer."

"That's the point I'm making. Because he had no will, nothing, they had to keep him on life support. The hospital had to petition a judge, and it took months. That poor man laid in an ICU for months before he finally died. Do you want to end up like that?"

"Well, no?"

"That could very easily happen to you."

"Well you could just say."

"We might not be able to. That's the point I'm making about the power of attorney."

Norma had a look of thought on her wrinkled face. "If it has to come to this, I want you to be my legal representation, Cyrus."

Cyrus nodded. "I would gladly do that for you, Grandma."

"I trust you being the level headed one." Norma smiled.

"Level headed is my standard operating procedure!" grinned the wolf.

"Plus you're a red head like me." Norma laughed.

"We do like to stick together, huh~" Cyrus chuckled. He got up with Norma to go grab his shoes at the door.

"I'll have to talk to Dad and make an appointment with the attorney to get this set in stone. I'll call you tomorrow about this."

"Okay, Cy."

Cyrus gave his Grandma one more tight hug. "Grandma, I love you~"

Norma bent Cy down to her size to kiss his cheek lovingly. "I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, Cy."

Cyrus smiled. "Good night, Grandma."

"Good night Cyrus~"

Cyrus turned and left through the door. He walked back to his truck, climbed in and took off for home. Feeling a bit better after expressing his feelings, Cyrus sat back looking more relaxed as his headlights peered into the darkness on his way back.

---

Friday afternoon was cool and dreary, with a wind that rustled leaves that strewn the sidewalks of downtown Newark. Arriving into Newark, Cyrus drove his father and grandmother to the attorney's office. After consulting with everyone during the week, it was decided that Dan and Cyrus both would have a joint power of attorney with Norma, to protect her legal and financial matters, plus medical decisions.

Taking the Hudson Street exit off Route 16, Cyrus came up to the red light and waited. In the backseat of his crew cab truck sat Dan, fiddling around with his phone. Norma sat buckled up in the front seat, dressed formally in gray slacks, white blouse with a gray sports coat and her hair all neatly curled. She sat back watching the scenery.

"Cyrus are you ever gonna get yourself a new truck? You've had this truck for ages now!"

"Thirteen years~ Why replace something that's still in perfect shape."

"Can you imagine the price of this now?" chuckled Dan. "I remember when trucks were cheap~"

"Pfft. I paid twenty-six for this back in 2009 for a 2006 model year, and I think the last time I checked, this same exact GMC configuration was now almost eighty grand?"

"My god. They're gonna price themselves out of business!"

"Nah. You just sell a kidney or your left testicle to pay for it." Cyrus laughed as he took off and turned for the green light.

Reaching the downtown square, Cyrus made it through the roundabout and turned to park in front of the law office of "Scheiddegger, Manson, and Juarez". It was a small office that was squeezed between an eatery and a jewelry store, with an outdoor façade of marble and granite. They were due to meet with their attorney, Joe Manson.

Going inside and heading upstairs, Cyrus, Dan, and Norma sat down with Manson in his office. Joe Manson, a Saint Bernard in his early forties, specialized in wills and power of attorneys. Pouring over the paperwork, he discussed the legalese of all the documents to them, and they signed, a painstaking process totaling dozens of pages that needed full signatures, initials, and then notarization. When all was said and done, there were five big packs of documents that were stapled and clipped together. Cyrus and Dan were Norma's official legal guardian for her finances and medical decisions, her living will was updated and confirmed, and a minor issue with the deed to her home fixed and completely changed over to her name. Dan was handed everything in manila folders that were marked with their contents. Everyone shook hands and soon departed.

Dan helped his mom down the stairs slowly, and Cyrus took a moment to say hi to Lisa Scheiddegger and her husband Richard. As he started down the steps, he saw his friend Rob Barion stepping inside, clutching a big stack of paperwork tucked under his arm. Rob was one tough looking wolf-hybrid, a brown and tan wolf-malamute mix with brown hair that was greased back atop his head. He was forty years old, but he looked almost like he was pushing sixty. A dark, jagged scar dominated the left side of his roughened face. Rob wore his usual attire of dark slacks, a white dress shirt, and a dark pink necktie, the latter taking Cyrus by surprise. A fierce gaze looked up at Cyrus, which immediately softened when he recognized the redhead wolf.

"Hey Cyrus, what are you doing here?" Rob greeted. He stopped mid-way up the stairs to meet Cyrus and shake his paw.

"Doing some legal damage control." The wolf chuckled. "You?"

"Oh, getting ready to sue Chicago again." Chuckled Rob with a whimsical smile that had a sinister undertone to it.

"Oh boy." Cyrus laughed. "Didn't you get enough money the first time!"

"New revelations. FBI busted more people involved in the conspiracy, and it came out that the city government was targeting my factory there with audits, and other stupid bullshit."

"Oh boy..."

Rob tapped his fingers on his giant stack of paperwork. "So I'm going to sue them for six hundred million. Pocket change~" Rob chuckled.

"Wanna gimme some of that?" Cyrus grinned with a laugh. "I could def give some to my Grandma..."

"Yeah? What's going on with that?" Rob asked, his curiosity perked.

"God... my Grandma got hacked recently... she lost like eight grand from the bank from what I think was a spam caller. Jesus Christ, her phone constantly is blown up... it's never ending... and I think Grandma has dementia and we're going through the medical stuff now, and we wanted to get all the legal stuff taken care of."

"Fuckin' spam callers." Rob shook his head. "It's stupid."

"I get it completely. Apparently someone got her information and rerouted her money to a bank account that was located in Springfield. Social Security office gave all the information, the full address, everything."

"You, uhh, want me to do anything to help you?"

Cy's blue eyes went wide. He froze up and thought deep and hard about what his answer would be. There were two people in Cy's life that genuinely could scare him; Dale Bradley, the father to his ex-boyfriend Talon, and Rob Barion. Rob was a person with a ruthless resolve, and if Cyrus gave the wrong answer, someone could very easily wind up in the hospital, or worse. Cyrus remembered an incident where an angry customer stole his riding lawnmower by threatening him with a gun. Cyrus had mentioned it to Rob, and mistakenly asked him for help in getting it back. Rob, and a couple of his Gestapo like security guards confronted the troublesome customer and got Cy's lawnmower back by beating the dude with their rifles, leaving him as a bloody mess in the driveway.

"We made a report to the Sheriff's department, and they're working with the Springfield police on the matter, so we're good!" Cyrus smiled. Rob just shrugged and gave an "alrighty" for an answer.

"Social Security office is gonna try and recover the money for her."

"Well if you need it, I'm willing to give it to you, Cy."

"I really appreciate it Rob, but I think we're good!" the big wolf smiled.

"Good." Rob mustered a smile. "Well I best get this nightmare going. You take care big Cy."

"You too Rob!" Cyrus exclaimed as he started to walk to the exit. "You and Joey come on out and have some barbeque with me and Ben!"

"I'll see what I can do. See ya around, Cy."

"Bye Rob!"

Cyrus picked up the pace out the door and ran back to his now idling truck, where he hopped in and took off to take them back home to Hanover. They hit the roundabout again, and exited the downtown to hop back onto the expressway.

"Well Mom, we got all that taken care of. And hopefully soon, we'll get your money back." Dan said from the backseat.

"I sure hope so. So what did you do again about the money?"

"For the millionth time. I took money from one of the CD's to replenish your new bank account." Dan explained again. "We closed out your old checking and saving accounts and made new ones with new routing numbers. And the new cards will be coming in too."

"I'll need those, Daniel."

"Oh no, Mom, sorry. I'm in charge of the money now." Dan shook his head. "I'll give you three hundred a week, and I'm paying the bills!"

"I can still write checks, c'mon now!" Norma protested.

Dan tapped a finger on the folder that read "FINANCIAL POWER OF ATTORNEY". "Sorry Mom~"

"God damnit Daniel, I'm not stupid!" Norma yelled. "I've been handling money for sixty years now!"

"No Mom. This is the way it's going to be. This is the new normal!"

As Dan and Norma argued over her bank account, Cyrus just sat back and chuckled as he drove. Feisty Norma, that was still normal. But as he drove on following traffic, Cyrus pondered what the months and possible years ahead would be like for the family.

---

Six Months Later.

April 2023.

The ring of the telephone brought Cyrus from his slumber. The glowing clock read 3:01AM as the telephone rang. Bloodshot eyes slowly opened, and Cyrus rolled to stare at the clock. His long locks of red hair spilled all over as he let out a grunt. Stretching an arm out, he grabbed the phone and answered it.

"Hello..." Cyrus grumbled all groggily.

"Cyrus? It's your Grandma..." came Norma's voice, sounding all worried. "Cyrus, can you please pick me up and take me back to my house? I don't want to housesit this house anymore."

"Grandma... you live in that house."

"No I don't?"

"Grandma, you and Grandpa bought that house in January 1965. You don't own any other house. You have lived in that house for fifty-eight years."

"I have?"

"Yes."

"Well... can you still pick me up and take me back home?"

Cyrus hung up and sat the phone back on the receiver. He let out a sad sigh and rolled over to try and go back to sleep. Just as he was about to drift off to sleep, the phone rang again. Rolling over again, Cyrus found his Grandma calling him again. The clock read 3:35AM.

"Hello..."

"Cyrus? It's your Grandma."

"Yeah."

"Hey, can you help me get back to my home? I don't want to housesit anymore here. I want to go back to my other home?"

"Grandma... you live in that house."

"I do?"

"Is it three-oh-two Brown Street?"

"I think so?"

"Do you have a stone fireplace against the west wall?"

"Yeah! Yeah! There's a stone fireplace."

"Then you're at your house, Grandma. You moved in there in 1965."

"I have? How do you know this?"

"My brain is functioning. That's how." Cyrus grumbled all groggily. "Grandma... you've woken me up in the middle of the night..."

"It is? What time is it? I've been cleaning all afternoon!"

"Jesus Christ Grandma, it's three-thirty-six in the morning!" Cyrus exclaimed.

"It is? Oh Wowzers, I've lost track of time. Can you please pick me up?"

"Grandma, I love you, but you're really stressing all of us out."

"Can you please pick me up, Cy?"

"No."

Norma sighed and whined. "Why not?"

"Grandma you live at that house. Please. For god's sake, just sit down and rest, and try and go back to sleep. I love you, goodbye."

Cyrus hung up and sat the phone back onto the receiver. He went as far as unplugging the landline and rolling over to try and go back to sleep again. But try as he might, he just could not fall back asleep. Saying "fuck it", Cyrus got up to get ready for another busy day.

Looking tired, Cyrus propped up his head with an arm as he slowly chewed a slice of buttered malt loaf to go with his coffee. He listened to the morning news play on the TV in the living room as he swallowed and took a sip of hot coffee to get his caffeine fix. He felt really worn out mentally.

The telephone rang, and Cyrus jumped a bit. He dreaded that ring. Closing his eyes as he got up, Cyrus mentally prepared himself as he walked over to his desk to pick up on his old Bell telephone.

"Hello?"

"Hey Cy~" came his Dad's voice. He sounded tired too."

"What's up, Dad?"

"I'm gonna be late getting to the shop. Can Rudy dispatch for a couple of hours?"

"Yeah, what's up?"

"God, your fucking Grandma. How many times did she call you during the night?"

"Two as far as I can tell, around three in the morning."

"She called me six fucking times." Dan grumbled. "Needing to be picked up and taken to her other house. Is that what it's about?"

"Yeah."

"Jesus Christ, Cy. She hasn't lived in that other house on Clearview since I was a little kid!"

"Whatever her brain conjures up, huh?"

"I guess so. She threatened that she'd walk over there if I didn't come, so I fucking got over there at four in the morning to set the record straight. Hell she won't even remember this hallucination."

"Was everything okay?"

"Yeah, she was just cleaning... in the middle of the night. Her sense of day and time have really gone downhill."

"Sad." Cyrus frowned.

"I'm heading back to bed, Cy. Sorry. I'll be in around ten."

"Okay, Dad. Rest up. Bye."

Cyrus put the phone down and stood for a moment to just reflect, before going back to breakfast.

Saying goodbye to Freddy, who was getting ready for class, Cyrus was out the door at the first rays of light. Cooler in tow, Cyrus walked to his awaiting truck, his cowboy boots crunching on the gravel with each step. Dressed in a bright yellow hoodie that bore his company logo and snug Wrangler jeans, Cyrus tossed his cooler into the cab and jumped in to head to work.

Turning the key over in the ignition, Cyrus listened to the Duramax spool up and whir to life. All the gauges glowed green. The wolf sat in the driveway for a moment, looking glum, before reaching for the column shifter and throwing the truck into drive. He took off for the road and made a left to head to his headquarters.

Cyrus watched the scenery as he drove along the backcountry road. Through patches of woodland and farm fields, Cyrus listened to his Duramax burble under the hood. He took the time to sit in silence and reflect on the past six months.

After the initial meeting with her primary doctor, Norma was subjected to a battery of tests by her doctor and a neurologist assigned to her care. She had a CT scan done, and did two cognitive tests, which she both did not pass. The CT scan showed "gray areas" of her brain, a telltale sign of Alzheimer's Disease, but her neurologist quipped that a definitive diagnosis could only be done post-mortem. All the symptoms lined up to Norma having early-stage Dementia. She was given a new dementia drug, in hope of slowing down the disease progression.

The life that Norma once had, largely independent, was gone. She was no longer allowed to drive, and her doctor pulled her license from the BMV. To Norma it was a devastating blow. From the moment Dan took the keys away, Norma asked, ranted, and begged for the car back. She asked every nurse, doctor, specialist, her family, anyone who'd listen, if she could drive. The answer was always "no". She no longer handled her own money, she no longer handled her own medication. Dan took care of her financing and bill paying, and every day came over to dole out her prescriptions. Cyrus took turns with his brothers to take her grocery shopping, go to doctor's appointments, and check in on her. The whole family tried very hard to make her life as comfortable as possible. If only Norma made it easy for them.

Feisty Norma was a hellraiser. She griped and wanted to argue almost every day. The car. The medication. Her money. Every visit was a trying experience as they tried to make Norma happy, only to be snapped at and listen to a nonstop gripe session over her life.

For Cyrus, the usually calm and easy going wolf seemed strained. Stress seemed etched on his face more and more. Every phone call he dreaded. It felt at times like nothing he did was ever good enough for Norma, who always snapped at him that "she could do it!" It made him unhappy in other aspects of his life. The past six months felt exceptionally long.

Getting into work, Cyrus checked in on things and did some management work, before grabbing a riding mower and some lawn tools and loading it into his Sierra. He stowed the ramps in the bed, slammed the tailgate shut, and took off to go cut some lawns himself. He was short staffed, and at the worst possible time, as lawn care season was really taking off.

Arriving into Newark, Cyrus mowed one of his regular's, a big home owned by Mr. Phearson. He neatly mowed the lawn, giving it a diamond pattern of crisscrossing lines, and then trimmed all the bushes with his electric cutters. He eventually had to stop and take a break, doff his hoodie and adjust his bandanna tied atop his head. All the work took him a hour and a half.

The front door opened slowly to reveal Mr. Phearson, a yellow Labrador in his late fifties. He stepped outside in his formal attire and saw Cyrus leaning on the bed of his truck, looking utterly exhausted as he filled out paperwork.

"Good morning, Cyrus!" greeted the lab. "Hey! Where's your usual guys at?"

Cyrus looked up, revealing a really tired face. "Well I'm a bit short staffed there, Jeff~"

"I can see that!" Mr. Phearson exclaimed as he handed Cyrus a wad of folded up cash. Cyrus handed him the invoice, counted the money, and stowed it into a money bag he kept in his clipboard. "Cyrus, you look utterly exhausted. Are you okay?"

"I am exhausted. I didn't sleep good. I haven't slept good lately." Cyrus admitted. "I'm helping to take care of my Grandma. She has dementia and it's been... a real adventure."

Mr. Phearson frowned. "Oh Cyrus... I'm sorry to hear. I know what you're going through. I helped take care of my Mom who had Alzheimer's. There were moments where it was really tough... but to the end, we took care of her as best we could until she died of pneumonia."

"Yeah. I get it." Cyrus nodded.

"What you're experiencing is your grandmother not understanding what the problem is. You can see the problem, but she can't, Cy."

"That's what I've noticed."

"And I'm sure denial too."

"Just take it one day at a time I suppose, huh, Jeff?"

"Yeah." Smiled the lab. "Well Cyrus. I hope you have a good day."

"Thanks, Jeff. See you around~"

Cyrus made sure everything was secured in the bed before climbing into the truck and taking off to his next destination. By the early afternoon, Cyrus had mowed and tidied up three lawns. By the time he returned to his headquarters, the wolf was zapped of all energy. He dropped the mower and his tools off and told everyone he was heading on home. He couldn't go on anymore.

Returning back home, Cyrus hopped out, practically dragging himself up the steps to his porch and inside his house. He closed the door behind him, and noticed on the small table opposite of the front door, the answering machine just packed full of calls. He closed his eyes, pursed his lips, and walked over to press a finger on the playback button.

"Cyrus? It's your Grandma. Look, this TV isn't working, and I think I need a new TV, can you please come over and look at it and tell me what you think?"

He pressed the next message.

"Cyrus? It's your Grandma. Look this TV of mine, I can't get it to work, and I know you showed me how to use the cable box, but it's not working and I think the TV has gone bad. Can you please come over and work on it?"

He pressed the next message.

"Cyrus? It's your Grandma. Look, I can't find that little boy I'm protecting... I can't find him! Can you please help me?" Norma said, sounding desperate. She sniffled and started to cry, her voice choking up. "I can't find Neal, I can't find him. I can't find Neal, and that priest is around here somewhere... Cyrus please help me... I'm scared... I'm so scared."

Cyrus hit the stop button. Walking over to the couch, Cyrus dropped his cooler, which landed with a dull thud on the rug. He laid out on his couch, and the moment his head touched the pillow on the end, Cyrus fell asleep, for approximately an hour.

The telephone rang, its ringtone startling Cyrus. He threw his head up as he heard the ringtone mix with the traditional bell ringing in his Bell telephone. He took a few deep breaths to regain his composure as he got up to answer the phone on the answering machine, finding it his Dad calling him. Cyrus breathed a sigh of relief.

"Hey Dad~"

"Cyrus, I gotta head over to your Grandma's and give her, her medication and show you some bill stuff. Can you come over and help me fix her damn TV again?"

"Yeah. I'll be over."

Cyrus hopped back into his truck and drove over to his Grandma's house. He got there right as Dan arrived in his black Tahoe. They both went inside together to greet Norma, who was happy to see them.

As Dan doled out her medicine and went over her bills, Cyrus worked on the TV. Norma had a cable box, that was wired up to her ancient Sony Trinitron that she adored so much. He simply selected the composite output on the box, which fixed the TV. A game show played on the crummy looking screen.

As Cyrus finished up, the telephone rang. Norma had a Bell trimline sitting on her coffee table. He picked it up to hear a deep accented voice ask for Norma. Cyrus quickly hung it up. He glanced over to hear Dan and Norma arguing as usual.

"Mom I am telling you for the umpteenth time. There is no little boy."

"Yes there is! He's right over there!"

"Where? What are you seeing? I see a mop and bucket, Mom."

"That's the little boy, that's Neal!" Norma shouted. "Neil! Tell Daniel you're there! Yes I know I can see you!"

"Neal, Mom, Neal is a seventy year old man who lives in Ireland." Dan grumbled.

Cyrus leaned in through the doorway into the dining room and kitchen to watch Dan and Norma fight.

"I'm telling you Mom, this is a hallucination. There is no little boy. There is no priest."

"I see the little boy! Now I know you think I'm stupid."

"I never said that, Mom. Don't put words in my mouth!"

"Well you're telling me I'm seeing things and I don't like being told I am hallucinating! People will think I'm crazy!"

"Well you are fucking crazy!" Dan shouted.

"Dad! Grandma! Easy!" Cyrus shouted. "Grandma... I fixed your TV."

"Oh good!" Norma smiled. "I think my TV is going bad! You know they don't make those kinds of TV's anymore!"

"Grandma, you hit the wrong button and changed the cable box's output."

"I did?"

"Here, let me show you again." Cyrus said as he grabbed the remote. He showed his Grandma what buttons she needed to press. She nodded and watched as Cyrus told her how to use the cable box. He went as far as taking a legal pad from her little letter desk and drawing the remote and annotating it to show her the steps. He tore the yellow page out and sat it on the coffee table, by the telephone which rang again. Cyrus picked it up to hear the same thick accented voice, which he hung up on.

"Cyrus, don't be rude... it's rude to hang up!" Norma protested.

"Grandma, they're spammers. What did I tell you?"

"What did you tell me?"

"DON'T TALK TO THEM!" Cyrus exclaimed with a smile on his face. "Stop talking to them! Stop it!"

"Mom, what did I tell you as well?" Dan asked with a glare.

"I don't remember?"

"That's the problem!"

"I don't see that I have any problems, Dan and Cy!"

"Oh trust me, you do."

"There is nothing wrong with me!"

"Yes there is Mom! It's your mind slipping!"

"I have just as sharp of a mind as you!"

"No you don't!"

"C'mon. Stop it guys." Cyrus stepped in.

Dan threw his arms up in annoyance. "Alright, Mom. Here's your medicine laid out. Here's your heart pill! Here is your dementia pill! Here's your thyroid pill!"

Norma nodded. "You know I can take care of my medicine~"

"No you can't Mom."

"Yes I can! What does the doctor know?"

"He's a doctor..." Dan glared.

"I know how my body works, I know how I am! You all just think I'm stupid!" Norma shouted.

"No. We don't think that..." Dan said calmly. "You have problems."

"What about you? You have problems too! You have back problems!"

"Mine are physical... yours is mental..." Dan rolled his eyes. "Jesus fucking Christ, Mom."

"What problems do I have?" Norma asked.

Cyrus sighed a bit and chuckled. "You were diagnosed with dementia. You have cognitive decline."

"How do they know?" Norma asked. "How do they know? And who gives them the right to take away my car! I need my car!"

"The law." Dan grumbled. "Mom... you're really stressing all of us out."

"There is nothing wrong with me!"

"Mom... why can't you just let us help you?"

"I have done it for over sixty-five years!"

"Mom, that was then, this is now." Dan snapped.

"Grandma... you're facing cognitive problems, and you can't do what you did before, because you're almost eighty-five."

"I think I'm in great shape!" Norma exclaimed, showing off her slender physique.

"Mom! That's physical health. You have mental health issues."

"No I don't!"

"Dementia?"

"Yeah? So?"

"Fuck it." Dan said, throwing his arms up. "See you later, Mom."

"You don't have to be so mean to me!" Norma exclaimed.

"Okay. Bye Mom."

"Grandma, I gotta get going."

"You take care, Cyrus~" Norma smiled at him. "And don't forget to tell Neal goodbye!"

Cyrus closed his eyes, and just cynically chuckled as he turned to leave. He closed the door behind him.

Returning home, Cyrus turned the radio up to drown his mind out with some Lynyrd Skynyrd. This is what their relationship with Norma was reduced to. Almost daily yelling matches over everything. Their relationship dynamic was forever changed.

Pulling back into his driveway, Cyrus threw the shifter into park and just sat for a moment in his truck. He looked completely burned out as he sat listening to music in the air conditioned cab.

---

Friday, mid-day. The sun shone brightly in an almost cloudless sky over Dillon Lake. Murky lake water lapped against the sandy pebble beach by the dock ramp zone. The water had a funky bouquet of algae and sewage, fed by the Licking River that flowed into it. Dillon Lake was once a nice place to visit, a place where the Filtons went to all the time for picnics and swims.

Pulling up to a parking spot, Cyrus hopped out first and quickly walked over to open the passenger door for his Grandma. He took her paw and gently helped the frail wolfess down to the pavement below. Norma wore a pair of gray pants with a blue sweater. A big wide brimmed hat and dark sunglasses covered her face. Cyrus closed the passenger door and walked over to open the back right door and fetch Norma's big wicker picnic basket. He grabbed it, closed the door and adjusted his blue boonie hat atop his head, before putting an arm around Norma to help keep her balance as they walked towards the pebble beach to have lunch together and enjoy the sunshine.

"I remember before this was a lake." Norma recalled as she gazed around at the scenery. "And I remember there used to be a nice picnic bench around here! Where me and your grandfather would sometimes come to eat lunch together! What happened to it? It's gone!"

"Erosion, Grandma." Chuckled Cyrus. "This place used to be nice, but eh, not anymore."

"I guess nothing lasts forever." Norma remarked with a hint of sadness on her voice. "Many years ago, my auntie and uncle had a family friend who owned a house where Dillon Lake flooded when they built the dam. They had to move away, my god, I remember because your father was born when it happened."

"1960." Cyrus nodded.

"We would always visit there in the summer. Even after I married your grandfather, we'd still pay them a visit. Now it's gone. Underwater." Norma recalled. "That was a long time ago."

"Indeed it was, Grandma." Cyrus responded as he fumbled around in the picnic basket to hand her lunch out. Sitting on an old weatherbeaten tree trunk, they listened to the sounds of the water lap against the rocks while eating. Cyrus had a hoagie stuffed with ham and lettuce, with a bag of chips, while Norma munched on some apple sauce and a sandwich. While Cyrus washed his down with a bottle of Perrier, Norma preferred some Scotch with a dab of soda water.

"I know they say you're not supposed to drink in public... fuck it." Norma brushed the sign off. "I'm almost eighty-five, what are they gonna do? Arrest me?"

"Grandma, yeah, they can." Cyrus laughed with a grin.

"They'd arrest a lil' old lady like me, Cy?"

"Yeah, they will." Chuckled the wolf.

"Pfft." Norma laughed a bit. "After all the shit going on... I think that's going on... I don't know anymore. I feel like I need to start drinking..."

"I didn't know you stopped?" Cyrus joked with a grin.

"Cyrus I don't get it, my brain seems like it doesn't want to work anymore."

"Grandma, that's why you got diagnosed with dementia."

Norma turned to look at Cyrus. "Cy? Do you really see the problem? Like what do you see that's wrong?"

"Your short term memory is severely degraded, you forget stuff, and you're having hallucinations." Cyrus explained.

"I wish they wouldn't call them hallucinations, because I just don't get it."

"You're seeing things that nobody else sees, what would you call it?"

"I don't know. What am I? A doctor?" Norma shrugged as he took another sip of her drink. "And how do these doctors know? I don't see the problem!"

"That's the problem." Cyrus chuckled.

"What do these doctors know? I don't think they have a right to take someone's car away. That should be the person who is driving!"

Cyrus just laughed. "Oh Grandma..."

"What?"

"They did a bunch of tests on you. You were ruled medically incompetent. You didn't pass your cognitive tests. You have been told by two doctors and four nurses. You. Can't. Drive."

"Well what am I supposed to do? Just stay cooped up in my house all day?" Norma groaned.

"Well it's not like you did much during the week! You drove to Bradley Supply on a Wednesday, and church on Sunday. We started taking you to the store in Newark on Saturdays."

"Maybe I want to go out and do something?"

"Like what? What is there to do in Hanover?"

"I don't know?"

"You don't even have an answer."

"I want my independence back! I feel like a prisoner of my house."

"Don't people from church offer to take you places?"

"I don't want to ask people. I want to do it myself."

"You're not driving anymore. Doctor's orders."

"Fuck the doctors." Norma scoffed as he downed the last of her Scotch. "They don't know what it's like."

"Grandma, I'm not arguing with you."

"Fine, fine. Whatever." Norma grumbled as she poured herself more Scotch into a plastic tumbler. "Wait till you're eighty-five!"

"Well hopefully I make it that far." Laughed the wolf. "Nothing's set in stone ya know?"

"I want to make it to ninety, Cy. See what it's like?" Norma chuckled. "I made Hanover my home, and I hope to die there and be buried there."

"Grandma, nothing is set in stone."

"That's my goal."

"Grandma, you may reach a point where you may have to go into assisted living."

"I just won't go. Nope. No. No. Not for me. I'd rather just die." Norma fired back.

"You might not have a choice."

"I won't go."

"Grandma, I love you, but you make it so hard."

"What do you mean? I'm one of the most easy to get along with people ever!"

"HA. When it goes your way." Cyrus laughed. He couldn't help but laugh at Norma's comment. She just glared a bit, swirled her alcohol and took another sip.

After lunch, Cyrus helped Norma back to the truck. They walked along the empty beach back towards the boat dock. Norma calmed back down as the alcohol helped numb her temper. As they walked, Norma told Cyrus stories about her youth and times spent at Dillon Lake with his late grandfather Gary.

"I miss Gary so much. When did he die again?"

"Almost eight years ago."

"Wow. How old was he again?"

"Eighty-eight."

"How old would he be now if he was alive?"

"A few months from turning ninety-six."

"Your grandfather was the man of my dreams." Norma recalled to Cyrus. "From the first moment I laid eyes on him. I knew he was the one. I ran into him one day when I went with my uncle to the hardware store. Gary was buying a hammer for work, and we got the talking there. He was such a gentleman, and I was shocked that was twenty-nine and unmarried. He had just gotten out of the Army. I knew Gary was the one from that moment. And we were married a long time... how long again, Cy?"

"You and Grandpa were married for fifty-eight years."

"A long time."

"Yeah." Smiled the wolf.

"Hold on, I need to sit down for a minute..." Norma announced as she caught her breath. She sat down on one of the steps that led to the parking lot. "Sorry! This damn heart of mine gets racing...and I gotta catch my breath." Cyrus sat down with her as she caught her breath.

"Getting old kind of sucks. So don't get old Cy!"

"Heh. Don't remind me." Chuckled Cyrus amusingly.

Norma looked introspective. "I'm a hard luck woman now, Cy."

Cyrus quietly nodded.

"I really am a hard luck woman now." Frowned the elderly wolfess. "I used to think when I was a teenager that I was a hard luck woman too... after what had happened to me."

"I understand completely."

"Today, something like that happened, you'd have all this love and support, support groups. None of that shit was around when I got raped." Norma shook her head. "I was one of Ireland's fallen girls... a shameful sinner, the girl that got pregnant at thirteen... You couldn't even talk about being pregnant back then. Such a hush-hush thing! Especially from such an esteemed priest in town. Father Hubbley. Everyone just adored and loved him, until they found out he molested dozens of girls. It took a long time, but he got busted. His whole family name, ruined. Yeah, Cy, it sounds crazy. But I had my first born son, Neal, at age thirteen... March the first, 1952. It was scary. What do you know about your body, anything when you're thirteen? I remember I wasn't even allowed to hold the baby. They didn't want me to get attached or anything. I gave birth to him, they let me see him for a second, and I christened him Neal, after my grandfather who had passed away. They then took him away."

Norma looked away for a moment, as if to keep her composure. "I never knew what happened to that little baby for forty-three years... until I got a letter from a Neal Magruder from Cork Ireland in 1995. You know today, it would be a completely different story. Well almost. I mean, I could have had an abortion, or support group. Not back then. It was hard to be a woman back then, Cyrus. You men would never understand."

"Understandable." Cyrus nodded.

"My family was so horrified that they didn't want me to be shamed in Ireland. So the whole family scraped together the money, and bought me an airplane ticket for the United States. That was really expensive back then! Family from America sent money, and my parents sent a bunch of money to get that ticket. And when you're just fourteen, flying across the ocean is a scary thing. I still remember them saying they wanted me over there so fast because they feared me being on a boat and the same thing happening again."

Norma gazed out at the lake. "I was a hard luck woman then... and at the end of my life... I'm a hard luck woman now."

As Norma talked, Cyrus listened, but something really struck him. He gazed at his grandmother's face, and it dawned on him how badly aged she looked. She was elderly, but in the past six months, Norma looked like she had aged another ten years. The stress and despair was taking its toll. Cy's aching heart hurt more for his grandmother. She craved her independence, and did not understand why she no longer could do the things that she once did. It only made the wolf sadder as he thought about it.

---

Messy locks of red hair spilled out from around Cy's head as he slept on his back. The clock glowed 11:15AM as Cyrus really slept in. He had been up till two in the morning after he got another frantic phone call from his grandma, this time an actual emergency. Her water main broke in the kitchen, and her house was flooding. He rushed over with his brothers and Dad, and they managed to make an emergency repair to stop the flooding. Ed cut off the damaged section with a blowtorch and he and Darryl welded on a new section of pipe with a valve. They then spent hours mopping up the aftermath and trying to dry everything out. Cyrus was utterly exhausted by the time he went to bed. He was really feeling the strain of being a caretaker. Everyone in the family was feeling the strain, especially Cyrus and Dan, who bore the brunt of Norma's wrath.

Finally at 11:30, Cyrus opened his eyes and slowly got up. The bright light through the window made his eyes wince. He had a bad headache and his neck ached. Turning his head, Cyrus was surprised to see his boyfriend in bed with him. Ben was taking a nap, his back turned to him as he slumbered. Cyrus mustered a smile and gently rubbed his arm and side. Ben slowly stirred awake.

"Yay, you're not dead~" Ben joked as he rolled over. "How are you feeling?"

"I feel awful."

"Like hung over awful?"

"Bad headache awful."

Ben smiled and gave his boyfriend a kiss. "Why don't I get you some water and Tylenol."

"Please~"

Ben got up, wearing just his snug briefs as he walked into Cy's attached bathroom to return with a paper cup filled with water from the sink tap, and some Tylenol, which Cy quickly downed with a sip of water. Cyrus threw the blanket off of him, and slowly got up to go take a shower with his boyfriend.

In the walk-in-shower, steam enveloped them as Cyrus stood in the hot stream of water, letting it fall upon his neck as he tried to loosen it up. Eventually he managed to crack his neck, which made an audible "pop" which brought much needed relief. Ben stood by him and rubbed his hard flat stomach and tattooed chest with nipple rings, which bore an artful skull and crossbones design. Flipping his wet hair back, Cy put his arms around Ben and held him as they shared a deep long kiss.

"I love you sexy."

"Love you too Cy~"

They shared another deep kiss before Cy grabbed some shampoo to lather up his bright red locks. He scrubbed his scalp and made sure all his long hair got soaped up to get it clean for the day. "God last night was a disaster."

"What happened?"

"Grandma called me around ten. I was just about ready to go to bed and she called. Her damn water main blew up under the sink and it flooded half her house."

"Oh no!"

"Yeah!" Cyrus exclaimed. "So me, Dad, Darryl and Ed all went over to play damage control. Aunt Becky, Mom, Uncle Ronnie, all of us spent hours cleaning that fucking house up. And in the midst of all this? Grandma wanted to argue with Dad about the money and car."

"The fucking car." Ben stared blankly. "Of all the things going on in her life, she's worried about the fucking car?"

"Every day." Cyrus grimaced as he tipped his head back to rinse his hair off. "Every. Single. Day."

"Wow. Well that part of her memory works, huh?" the husky chuckled as he rubbed soap into his fur.

"Heh, you're telling me." Cyrus laughed. "Can't remember what the fuck she did ten minutes ago, but sure can remember all the intimate details about that car... The car... the car..."

"I heard that's what Alzheimer's patients do. They just rant about one thing all the time. Like a loop." Ben recalled.

"Grandma's really exhausting me..." Cyrus admitted.

"I can see the strain on your face..." Ben frowned. "Maybe when we're done here... we can play some catching up to do in bed..." The husky smiled and playfully groped Cy.

"Eh. I don't really feel like it today babe~" Cyrus frowned. "Sorry. Horny Cy isn't here today."

"Wow. That's a first." Ben frowned. "I was kind of expecting to get railed as usual."

"Grandma's killing my sex drive."

Ben covered his mouth and about lost it. "Oh lord, I don't ever want to hear those words strung together like that again."

"Oh wow, yeah, that was awful." Cyrus laughed. "Now my brain ain't workin'!"

"It's the stress, Cy." Ben said with concern on his voice. "You gotta take care of yourself too."

"Yeah." Cyrus nodded as he put his arms around him again for another kiss. "God, I have such a sexy, adorable cumdump!"

"And my STI check came back perfect too."

"Awesome!"

After drying off and getting dressed, Cyrus ventured downstairs. Leaving his hair untied, it gracefully flowed down his backside as he walked into the kitchen to go make a late breakfast.

"Here, I'll cook sexy." Ben offered as he took the frying pan from Cy's grip. "How's work?"

"That's the other thing that's stressing me." Cyrus admitted. "So I had to let a couple guys ago on Wednesday."

"Oh boy..." Ben grimaced. "Aren't you short staffed?"

"Yes! And these ding dongs decide to smoke fucking weed in a company truck, and get BUSTED FOR IT." Cyrus rolled his eyes. "Jesus fucking Christ, what am I going to do?"

"Everybody seems short staffed these days. It's like nobody wants to work."

"I mean, when an eight year old can make twenty-six million dollars on YouTube, I guess some people are willing to publically flog themselves for attention and money, verses making money the old fashioned way with hard work!"

"Pfft. That's what Mexicans are for!" Ben joked.

"Ha! Yeah." Cyrus laughed. "Oh lord... Last year I had a hell of a time getting guys to come in, and the fuel prices were a disaster... if Rob didn't give me a hundred grand I would have been fucked... UGH!!!! And my Grandma on my mind..."

"You have a lot on your plate..." Ben frowned as he cracked eggs into a bowl to make an omelet.

"How did I get myself into this situation..."

"You didn't, Cy. It's just how life rolls."

"More like rolling down a hill with the ties coming off!" Cyrus exclaimed. He visibly shuddered when the phone rang. "Oh god! Here we go!" the wolf grinned to his boyfriend as he walked over to his desk to pick the Bell telephone up.

"Damage report!" Cyrus exclaimed into the phone.

"You won't believe what the fuck your Grandma did at the store..." came his father's voice. Dan sounded very annoyed.

"Oh boy..." Cyrus muttered into the receiver.

"So... Norma forgot who's shopping cart was who's... and she grabbed some guy's cart by mistake..."

"Okay."

"The guy was a fucking prick and he yelled at her. Norma got mad and smacked him! I had to step in because that dude was gonna deck Norma. He tried to punch me and I kicked that motherfucker in the nuts and dropped him. Me and Norma were kindly escorted out of the store by two police officers, and we were told we are no longer allowed to shop at Kroger."

"Whaaaaaaatttttt..." Cyrus exclaimed. His comment made Ben look over as he cooked.

"Can you believe this fucking shit!?" Dan exclaimed. "I told Mom that she needed to stay with her cart, and what does she do? She wanders off and forgets what fucking cart is her's and this happens. Now what? Walmart?"

"Oh god, Walmart." Cyrus laughed morbidly.

"Darryl and his girlfriend are taking her to Walmart currently." Dan groaned.

"I'm gonna have to take her to Giant Eagle or something." Cyrus muttered.

"And the other thing... her god damn telephone number still has not been switched! I have called the telecom company at least four times and they keep telling me they have computer issues and won't switch the number! She keeps getting and she keeps speaking to these fuckin' muzzies on the phone! I keep telling her to hang the fuck up!"

"I'll try and call them." Cyrus offered.

"This shit's really getting to me, Cy. She made so upset over the money and the car shit again..."

"Again?"

"Every god damn day... claiming I'm stealing her money, the stupid car... the doctors... how many times do I have to explain it? I told her that if she thinks that she can drive? I gave her the phone, she can call the doctor and talk to him. The money? I told her I'd take her to the bank and she can get all her information and I can take my name off her accounts. Fuck it. If she fucks up talking to those goat fuckers and loses all her money again, she's on her own. She can fall back on Ron or something. I don't give a fuck."

"Dad. Calm down please."

"Cy, I'm so frustrated."

"I'm frustrated too."

"She made me so mad I got a bad headache and a god damn nosebleed... I think I'm gonna lay down for a while."

"Dad, just take it easy and rest."

"Okay, son. Take care Cy."

"Bye, Dad."

Cyrus hung the phone up and looked at Ben with a burned out expression on his face.

"So what happened now?" Ben asked as he sat down for brunch with Cyrus, who sat back down and grabbed the salt and pepper off the table.

"Oh Grandma and Dad got kicked out of Kroger for a fight by some asshole." Cyrus remarked nonchalantly before taking a bite of his omelet.

"What!?" Ben exclaimed.

"Grandma forgot what cart was her's, grabbed some dude's cart by mistake, and he flipped out, and she made a scene and slapped him, and he tried to deck her, and Dad got into a fight and long story short Kroger told them not to come back!"

"Wow."

"I say that too." Cyrus shook his head. "What am I gonna do?"

"You can only do what you can, Cy. I mean, you can't babysit her twenty-four-seven, and it would drive you insane if you did." Ben reasoned. "You have to let it be. You and everyone else is doing what they can."

"It takes a village..." Cyrus rolled his eyes.

---

At Newark's Walmart, Darryl and Hanna had a handful helping Norma shop. Unsure of where anything was, Norma was frustrated as she pushed the shopping cart under the watchful eye of Darryl and Hanna.

"Okay, Grandma do you need anything in this aisle?" Darryl asked.

"What's in the aisle?"

"Cereal?"

"Yes. I need a box of corn flakes."

"Okay."

Norma looked frustrated as she scanned the aisle. "Why are we even here?"

"Because you and Dad got kicked out of Kroger."

"We did? Why?"

Darryl looked frustrated at Hanna, who just awkwardly smiled and shrugged at her boyfriend.

"Grandma... for the millionth time... someone tried to hit you and Dad protected you and you got kicked out."

"Why would your Dad need to protect me? I'm a tough old gal." Norma scoffed.

Darryl threw his arms up into the air. Hanna motioned for him to calm down.

"Grandma Filton, let's go to the next aisle to get some coffee."

"Perfect." Norma nodded. "What else do I need, Darryl?"

"Don't you have the grocery list?"

"Why would I have a list? I'm not stupid, I know what I need?"

"Then what do you need?"

"I don't remember."

Darryl stared at Hanna again.

An hour later, Norma, Darryl, and Hanna left Walmart with a shopping cart full of groceries. Norma griped about the experience to a visibly flustered Darryl, who helped guide her back to the truck.

"I don't like shopping here, Darryl. It's too noisy! Everything's not where I'm used to." Norma griped. "I want to go to Kroger next time!"

"Grandma..." Darryl rolled his eyes. "You are not allowed to come back there!"

"Why not?" Norma asked all confused.

Darryl stomped a boot onto the pavement. "God damnit Grandma, for the umpteenth time! You and Dad got into a fight with someone at the Kroger store who tried to hit you, and they told you to not come back."

"We did?"

"Oh Grandma..." Darryl sighed. "C'mon, let's get this loaded."

Norma walked up to the door to the backseat of Darryl's SuperDuty. She grabbed the latch and felt the door be heavier than expected. Putting all her might into it, Norma threw the door open, which quickly built up speed and struck a parked BMW next to the truck. Darryl grabbed the side of his head and yelled.

"God damnit!" Darryl shouted.

Norma saw that she put a big dent in the black BMW's driver side door. "Oh no." she muttered.

"Oh Grandma Filton..." Hanna sighed.

The owner of the BMW, who had witnessed the impact, came running up. A snobby looking guy in his thirties, a lanky black wolf with tousled brown hair looked visibly irritated. "Look at my fucking car you fucking idiots!"

"It was an accident!" Norma exclaimed. "Don't worry about it!"

"Don't worry about it!? Don't worry about a sixty thousand dollar sports car I spent years wanting to get! Don't worry about it? Listen here ya old coot!"

"HEY!" Darryl snarled. "Don't you dare talk to my Grandma like that!"

"Yeah? And what are you gonna do about it, ya big dumb hick!" the wolf snapped.

Darryl glared at him and grabbed the wolf by the collar of his shirt and yanked him into his face. "TALK TO ME LIKE THAT AGAIN MOTHERFUCKER!"

"HEY! HEY!" Norma and Hanna screamed.

Darryl threw him back into his car and grabbed his phone. "I'll call my insurance agent. You can call yours and we'll get it fixed. I got full coverage."

The wolf glared at Darryl and rubbed the collar of this button up shirt.

"Well why don't you use my insurance!" Norma exclaimed.

"Is this truck in your name, Grandma?"

"Well... no?"

"Then it won't work that way! Plus! You don't have car insurance, because you don't drive anymore!"

"I don't think my doctor should have that right!"

"Don't start Grandma, I gotta make this call."

"I can still do all of this, and all of you just think I'm stupid- there is nothing wrong with me!"

"Yeah there's a huge problem!" Darryl yelled as he dialed his insurance agent's number.

Other patrons in the parking lot slowed up and watched the yelling match.

---

Norma answered the knock at the door to reveal Ronnie and Becky Filton. Becky and Ronnie both carried food they had made for her. "Surprise!" Becky smiled.

"What's this?" Norma asked curiously.

"Dinner!" Becky exclaimed.

"I was about to fix something on the stove!"

"Oh no you're not! Let's eat!" Ronnie exclaimed.

Norma grabbed some china from the cupboard and sat it down at the table. Becky had made a pot roast, and an apple pie for dessert. The chubby wolfess doled out slices of pot roast and slow roasted vegetables for everyone, and they all sat down for a meal.

"I gotta tell you, I think someone's coming into my house and rearranging everything." Norma exclaimed. "I can't find my jewelry now! And my phone book is missin'!"

Ronnie glanced over at Becky, who pursed her lips.

"Mom, I think you're misplacing things."

"Oh no, no. I don't misplace anything!" Norma assured.

"Mom, I think you're moving stuff and forgetting about it."

"I am one hundred percent convinced that someone is breaking in here and moving stuff around!"

"Grandma Filton, why would someone break into someone's home just to move stuff around? Usually if you're gonna break the law... you're gonna steal something?" Becky remarked.

"Yeah! Make it worthwhile!" Ronnie exclaimed.

"Plus, you're here all the time."

"That's the other thing too... I'm always cooped up here! I can't drive my car out there! It's not fair! How can a doctor just decide that someone can't drive anymore! I don't think they should be allowed to do that."

"It's the way it is." Becky shrugged. "You know I'm willing to take you places when needed."

"Oh no, it's fine."

"Weren't you just complaining about not being able to get out of the house?" Ronnie asked his Mom.

"Well... yeah?"

Ronnie chuckled. "Mom, you make no sense. You complain about not being able to get out, and we offer you, Ed, Darryl, Cyrus, Dan, all of us offer you to take you places, and you won't go."

"Grandma Filton, your days of complete independence are over."

"Well it's not right, Becky."

"Look, I understand you're frustrated, but this is the way it is for your own safety."

"What safety? I'm always safe!"

"You're almost eighty-five."

"Christ if I fall it's scary." Ronnie muttered. "And I'm sixty-five!"

"If I can't drive, then I'm just gonna start walking to places!"

"Oh no you're not!" Becky exclaimed. "Where the hell are you going to walk to!?"

"The gas station? Bradley Supply!"

"Mom! That's two miles away! You're not walking to Bradley Supply!"

"Well I can't stay cooped up in here all the time, Ron!"

"Then call us and we'll take you!" Ronnie exclaimed.

"Now you're all sounding just like Daniel... thinking I'm stupid or something. Well I'm not stupid! I raised all of you and took care of this family for over sixty years!"

"We know that, Mom..." Ronnie groaned. "But you can't do it anymore!"

"Yes I can! There is nothing wrong with me, Ron!"

"Dementia? Mom?"

"Okay, so what?"

"So what? Grandma Filton, your short term memory is gone~" Becky tried to explain, before being cut off by the phone ringing.

Norma started to get up to answer it, only to be cut off by Ronnie. "Oh no, Mom. I'm answering it!"

"Ronnie I can answer it!" Norma protested as Ronnie grabbed the trimline off the wall in the dining room.

"Hello? Yeah? You wanna speak to Norma? WELL FUCK YOU AND THE HORSE YOU RODE IN ON MOTHERFUCKER!" Ronnie screamed to the telemarketer before hanging up.

"Ronald Filton!" Norma yelled.

"MOM! Stop talking to spammers!" Ronnie yelled. "This is how you lost all that money in the first place!"

"It was the bank's fault!"

"How was it the bank's fault?"

"They never told me!"

"Did you read the bank statements?"

"Yeah!"

"Then how did you not realize you weren't getting paid?"

"Well... I don't remember.... But it's the bank's fault!"

"Jesus Christ Mom... you're losing it..." Ronnie frowned.

"IT'S NOT MY FAULT!" Norma screamed. She got so upset that she grabbed an empty whisky bottle and threw it at Ronnie. He just barely missed it as it shattered against the wall, knocking an old calendar off along with a couple picture frames that came crashing down. Becky looked shocked at Norma's aggression, and Ronnie looked very upset.

Norma had tears well up in her eyes. "You and your brother have ruined my life!" She broke down in tears. "You and Daniel have ruined my fucking life..."

"You have health problems Mom... and you can't accept it." Ronnie said, more calmly.

"Grandma Filton, you have a cognitive condition." Becky tried to reason.

Norma grabbed a paper towel to dab her bloodshot eyes. "Maybe I just don't belong here anymore. Maybe I just need to die."

"Mom, stop talking nonsense."

"I feel like I serve no purpose." Norma sniffled. "I'm just... here... maybe I just don't belong anymore."

"Mom... you have problems..." Ronnie frowned.

"We all have problems..."

"Not like yours, Mom..."

---

Tuesday morning was cool and gray in the morning. An overnight rainstorm left the landscape drenched, and standing water pooled in low lying areas all through the Hanover region. Sloshing through puddles was Talon Bradley's huge Ram truck, the black Ram 3500 burbling into the parking lot of his daughter's elementary school. Talon slowed up and rolled slowly with the drop off queue that wrapped around the front of the building.

Talon sat back behind the wheel in his usual work attire of boots, jeans, and a bright green hoodie and beanie, which bore his landscaping company's name, "Bradley Supply and Landscaping". His eight year old daughter Emily sat in front seat, clutching her pink backpack and wearing a pink jacket and pants. Her brown hair was neatly tied back into a ponytail.

"Now lil' lady, I hope you have a fantastic day at school." Talon said with a smile.

"I will, Dad!" Emily smiled big for him.

"That's the spirit!" Talon exclaimed as he parked at the drop off zone. Talon leaned over and kissed his daughter on the cheek and wished her well as she jumped down and ran to meet up with her friends. Talon watched happily as they all went inside as he departed for the exit. Turning back onto Licking Valley Road, Talon turned the radio on and blasted some rock music as he drove to his father's farm supply and grocery store that was just outside of town. The big red Doberman sat back with one paw on the wheel as he drove down the main road and passed through town.

Coming around a bend, Talon saw a lone figure walking on the road, a frail looking, elderly person. They were wrapped up in a thick wool coat, and a white knitted cap atop their head, shuffling along slowly. The Doberman sat up in his seat and put two and two together when he saw that it was an elderly gray wolf shuffling along.

"Oh boy..." he muttered as he passed by. Checking his mirrors for any traffic, Talon put his hazards on and stopped on the road. He threw the shifter into park and quickly hopped out. Talon ran over to see Norma Filton struggling along her journey.

"Norma!" Talon shouted. "What the hell are you doing!?"

"Oh good morning, Talon!" Norma waved. "I forgot a few things from the store, so I was going to get them at your father's place!"

"Norma are you insane!? What the hell are you doing walking!?"

"Well I can't drive! So what else am I gonna do?"

"Oh my god... come on Norma... let me give you a ride..." Talon offered as he put an arm around her to help her to his truck.

"Look I can make it myself, Talon! It's okay!"

"I'm not gonna let you walk two miles... no, no."

Talon helped her into his Ram truck, and they took off for his father's store.

"Norma if your family saw you doing this, you know how mad they would be?"

"Well they don't need to know now do they!" Norma exclaimed. "You know, I can take care of things myself still! I'm like a damn child to them! I don't know why?"

Talon just kept his mouth shut.

Pulling into the parking lot of Bradley Supply, Talon hopped out and helped Norma out of his truck. He helped bring her inside where he could hear his father argue with his brother in law as usual over some trivial matter. His eighty-seven year old grandmother Phyllis counted money at the counter.

"Now do you know what you need, Norma?" Talon asked. She reached into her purse and pulled out a piece of paper with stuff written down on it.

"I followed my grandson's advice!" Norma exclaimed.

As Norma did her shopping, Talon walked over to grimace at his dad and grandma.

"Talon, what's this?" Phyllis asked in a quiet tone.

"I dropped Emily off from school and I'm driving here and I see her on the road."

"On the road!?" Dale snapped quietly. "Like... walking alone... on the road... here?"

"Yeah!" Talon quietly exclaimed.

"Jesus fucking Christ Talon, that's like two miles from here to Norma's home!" Dale exclaimed.

"When she gets her stuff, I'll take her back home."

Phyllis looked sat at Norma shopping alone. The elderly Doberman reached for the phone under the desk and dialed the number to Cy's landscaping business.

"Filton's Finest Landscaping Company! Ed speaking, how can I help you?" came the cheerful voice of Cy's brother.

"Hey Ed, this is Phyllis over here at Bradley supply."

"Oh hey, Phyllis! How are you doing?"

"Well I'm okay. Uhh, is your father around?"

"Yeah, just one second~"

Phyllis heard the phone switch and it pick up to have Dan answer.

"Dan Filton."

"Good morning Dan, it's Phyllis over here at Bradley Supply."

"Oh hey Phylli~ How's things?"

"Well they're okay. Uhh, I wanted to let you know that Talon found your mother out walking on Licking Valley Road to come here."

"WHAT!?" Dan shouted. It startled the elderly Dober.

"Jesus... Dan, calm down!" Phyllis said quietly as she watched Norma. "Talon picked her up and drove her here, so she can pick up a few things."

"God damnit Mom..." Dan grumbled. "Look I'll be over."

"No, no. It's okay, Dan. Talon will drive her back."

"I'm gonna give her a piece of my mind..."

"Dan, Dan, Dan, please listen to me."

"Okay."

"I know you're upset at Norma, and I know that you care, but you have to tread lightly with dementia. If she makes one remark that you're mean to her, that could really screw you with the authorities."

"Phylli I can't wear kid gloves... she has to know the truth of the matter that what she's doing is reckless."

"I understand that Dan, but I don't think she understands that." Phyllis explained. "There's only so much that you and your family can do. Especially to a woman of Norma's caliber..."

"Look I'm a military man, and when you're told and given an order? You follow it. A doctor or lawyer gives you the facts? You follow it to the T."

"I understand that completely. But you have to tread lightly. Plus she's your mother."

"She's gonna get herself killed, Phyllis."

"I know."

Dale stepped out from around the counter to help Norma with a pack of napkins from the shelf. "Misses Filton, let me help you here."

"Oh thank you. I just don't have the strength anymore, Dale."

"I'll hold the basket for you."

"Just one more thing, Dale."

Dale followed Norma around to see her struggle to pick up a bushel of potatoes. "I forgot these for some reason at the store. My mind just doesn't work anymore Dale. I don't know why?"

Dale glanced at Talon, who had to stifle a smile. He turned his head back to help Norma with the bushel of potatoes. "What the hell do you think you're doing walking here?"

"Well I can't drive anymore!"

"You should not be walking this far!" Dale exclaimed. "You're gonna hurt yourself."

"Bollocks..." Norma grumbled. "Everyone keeps saying that. I'll be careful."

"Jesus Christ, it's over two miles. I wouldn't walk two miles and I'm almost seventy!"

"Does everything just think I'm stupid or useless, or what?" Norma snapped at Dale. She looked visibly annoyed.

"We don't think you're stupid, Norma. We know you have health issues?"

"And what would those be?"

"Dementia?"

"Oh rubbish, there's nothing wrong with me!" Norma said in defiance as she walked to the counter to check out. At the register was Dale's younger brother Tim, and behind him stood his brother-in-law Randy Martins. Tim rang Norma up while Randy bagged everything. The total came up to be sixty-five dollars. Norma fumbled through her purse and Talon watched as her facial expression turned to a look of shock as Norma realized she left her bank card back home.

"Oh no... Oh no..." the old lady sighed. "Oh god damnit! I left the card behind! I don't have the money!"

"Here." Talon said as he stepped in. He grabbed his wallet, yanked out his debit card and paid for the items himself. "Don't worry about it Misses Filton."

Norma sighed. "My brain doesn't want to work, and I don't understand why."

Talon just smiled at his Dad and shook his head a bit. "Come on Misses Filton, I'll take you home."

---

"See? How would you have gotten home with all these bags?"

Talon and Norma made their way back to her neighborhood. Norma sat in the front seat, clutching her purse and looking kind of sad.

"I can't believe I forgot my bank card...." Norma shook her head. "I'll never hear the end of it from Daniel and everyone. My whole family thinks I'm stupid."

"No. They don't think you're stupid, Misses Filton." Talon reasoned. "They really care about you. And they worry about you."

"They don't need to worry." Norma shook her head.

"They're going to worry because that's what families do. If they didn't love you, they wouldn't be doing the things that they're doing."

"Daniel treats me like a little kid. He does my banking, he gives me my medicine, what does he think? I'm five or something? Okay so I forget stuff, big deal..."

"Dementia is a big deal. It's an evil disease. It's a living death."

"You're telling me." Norma frowned. "Well, why does your grandma not have it? She's older than me!"

"That's not how dementia works. It's genetics. It's a bunch of stuff. They don't really understand why some people get it and others don't. I mean in my family there's an unnatural longevity. My great-grandparents made it both to a hundred and two on Grandma's side. It's just the luck of the drawl unfortunately."

"I want to make it to ninety. Then I want to die in my house. I feel like I can make it."

"Nothing is set in stone."

Talon made the left turn onto Brown Street and saw Dan's Tahoe sitting in the driveway. Norma groaned at the sight.

"Oh Daniel is never gonna let this go..." Norma sighed.

Talon helped Norma out of the truck, just as Dan came storming out of the house. "Mom!? What the hell are you doing walking to the store!"

"I needed a few things!" Norma protested. "Will you stop controlling my life!"

"Mom! That's two miles!" Dan yelled. "Two miles!"

"So?" Norma shrugged as she grabbed her bags.

"So? Just so? Are you kidding me, woman? You could have tripped and fell!"

"I'm careful when I walk!"

"Jesus fucking Christ, Mom."

Norma looked upset. "What's the big deal if I get out and walk?"

"MOM..." Dan rolled his eyes. "It's one thing to walk around the neighborhood. It's another thing to WALK TWO MILES TO BRADLEY'S STORE!"

"I mean, think about it Misses Filton. You could have fallen and broken a hip, or got hit by a car." Talon chimed in.

"I'm careful!" the elderly wolf exclaimed.

"Mom, you're two weeks shy of turning eighty-five..."

"So?"

"Your damn bones are fragile! If you fall and break your hip, guess what? That's it! Game over."

"Misses Filton, that same scenario happened to my Great Aunt Rebecca. She was out walking, tripped over a curb, fell, broke her hip, and she never recovered. She passed away at eighty-two in a nursing home because of it."

"I don't think that's gonna happen to me."

"Don't be so sure of yourself, Misses Filton."

"Mom, if you fall and break your hip, you're never going home. Your doctor will put you in a rehab place, and then a nursing home!" Dan exclaimed.

"No that won't happen! You just go home and recover~"

"Oh my fucking god, Mom." Dan rolled his eyes. "God damnit, woman."

"You're always bossing my life around!" Norma frowned. "God damnit, I'm not stupid! I can still take care of things. You act like I'm retarded or something with this so-called diagnosis."

"It's not so-called, Mom. YOU HAD A CT SCAN AND FAILED A COGNITIVE TEST!" glared Dan. "How many times do we, the neurologist, and your doctor, have to explain it?"

"I just don't see the problem."

"That's the problem..." Dan grumbled. He turned to thank Talon. "Look Talon, I really appreciate you for picking her up and taking her home."

"No problem!" the Dober smiled. "And don't worry about repaying. It's fine."

"Repaying what?"

"Norma forgot her bank card."

"Oh my god... god damnit Mom..."

"I knew I had forgotten something!" Norma exclaimed.

"It's fine! It's fine!" Talon reassured with a smile. "But please Misses Filton, don't walk to our store... we will gladly pick you up."

"I could just drive there if everyone didn't take me car away!" Norma protested.

"Oh here we go..." Dan groaned.

Talon excused himself from the argument and waved goodbye. Dan and Norma stood in the yard yelling at each other, as he hopped back into his Ram truck and went off to work. He glanced back in the mirror to see Norma and Dan still arguing in the yard.

---

Glancing out sliding glass door to his deck, Marty watched the sunrise out over the field behind his house. Getting dressed for work, the Dober walked into the kitchen where Jason made breakfast for his daughter Megan. Marty grabbed his bandana off the countertop and looked at the calendar as he tied the bright red bandana atop his head between his tall cropped ears. It was Thursday, towards the end of April, and he had nothing else planned that day.

"How about after we work, we stop at Albyn's and we'll pick up that maple tree you wanted to get." Marty suggested as he donned his leather jacket.

"Sure~" Jason agreed. "I think that'll look great in that empty spot where the old tree blew over."

"Sounds like a plan to me." Chuckled the Dober as he grabbed his backpack with some of his work belongings in it. He gave Jason a kiss and kissed Megan on top of her head. "I'll see you all this afternoon!"

"Bye, Marty! Have a good day!" Jason smiled.

"Bye, Marty!" Megan waved from the table.

Stuffing his feet into his riding boots, Marty made his way out the front door, where his Fatboy sat in the driveway beside his red Silverado. As Marty walked down the sidewalk to the driveway, he spotted a lone figure walking slowly on the road. Green eyes squinted to the sight of Norma Filton walking, slowly, shuffling her way up the road. Marty right away knew that something was off. Just as he pondered about what she was doing, he watched her trip on a pothole. Norma went down and fell onto her side. His eyes went huge.

Marty bolted and ran as fast as he could to get to her. Norma laid on her side, a bit dazed, with her right paw and arm bleeding.

"Oh Jesus Christ, Misses Filton!" Marty exclaimed. "Are you okay?"

"My paw is bleeding..." Norma winced. "I didn't see the pothole."

"Misses Filton, what the hell are you doing out walking this early?"

"I'm trying to get to my other house!" Norma exclaimed as Marty helped her up. The Dober looked confused. "Your... other house?"

"The one on Clearview!"

"Misses Filton, you don't own any other home."

"I do! The one on Brown is up for sale?"

"Huh?"

"I'm trying to get to my other house, since my family won't listen and pick me up!"

"Come on, let's get you cleaned up."

Jason glanced out the window and saw Marty helping Norma. He immediately threw the door open, and ran out to help Marty.

"Oh my god what happened!?" Jason exclaimed. "Misses Filton, come on, come inside, let's get that cleaned up and bandaged!"

"I'm trying to reach my other house."

Jason looked over to Marty, who just shook his head.

Norma sat in the living room on Marty's recliner as Marty cleaned and bandaged her wounds. Her right paw and arm were bruising up all black and blue. While Marty tended to a confused Norma, Jason grabbed the phone and called Dan Filton.

"Filton's Finest Landscaping Company, Dan Filton speaking."

"Hi Dan, this is Jason Greene, over here on Ridgefield. Uhh, I need you to come over to our house, your Mom fell on the street and Marty is cleaning up her right arm and paw."

There was an uncomfortable moment of silence as Jason heard Dan grumble something. "How bad, Jason."

Jason leaned over around the wall to see Marty bandaging her injuries. "Her right arm has a significant bruise on it with some cuts, and so does her hand. They're pretty black and blue. She's been talking about walking to her other home, she doesn't live in that house on Brown Street, she actually has a home on Clearview. She's hallucinating pretty good."

"Oh my fucking god... Okay. I'll be over. Thank you Jason." Dan calmly said.

"We'll see you in a bit. Bye-bye now." Jason concluded as he hung up. He proceeded to dial his workplace number to let them know he was going to be late due to a situation at home.

"You know you're lucky you break your arm, or paw." Marty said as he sprayed some antiseptic and bandaged a finger up. "A few years ago, my Dad slipped while shoveling snow and busted his wrist going down. You're at the age now where these accidents can be very serious."

"It's just a bruise. I can live." Norma brushed it off. "But I gotta hurry up and get back to my home, since I'm tired of housesiting!"

"Misses Filton, again, you don't own another home. You own one home, on Brown Street."

"Oh no, I don't! Dan put that house up for sale for some reason!"

Marty looked up all confused. "Where in the world do you get these ideas?"

Norma looked confused and just frowned. "Why does this keep happening to me..."

"Aww, Misses Filton..." Marty frowned. "This is just the progression of the disease."

Norma leaned back in the seat. "God... maybe it's for the better that I can't drive."

"Yes, I would agree so." The old Dober nodded.

A knock at the door signaled the arrival of Dan Filton. Marty got up and welcomed in Dan and his youngest son, Ed. Dan marched over to confront his Mom. Dan looked visibly frustrated, but sad at the same time."

"Oh Mom... look at your arm."

"I was just trying to go back to my home..."

Dan knelt down and grabbed his Mom's left paw and held it. Dan looked visibly sad. "Mom... you sold that house on Clearview in December 1964... I was four years old... Ron was six. You moved into your house on Brown Street in January 1965. You don't own any other house, you're not housesiting. That is your home, Mom!"

Norma just frowned. "Why does this keep happening to me, Daniel..."

"Mom this is just the progression of Dementia." Dan calmly explained. "Look, I think we're gonna have to talk to the neurologist again."

"No, no, no, no, no!" Norma exclaimed.

"I'm sorry Mom, this is getting out of control." Dan shook his head.

"You can't do this to me! I should be the only one who talks to my doctor!"

"Mom, I'm sorry, but you don't see the problem... you're stressing all of us out!" Dan exclaimed.

"Grandma, it's starting to get to the point where this is a problem." Ed frowned.

"You're calling me and Cy several times at night. You're stressing all of us out." Dan frowned.

Marty and Jason stood back and watched the sad sight unfold. Another knock at the door had Cy stepping inside. Cyrus looked visibly exhausted and his clothes were stained by mulch as he went to check on his Grandma. Instead of his usual braided ponytail, he just kept his long hair untied and flowing.

"Come on, let's get you home, Grandma." Ed said as they all helped her up for the door.

"Thank you so much." Dan said to Marty and Jason.

"Anytime." Marty mustered a smile. Marty and Jason walked outside to make sure Norma was safely in Dan's Tahoe. The Filtons took off, turning around to head back to her home a half block over.

Jason leaned against Marty and rubbed his back with a paw. "Poor Norma. She's getting worse."

"Yeah." Marty nodded.

---

The brothers convened a meeting at Darryl's trailer.

Darryl and his girlfriend lived in a mobile home, which sat not far away from Ronnie and Becky's trailer on Ronnie's property. The property was still strewn with debris after the 2021 tornado that had torn through the area. What was left of Ronnie and Becky's old farm home was just an empty hole in the ground with some debris; the home had burned in a freak accident in 2019, and was finally demolished by the monster tornado.

The evening sun glowed orange in the western sky as Darryl, Cyrus, and Ed sat together on Darryl's plastic patio furniture. Hanna served everyone an ice cold beer from the fridge.

"Grandma is out of her fucking mind." Darryl shook his head. "So me and Hanna decided to surprise her and take her to dinner, and I'm glad we did, because she almost burned the fucking house down."

"What!?" Cyrus and Ed exclaimed.

"I get there and we knock on the door, and apparently we woke Norma up. We step inside and I immediately smell something burning in the kitchen. I rush in there and the whole stove was filled with smoke. I shut that fucker off, grab the mitts and pull out an oven tray with three slices of pizza, charred fucking black. The whole kitchen filled with smoke. Those slices were seconds from catching on fire. They SIZZLED when I poured cold water on them!"

"God damnit. She forgot about them..." Ed shook his head.

"I asked Grandma about it, and she's like 'oh the other people must have put that in the stove!' and I'm like what other people? What the fuck is she talking about?"

"Grandma thinks people are coming into her house and rearranging shit." Cyrus rolled his eyes.

Darryl shook his head. "Fucking wow..."

"Grandma's condition is getting worse." Ed admitted. "I don't know how much more we can do."

"She has no memory of hurting her arm." Darryl added. "Her arm is really fucked up looking."

"Yeah." Cyrus nodded.

"She's lucky Marty was able to take care of that. God damnit Grandma..." Darryl grunted as he took a swig of his beer. Everyone looked burned out around the table.

"If Grandma breaks her hip, that's it, done, game over." Ed quipped. "I told her that and she doesn't seem to understand the gravity of that."

"I've said that too. And so has Talon and his family." Cyrus chimed in.

"Is it just me? Or does Grandma look really super old all of a sudden?" Darryl asked his brothers. "Like in the past six months, she's massively aged?"

"Probably form worrying about the fucking car!" Cyrus exclaimed. "I swear to god that every time I see her she talks about the car."

"Grandma flipped out because I drove the Skylark on Monday." Ed chuckled. "I needed to get into a tight parking place and that car needed to be driven. She goes blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, my car!"

"And the spiel about her doctors shouldn't have the right to?"

"Yes that too."

Darryl shook his head with a look of sadness on his face.

"She's really stressing me and Dad out. I haven't slept good lately, because she keeps calling me every couple of hours at night. It's like her sense of day and time are lost now. She keeps needing to be assured that that's her home, and nobody is coming in..." Cyrus sighed as he closed his eyes. "Between this and work woes..."

"How's the landscaping business?" Darryl asked.

"Fucked." Ed chuckled. "We're picking up business, but we don't have enough people!"

"What, nobody wants to fucking work or something?" Darryl asked. "It's the same thing with my new plumbing gig. You get these fucking useless retards that come in and have no idea what they're doing, and then they send me and the others to unfuck their mistakes."

"How is your new job at Ritchie's?" Cyrus asked.

"Man, I love it. It's decent pay, and it's not that bad. I'm glad Talon is the one who told me about it." Darryl revealed. "And Ronnie loves being a stocker at Walmart. I think it worked out better than the landscaping stuff."

"Well I'm glad for ya~" Ed smiled.

"Sorry to hear you guys are having trouble."

"Well it's just nobody wants to make money the old fashioned way anymore." Ed remarked. "And we had to let four guys go for getting busted with weed. So that's that."

"Idiots." Darryl scoffed with a laugh.

"Everyone wants money with little work, and you just can't do that unless you have like an Onlyfans or something." Cyrus chuckled. "The situation is fucked. But I'll figure something out."

"Well take it easy Cy, because you look dead tired."

"I am dead tired."

Darryl nodded. "This sounds really mean, but between us? I'd rather just see Grandma go in one piece than this slow living death."

"Yeah I agree." Cyrus and Ed nodded.

"This is really painful." Ed admitted.

"Well she has another appointment at the neurologist's office next Tuesday, so we'll find out." Cyrus concluded as he finished his beer with a final swig.

---

"Misses Goldstein, I'm so glad you're feeling better." Dr. Patel said as he held the door open for his patient. The golden furred wolf with hazel brown eyes, the resident neurologist for Licking Memorial, followed his patient out as the nurse took her to the receptionist area for signing some paperwork.

Patel stepped into receptionist office to check something on the computer and store the patient's file in the wall mounted rack. He checked the time and went to grab his next patient's file for the ten o'clock appointment. As he examined the rack in the "F" section, he couldn't help but hear a pretty heated argument just above the ambience in the receptionist's office. Patel stopped and turned around to stare through the glass windows to see his next patient arguing with her son. The nurses were amused at the usual argument between Dan and Norma Filton. Other patients in the lobby looked uncomfortable. He turned, grabbed the file, and quickly left the office.

"Mom, I've been hearing about that damn car for half a year and I am done with it!" Dan snapped in a hushed voice. "Tired of it, Mom!"

"Well it's my car! And I have the right to say it!"

"Stop talking about the damn car!"

"I want my car back!"

"Norma Filton?" came the nurse's voice.

Norma got up with Dan, and they both went to the exam room. A few minutes later, Dr. Patel showed up.

"Good morning, Norma." Dr. Patel greeted with a warm tone. "Good morning, Dan."

"Morning." Dan nodded off in the corner.

"Good morning!" smiled Norma. "How are you doing, doctor?"

"I'm fine thank you." He responded as he pulled up a chair. He started off with some basic questions and checked Norma's blood pressure and wrote notes down on his clipboard.

"Norma, have you been having any hallucinations lately?"

"Well... no... not really?"

Dr. Patel's eyes looked up at Dan, who nodded vigorously. The neurologist wrote it down on his clipboard.

"So what happened to your arm there, Norma? That look like it hurt."

"Oh I just fell. I think I fell...I was out walking."

"Out walking where?"

"Just out and about."

"Mom... maybe walking in a hallucination?" Dan suggested in a sarcastic tone. "Walking to a home you haven't owned in fifty-nine years? Claiming we're selling your current home?"

"I did not have a hallucination!" the elderly wolf snapped at Dan. "One time! One time!"

"Oh no, Mom! Multiple times! How about several in the past week and a half!"

Dr. Patel motioned for everyone calm down. He asked Norma several more questions and talked with her, before asking her to go with a nurse technician to administer a cognitive test, and draw blood. Patel asked Dan to stay as he made sure Norma went with the nurse technician. He returned and gently closed the door behind him.

"I can't help but notice that you and your Mom argue a lot."

"This goes on every single day." Dan admitted.

"I can see the strain on your face, Mister Filton."

"I love my Mom to death. I want to help her. But this has been a real challenge. She will not listen to us. She is her own worst enemy- she is a menace to herself and she's going to get herself hurt because she is in complete denial about her health situation!" Dan exclaimed in a frustrated tone. "She's stressing me, my wife, my brother, and my sons out! I get phone calls several times a night sometimes! My son Cyrus gets phone calls constantly! She wants to make sure she's in the right house, or for us to pick her up and take her to her other house, or look for this little boy so the priest don't get to him..."

Patel fumbled his brow at the last part.

"Mom calls me the dictator, but I'm a military man. I served fourteen years in the US Army. I have it drilled into my head- if you are given a lawful order, you follow it and execute it to the T. If a lawyer or doctor says you do this, you do it. I don't wear kid gloves."

"Mister Filton, I understand completely." Nodded the wolf. "I understand your frustration. Taking care of a loved one with memory problems is extremely taxing on the family. But I want to just remind you that arguing is not going to solve the problem, and it's only going to make the situation worse. Norma does not appear to understand the gravity of her diagnosis, most likely due to the nature of the disease itself."

Dan just nodded quietly.

"Your mother was a very independent woman wasn't she?"

"Absolutely." Dan said with a chuckle. "Mom got what Mom wanted, and my Dad doted all over here all the time."

"I can see that in her personality."

"Mom had a trauma in her youth... and I think that messed her up completely, and it gave her the personality that she has- take names and kick ass."

"I see."

"I think Mom's problem is that largely her physical health has not matched her mental health's condition, and she doesn't think there's a problem because she doesn't feel the physical slowdown. Mom's BIGGEST ISSUE is the fact that she's had it so good for so long, and never had any health issues aside from an occasional fainting spell from her a-fib. Now she's faced with a problem and she can't accept it, including the loss of her independence, her ability to come and go at her will."

"All of those are very plausible scenarios, Mister Filton. Now does she still largely handle taking care of herself, eating. Does she leave the burners on her stove?"

"Well a few days ago, my son Darryl went over and saw that she had forgotten some leftover pizza in the stove and it was at the cusp of catching on fire."

Patel wrote that down on his clipboard. "So mainly the hallucinations is the big issue?"

"Yes." Dan nodded. "It seems to get worse in the middle of the week. She has moments where she's lucid, and then goes crazy."

"That's kind of the expected progression of the disease."

"Now Doc, let me ask you your opinion... Do you think my Mom is getting to the point where she's gonna have to look at assisted living."

Patel pursed his lips and thought about it for a moment. "I am concerned about the wandering episode, and the stove episode, but these at the moment feel like isolated incidents. She seems able to still dress herself and take care of herself, so... no? But... I would start looking at maybe getting the feelers out to try and get the situation going? Because a lot of times with dementia patients, their decline plateaus out for a time, but for how long? It's hard to tell. When she starts to decline, it could happen really fast. So I would suggest you start getting your ducks in a row."

"Okay." Dan accepted. "God what a nightmare... She refuses to even talk about the matter."

"That happens a lot of times. But you're gonna have to be persistent about it." Patel suggested.

"It's just gonna be another argument."

"It would be ideal, and tell her that... it would be ideal that she can be part of the decision making progress in advanced care."

"My Mom has it dead set in her head that she will die at home. And I am afraid at the rate its going with her defiance, or whatever the hell you call it, she's gonna get herself killed." Dan said in a very serious tone. Dr. Patel pursed his lips and just nodded as Dan departed for the lobby. Dr. Patel watched the door gently close behind Dan, and he stood there for a moment before going to the receptionist's office.

---

Covered in little bits of mulch, Cyrus finished up his work laying mulch out at a customer's home. Feeling utterly worn out, he signed the invoice before walking up to the front door, where he got paid in cash by the customer. Cyrus handed a carbon copy of their invoice and stowed the money in the money bag he kept secured in his clipboard. He walked back to his truck and examined his handiwork. He mowed the lawn, trimmed the bushes, and put half a ton of black mulch down. His body was soaking wet in sweat. He climbed back into his truck and took off, the Sierra straining with the weight of his mower and a large mulch trailer hitched to the back.

Cyrus departed Newark on the expressway and rushed back to Hanover. Being short staffed, Cyrus took on an increasing amount of work as the landscaping season picked up. The clock on his radio struck eleven o'clock and Cyrus had already mowed five lawns and mulched two houses. He had been out since six in the morning. The big wolf yawned as he drove, feeling tired somewhat from everything.

Returning back to the headquarters, Cyrus backed the trailer in where a couple other trailers were at, and hopped out to unhitch it. He quickly spun his truck around and parked it in the gravel lot beside the old farm house that housed his business. He quickly ran inside to do his managerial duties.

"Is Dad still at the neurologists with Grandma?" Cyrus asked Ed, who was dispatching.

"Yeah."

"Okay. Uhh, did my job interview guy show up yet? He's supposed to be here for the eleven-thirty interview?"

"No." Ed shook his head. "I have three other applications on your desk, Cy."

"Great." Cyrus pointed with a smile. "Freddo!"

"Yeah?" his nephew said as he worked on processing a customer order on a laptop in Cy's office.

"How's the office situation?"

"The usual." The slender wolf laughed. "Hey, Cy, I have a friend from OSU who is interested in a summertime job here."

"Oh yeah? Is he not a fucking retard?" Cyrus asked jokingly as he sat down at his desk to look at the resumes Ed placed on his desk. "Can he pass a piss test?"

"Yeah! You've met him that one day. Mike Brewer."

"Oh okay! Awesome. Well tell him to fill out an application and send a resume and I'll call him."

"Will do!"

"Oh god... these names sound like dead men walking..." Cyrus grunted. "Walter Seale, Tanner Browne, and Mickey Helgerman..."

"Oh god... Helgerman..." Freddy cringed. "Throw that one away."

"You know him?"

"He graduated with me... We all called him 'Ding Dong' at school because he has extreme ADHD and can never focus and never get anything done. Will talk about Yu-Gi-Oh cards all day."

Cyrus crumbled up that resume and threw it away. "Thanks."

"Welcome!"

Cyrus grumbled under his breath as he sorted the other applications that needed to be called for his manila folder that held his eleven-thirty interview. It was already five minutes past the scheduled time of his interview. As he looked for the number on the resume, the telephone rang. Cyrus quickly picked it up on the second ring.

"Filton's Finest Landscaping Company, Cyrus Filton speaking."

"Hey, Cyrus, this is Bishop Redding, I had the job interview..." came a really slurred voice.

"Yeah. I was just thinking about you. You're late to the job interview..."

"I'm sorry... I'm not feeling well and I need to reschedule it..."

"I think what you meant to say was I drank too much... and it's midweek, not even noon and you're drunk... I don't think this was meant to be, and I suggest you seek therapy for your alcoholism. Thanks, bye."

Cyrus hung up the phone. His curt response got Freddy to look up from his desk. "Damn, Cy."

"I'm not in the mood for this shit." He admitted as his cellphone rang this time. Cyrus grabbed his phone and saw that it was his Dad calling him.

"Hey Dad!"

"Cyrus, hey, we just got done at the neurologist's office and are waiting on the prescription at CVS."

"How'd it go?"

"As far as appointments go, it was okay." Dan said in a calm tone. "Uhh, Doctor Patel talked with us, he had her do another cognitive test, and a blood test. Her cognitive ability has slipped some they said, but they increased the dosage of her dementia medication to try and help mitigate the hallucinations."

"Okay. Anything else?"

"Well I talked to him about the assisted living question, and he said that he doesn't think she's gotten to that point."

"Jesus... I'm afraid to think what getting to that point will look like!"

"Heh, you're telling me... but he said he would like us to start talking to her so she can have some say so."

"Ha. That's like talking to a brick wall."

"That's basically what I said to Patel. She's not gonna budge. She has it deadest in her mind that she's gonna die at home."

"At the rate it's going, that's what's gonna happen!"

"Unfortunately. Hey, I gotta go get this prescription now, we'll talk later, Cy."

"Thanks Dad, love ya. Bye."

Cy put his phone down on the desk and shook his head a bit with a jaded chuckle.

"What did Grandpa have to say?"

"She's nuts but not nuts enough." Cyrus joked. "More of the same basically. They're increasing the dose of her dementia medication."

"Ah." Freddy nodded.

"They want us to talk to Grandma about maybe looking into an assisted living, something."

Freddy snorted. "Yeah. That'll be the day. When pigs fly."

"I know, I know." Cyrus grimaced.

"Nobody knows Norma Merle Filton like we do."

"Scary, right?" Cyrus laughed. "Now I gotta make a few phone calls and then back to the races."

"Hey, hey, hey, Cy. Don't kill yourself."

"I have to get all this shit done, and sometimes you gotta do it yourself!" Cyrus exclaimed. "A lot of people's careers are on the line if I can't keep up..."

"You're under a lot of stress. Take a breather!"

"If only, huh? Yay, American dream!" Cyrus laughed bitterly. "Now if you excuse me..."

Freddy watched his uncle punch in a number on the old Bell phone. Freddy fumbled his brow and went back to processing his orders and ordering supplies.

---

Reeking of sunscreen and sweat, Cyrus finished the final lawn of the day, at sundown. The sky was starting to grow dim as the sun finally slipped beneath the horizon. Slamming the tailgate shut to his Sierra, an exhausted Cyrus scribbled out the last invoice of the day. Dragging himself to the home, he handed it off to the customer and got a personal check in return. Saying goodbye, Cyrus dragged himself to his awaiting truck, and took off to depart Hebron to begin the long journey back to Hanover.

Going into Heath, Cyrus stopped at a Speedway to refuel his almost empty truck with diesel. He scanned his points card, shoved his bank card in, and selected diesel. Shoving the nozzle into the port, he squeezed and locked the trigger and leaned back against the backdoor as the pump clanked away filling his fuel tank up. Cyrus closed his eyes for a moment and felt utterly exhausted. Not just exhaustion from work, but from home too.

His cellphone went off, momentarily startling him. He grabbed it from his jeans pocket and found his Dad calling him. Cyrus braced for impact as he swiped up to answer it. "Hey Dad~"

"Cyrus I want you to guess where I'm at right now." Dan asked him. There was a faint sound of beeping and voices in the background, which sounded like a medical field.

"Uhh... I don't know?"

"I'm at Licking Memorial, in the emergency room, getting stitched up..."

"What?! Why? What's happening?"

"Well... remember what I told you what the neurologist suggested? So me and your uncle went over there to try and maybe... get some early ideas going... and it turned into a screaming match..."

"Oh boy..."

"The usual Cy. Da-da-da, nothing wrong with me, da-da-da-da-da, nothing wrong, what do doctor's know, my car, my money, that stupid fucking spiel. And I told her that eventually she's gonna get to the point where she will need to be in a nursing home or whatever, and she broke down in tears. She says I ruined her life. She then proceeded to throw a vase at me, and it exploded against the wall and part of it cut my fucking left arm open. And the emergency room technician is stitching it back up all nicely..."

"Oh my god..." Cyrus moaned. "I'll be right over."

"I'm gonna be here a bit..."

"I'll be right over!"

Fueling his truck up, Cyrus bolted from Speedway and rushed to Newark, where he pulled into the parking lot for the emergency department at Licking Memorial Hospital. Running inside, Cyrus went to the receptionist desk and donned a surgical mask as he asked where his father was. Finding the room number, he quickly made his way through the sliding glass doors into the ER. Going to room 12, Cyrus found his Dad sitting in a hospital bed with Ed and Darryl standing with their Mom off to the side while the nurse technician finished up stitching a nasty gash up. Cyrus stepped into the room and slid the curtain back.

"Okay Mister Filton, that should do it." The nurse said as she cut the last bit of extra line and cleaned up a bit of dried blood on his arm with an alcohol soaked cotton ball. "The doctor will be back in a moment to examine it."

"Thanks." Dan nodded as the nurse threw away the needle in the sharps bin and tossed the trash away before leaving.

Dan looked over at Cyrus with an amused look on his face. "Can you believe this shit?"

Cyrus mustered a smile and shrugged.

"I don't think the neurologist knows who he's going up again." Linda chuckled. "Ole' Norma Merle."

"The unmovable object meeting an unstoppable force." Ed snickered.

"Doctor Patel has never met the most stubborn Irish lady around..." Dan rolled his eyes. "Your Grandma really pissed me off with this stunt..."

"Considering she threw a whisky bottle at Uncle Ronnie..." Cyrus grimaced.

"I'm this close to just saying fuck it and turn her bank account over to her and let her fuck up again and lose all her money to those motherfuckers that keep calling her god damn house. She wants her fucking car back? I told her she can talk to her doctor about it if she feels like she can drive. I'll give the fucking keys back!"

"Easy, Dad."

Dan shook his head. "I'm so mad right now. The doctor said my blood pressure is really up. I'm taking on too much. Well what the fuck am I supposed to do? She won't accept a home health nurse, assisted living, nothing. How the fuck can I help someone who doesn't see the extent of their problem!?"

"I don't know." Cyrus admitted.

"Jesus Cyrus, you look dead tired..." Darryl pointed out.

"Yeah, no shit." Cyrus grunted. "I am dead tired. Mowed fourteen yards, did five mulching jobs, and all of Barev's properties... And rinse and repeat until I can get enough warm bodies to work!"

"Cy, you need to take a break." Linda said with a concerned tone.

"How am I? I got work... I got Grandma... I don't have enough people to take pressure off!"

"You're gonna have a heart attack from all the stress..."

"Me too..." Dan grimaced. "What a mess we're in..."

Dan was released from the ER at nine-thirty at night. With a prescription for antibiotics, Dan went home with Linda, and the three brothers all went on their way back to Hanover. Cyrus took off in his truck for the expressway, reaching his house by ten o'clock.

Flipping on the light to his living room. An exhausted Cyrus dropped his cooler by the door and closed it. He locked the door and dragged himself over to his couch. He sat down, yawned a bit and fell over to his side. He was asleep the moment his head hit the pillow on his couch.

---

Bloodshot eyes opened to the dreaded ring of the phone. The electronic ring of the modern wireless phone, the ringing bell of his Bell desk phone, echoing in his groggy, exhausted head. Cyrus dragged himself up, awaiting the call to ask him if he could pick his Grandma up, or reassure her that she's in the right home from another episode of hallucinating. Cyrus rubbed his tired eyes and saw that he forgot to turn the living room lights off.

Sure enough, his Grandma's phone number, the same number they were trying to change for months, was on the caller ID. Cyrus picked up and hit the "talk" button.

"Hello."

"Cyrus... Cy..." came a very weak voice. "Oh Cy... I'm in so much pain..."

Cy fully awoke at the sound of how sick his Grandma was. "Grandma? Grandma!?"

"I could barely get to the phone... I can't feel part of my face... my right arm is so weak... I need help... help me... I feel so sick."

"Grandma, I'll be right over! I'll be right over!"

Looking panicked, Cyrus hung up and dropped the phone. He grabbed his wallet and keys, shoved his feet into his cowboy boots, and took off out the door. The commotion woke Freddy, who came running down in just his boxers. Recognizing that something was amiss, he ran back upstairs to get dressed.

Peeling out, Cy kicked up gravel on his mad dash for the road, keeping his foot to the floor, Cyrus raced through the night to get into Hanover. He called his Dad, and told him the situation and to meet him at Norma's. Racing into Hanover, Cyrus screeched in his turn to make it into Norma's neighborhood. He swung hard into the driveway and hopped out, his truck still running.

Getting to the door, he knocked and frantically turned the knob to find it locked. Peering in through the little window in the door, he saw his Grandma slumped to a side in the chair. The wolf let go of the knob, and slammed his body into the door. He heaved and threw all his weight into the door, which finally broke open. It swung open and smacked against the wall, a picture pictures falling off as Cyrus ran inside.

"Grandma! Grandma!" Cyrus called out. He grabbed his grandmother and shook her a bit by her arms. She opened her eyes and looked confused and dazed.

"I have such a terrible headache... my arm is numb..."

"I'm going to call the squad."

Cyrus ran over and dialed 9-1-1 on her phone and requested an ambulance. As he spoke to the emergency dispatcher, Dan and Linda came running in through the door.

"Mom! Mom!" Dan exclaimed. He still wore his pajamas. Dan quickly helped Norma to the couch and helped her lay down. "Mom, we're getting an ambulance. Stay with me, okay?"

"I'm in so much pain..." she mumbled. Her words were slurred.

Within minutes of the call, the flashing strobe lights of an ambulance signaled its arrival. They parked out front on the street, and paramedics came rushing in to begin evaluating Norma. A fire engine arrived and additional backup arrived to begin emergency treatment. They moved Norma to the stretcher and started an IV line for her. Getting her secured, they quickly whisked her into the ambulance and took off into the night with their sirens blaring. Cyrus and Dan quickly followed behind, just as Freddy's Silverado came to the intersection.

"FOLLOW US TO THE HOSPITAL!" Cyrus yelled to Freddy as he made the right turn onto Licking Valley Road.

"OKAY!" Freddy yelled back.

Cyrus drove through the night with his Dad and nephew following right behind. Cyrus kept pace with the ambulance, not sure of what the outcome would be for this.

---

Leaning against his shower wall, a tired Cyrus sighed as he let the hot water soak his long mane of hair. He had been at the hospital since eleven o'clock at night after his grandmother had called him, and had a moment's time to get home and clean up and change clothes before running back to the hospital.

Squirting a glob of shampoo, Cyrus worked it into his messy hair and just tried to relax. As if things could not get any more stressful, he was now facing with the fact that Norma had a stroke. It wasn't a major stroke according to the hospital, and they were able to clear the blockage with thrombolytics, but Cyrus worried about the long term damage to her memory, and bodily functions. She was still complaining about a lack of strength on the right side of her body, and her face feeling a bit numb. Although nobody could prove it, Cy felt that her very heated argument with his Dad probably led to the stroke. But who knows? Both her parents died of strokes in the 1980's. Heck, at the rate things were going, Cy felt he was doomed to have a stroke too from all the stress.

Stepping out of the shower and drying himself off Cyrus grabbed the blow dryer and took the time to dry his long locks of hair while he brushed it gently. Forgoing to braid it up, Cyrus grabbed a fresh pair of red briefs, some black gym shorts, and a dark red t-shirt to wear. He fixed and brushed his hair a bit more, just as the phone rang. Cyrus recoiled to the ring as he answered his bedroom landline.

"Hello?"

"Hey it's Dad. You won't believe this shit..."

"Oh boy..."

"Can you go over to your Grandma's house and check to see if she has anything on her health insurance?"

"Why?"

"Your Grandma apparently cancelled her Anthem insurance."

"Oh nooooooooo."

"I have no idea what insurance she has and neither does the hospital! See this is further proof that she gave her damn info out over the phone. She had to have called and cancelled and HOPEFULLY set up another insurance. Grandma said she did... but she has no fucking clue what she did."

"Oh my god... Okay... Let me check and I'll call you back there."

"Okay."

Cyrus sat the phone back down on the charger and pursed his lips with manic eyes. Cue the damage control.

Cyrus drove over to his Grandma's house, and saw Uncle Ronnie and Darryl working on repairing the door. Cy greeted them and stepped inside to hear the phone ringing. He picked it up hear a middle eastern voice asking for Norma, which Cy hung up on. He was still upset over the fact that the telecom company still did not change her phone number as requested several months before. He and his father had called Datastream Telecom, the local carrier in Licking County, about changing her phone number all the way back in December due to the influx of spam calls, but the telecom kept telling them they had "computer issues" every time they called in. They were a crappy telecom service, but that's all that Hanover had to offer.

Going to her letter desk, Cyrus opened it up to find multiple health insurance packets. The wolf sighed as he saw a packet for Aetna, a packet for Molina Insurance, and a packet for BlueStar. "Oh my lord..." he muttered under his breath.

Cyrus pulled up a chair and sat down and grabbed the phone. He had some phone calls to make.

---

Jotting notes down on a yellow legal pad, Cyrus wrote the information down with a slowly dulling pencil. He wrote down the new policy number, the account name, and insurance type, below a description of what the insurance company told him. Cyrus had spent over two hours on the phone, calling every major health insurance company that was in Ohio, to try and figure out what Norma did.

After two hours on the phone hunting down any scrap of information, Cyrus got a better picture: His grandmother apparently saw a commercial for a health insurance company, AmBetter, and decided to switch to them. She cancelled her Anthem insurance approximately a month prior. Cyrus explained the situation about his grandmother, who he was, and was able to get her information and order new insurance cards for her.

"Alrighty! Thank you so much! Bye." Cyrus concluded as he hung up the trimline. Breathing a huge sigh of relief. He grabbed his cellphone and snapped a picture of the notes he jotted down, and send them to his Dad in a text. As he put away the pencil and prepared to throw away the packets of information, the telephone rang again. Bracing for a spam caller, Cyrus picked up.

"Hello."

"Oh hello?" came a very Irish voice of an older gentleman. "Hello? I'd love to speak to Mother Norma?"

"Who's this?"

"This is Neal Magruder."

"Oh hey! Cyrus Filton here!"

"Hello Cyrus! How are you doing? I don't think we've spoken in a very long time."

"It has been a long time, Neal. Hope you're okay."

"I'm okay. Retired now! I was hoping to speak to ole' Mother Norma. How is she doing? Is she around?"

"I'm glad you called, because Grandma's in the hospital at the moment."

"Oh no! Is she okay?"

"Grandma had a mild stroke during the night."

"Oh my... is she okay?"

"She's stable at the hospital. They're accessing the situation right now."

"Oh okay. Could you please keep me posted? I know Mother Norma has been having a lot of troubles lately, with her dementia, and whatnot."

"Yeah, unfortunately. She's still been rather holding her own, but it's difficult at times." Cyrus admitted.

"I want you to have my phone number just in case."

"Sure."

Cyrus jotted his number down on the legal pad and promised to stay in touch. He excused himself to go back to the hospital and wished Neal well before ending the call on a happy note. Tearing the page out and folding it up, Cyrus stuffed it into his pocket before leaving in a hurry to head back to the hospital.

---

The first of May was very warm. The thermometer read eighty-two in the early afternoon sun as Cyrus watered a newly planted barberry bush in a customer's lawn in Morgan Manor, the rich area in the hills of northwest Newark. With the lawn perfectly cut, and bushes trimmed, Cyrus finished up the job giving the newly planted bush a long drink of water with the customer's hose.

As he finished up, the customer stepped out of their giant mansion of a house. Mrs. Rothstein, a snobby looking middle-aged brown and tan wolfess with a coifed hairdo of peroxide blonde hair and wearing a golden yellow dress, came stepping out of the house and walked up to Cyrus.

"Uhh, what kind of bush is this? It's really small!" she asked Cyrus, who turned his head to glance at her.

"It's a barberry just like the others that line the driveway." Cyrus explained.

"Okay, it creates a break in the line of bushes. I don't like that." Mrs. Rothstein explained, looking a bit annoyed.

"Well that's the biggest barberry you can buy, and it will take a few years to grow and fill in with the existing barberries. So give it a few years and it will grow in and look seamless."

"I don't get why the other bush just died?"

"Sometimes it happens?"

"This looks awful, what are my neighbors gonna think?"

"I don't think they'd really care?"

"Well I care!"

Cyrus just turned his head and laughed. "Jesus Christ..."

"What's that supposed to mean?" glared Mrs. Rothstein. "What's that comment supposed to mean? You think I'm being a bitch or something?"

"I think you're getting carried away over the new bush. You asked for a new bush, and I got a new bush and planted it, and removed the old one."

"Well I'll tell you what, Cyrus, I don't like your attitude and I want to speak to your manager!"

"Hi I'm Cyrus Filton! President of Filton's Finest Landscaping Company! What's your complaint!" Cyrus announced sarcastically.

Mrs. Rothstein looked flabbergasted and stepped back.

"I don't know what to tell you, Judy." Cyrus muttered. He looked mentally worn out. "I don't know what your thought was going to be about the bush? But you asked us to tear the dead bush out, and put a new one in, and we did that. I don't know what to tell you?"

Cyrus walked over to turn the hose off and reel it back in. He walked back to his truck, grabbed his clipboard, and filled out the invoice with his blue pen. He walked back up and handed Mrs. Rothstein a copy of it. She looked at the invoice and looked at Cyrus with a look of disbelief.

"Two hundred dollars?"

"The nominal cost of the lawn cutting, the trimming of the bushes, the mulching around the front garden by the door, and the new barberry."

"That barberry was seventy dollars!?" the wolf exclaimed.

"Yes. Albyn's price."

"Jesus Christ... I don't feel like I want to pay it?"

"You don't want to pay for it, huh?" Cyrus said with an amused smirk. "You think you're just gonna stiff me?"

"This is ridiculous!"

"Judy, you and your husband have a combined worth of sixty-two million dollars."

"It's the point of principle!"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Look at this bush!"

"You're letting this bush drive you crazy!" Cyrus pointed with a laugh and a grin. "Two hundred dollars!"

"I'm not paying it!"

"You want me to call Rob Barion?" Cyrus asked. Judy immediately got the hint. Her shit-eating smirk faded to a serious gaze as Cyrus smirked at her.

"If I don't get my payment for my services rendered, I'll call Rob, and I'll ask him to come get my money, and he'll split your fucking head wide open."

Judy quickly ran back inside, and soon Cyrus left with a wad of two hundred bucks stowed away in his money pouch. The wolf was disgusted; the usually easy going Cyrus was transforming into a jaded asshole from all the stress in his life. Stress from his business, stress from his Grandma. It felt like the walls were closing in all around him.

As he drove, Cyrus started to feel unwell. His chest felt unusually tight. His neck felt stiff, and breathing started to hurt some. His breaths grew shallow with the pain. Going through the intersection of Country Club and Granville Street, Cyrus saw the blue "H" sign for the hospital, pointing in the direction. Fearing a heart attack, he quickly made his way to Licking Memorial on Main Street. The stress was literally killing him.

---

The room was somewhat dim, and the curtains were drawn on the window peering out from the fourth floor. An IV quietly dripped into Cy's arm as he laid in a hospital bed, relaxing with the help of a mild sedative. He laid alone in a private room, recuperating, after checking himself into the hospital for fear of a heart attack.

He thankfully wasn't having a heart attack, but the emergency room did diagnose him with extreme exhaustion and hypertension. The doctor ordered Cyrus to rest. He was given a private room and a sedative to help him relax. For several hours, Cyrus slept. It was the first time in quite a while that he got a well rested sleep.

It had been rough emotionally for a while, but the past two weeks were especially rough. His grandmother ultimately had a mild stroke. While she didn't have any physical affects from it, and largely recovered, the stroke negatively affected her memory progression. The "cognitive plateau" she had been on was starting to becoming a decline, and her memory was slipping more and the hallucinations were getting worse. After the stroke, her doctor prescribed her blood thinners, which ended up making matters worse when the dosage was calculated wrong. They gave her too much of a dose of warfarin, and Norma wound up back in the hospital after throwing up blood one morning. Her primary doctor, Dr. Pastorius, ordered her to have a home health nurse help her, which only added to the chaos.

While the Filtons could get something of a respite, Norma made life hell for everyone who'd listen. She simply did not understand the magnitude of her condition, and made the lives of the nurses who tended to her a living hell. Any talk of assisted living was an instant argument, with a reminder from her that "there is nothing wrong!" But it was clear to all who knew Norma that her health was declining.

Cyrus was asleep for six and a half hours when he heard the sound of the door opening. He opened his eyes and turned his head towards the sound to find his Dad helping Norma in. The wolf reached for the controls to the bed and slowly lifted it so he could sit up. "Oh hey, Dad and Grandma~"

"Son, how are you feeling?" Dan asked.

"I'm okay, Dad. I'm feeling a hell of a lot better."

"Hi Cyrus~" Norma smiled. The elderly wolf walked with a cane as she sat down in the chair next to him.

"I'll be right back. I gotta use the bathroom Cy."

"Okay, Dad."

Norma motioned with a paw. "I want to hold your hand, Cy. Gimme your hand."

Cy reached out with his left arm and Norma gripped his big paw with her frail little paws. She gently rubbed his paw with a smile on her face.

"Your Dad told me you were in the hospital, and it really scared me." Norma said to him. "Are you okay?"

"I was told I was suffering from extreme exhaustion." Cyrus told his grandma. "From everything going on."

You work too hard!" Norma exclaimed. "You should take a break!"

"I have to." Smiled the wolf. "I have to pick up the slack at work. Plus I'm worried about you, Grandma."

"Don't you worry about me, Cy." Norma assured. "I'm a tough ole' gal."

"You're my Grandma. Of course I'm going to worry."

Norma nodded and frowned a bit. "Everyone worries about me now. It didn't used to be like that."

"Grandma, it's because you have dementia. Your memory is fading. We worry about you because we love you."

Norma nodded. "My health is fading too it seems. You know, Cyrus, I really hate my life."

Cyrus nodded sympathetically.

Norma smacked her lips together. "I really hate how my life has become. Damn hard luck woman."

Cyrus didn't say anything. He didn't know what to say to his grandma.

"Maybe it's just time for me to go." Norma shook her head.

"If that's the way you feel~"

"I don't know, Cy. I don't know." Norma frowned. "But I want you to get better." She mustered a smile for him. "I don't like seeing you sick."

"I don't like being sick, that's for sure."

"I want you to be happy." Norma smiled.

"I appreciate you, Grandma~"

By nightfall, Cyrus was released from the hospital, with an order to rest for a couple of days. With paperwork in tow, Cyrus climbed aboard his truck to depart for Hanover. He followed Dan and Norma back onto the expressway for the drive eastward.

---

Following the doctor's advice from the emergency room, Cyrus took the rest of the week off. Business matters would be left to his Dad, brother, and nephew to run the office during his absence. It was the perfect time for a sick week; the first week of May was warm and sunny, the first taste of the upcoming summer months.

It was midweek, and the early afternoon sun shone brightly in an almost cloudless, cyan sky. Cyrus found himself hanging out with his friend Rob Barion, on the public firing range on the outskirts of north Newark.

Surrounded on three sides by tall berms adorned in trees and fencing, the firing range was a large open space. Gunfire echoed as targets were smashed by a hail of bullets fired by Cyrus and Rob at the firing line. Armed with a pair of M1 rifles, Rob and Cyrus put lead downrange at a set of paper targets that got tore up. A loud metallic "PING!" signaled the last round as the rifle spat the metal clip out.

Cyrus looked like he was having a good time as he grabbed another enbloc clip from his ammo belt strapped around his waist. He shoved the eight round clip into the rifle and slammed the bolt forward to let bullets rip down the range into his target. The ground behind it kicked up dust from each impact. Cyrus rapidly unleashed another clip, which shot out after the last shot with the distinctive ping.

"WHOO!" Cyrus exclaimed with a grin as Rob took his final shot.

Rob blew some smoke out of the receiver from his M1 and sat it down on the bench after engaging the safety. He doffed his earmuffs and sat them down with his rifle. "You can never go wrong with the Garand."

"It's one hell of a rifle that's for sure." Cyrus chuckled as he put the safety on and sat his rifle down.

Going to a shady spot nearby, Rob and Cyrus sat down to a working lunch at the picnic table. Cyrus packed a lunch in his dinged up cooler for them. Some homemade hoagies and pasta salad, with a couple of cans of Pepsi. Under the shade, Cyrus and Rob talked business; Cyrus wanted two commercials made to promote his landscaping business, and Rob was willing to shoot it at a steep discount for his friend. They talked about some of the ideas Cyrus had as Rob jotted the thoughts down in his brown leather portfolio. Rob was largely quiet and let Cyrus do the talking as he wrote it down. When they were done, Rob stowed his pen and closed his portfolio up to resume munching on his sandwich.

"It's been a doozy of a time." Cyrus admitted to Rob.

"Doozy of a decade so far." Rob joked with a morbid chuckle at the end.

"I don't think I've ever felt this stressed. Not in a long time." Cyrus remarked. "Even all the time I lived in Dayton, and my coming out... it didn't feel like this. This has felt like a nonstop pressure crushing me in all the time."

"Taking care of a loved one is a labor of love. It's a nightmare." Rob shrugged. "I help take care of my Grandma, who just turned ninety-one last month, but I also have two uncles and an aunt helping me. Plus my Grandma is still in pretty good health for her age."

"Heh, wish I could say that about Norma."

"How's your Grandma doing lately?" Rob asked.

"Fine I guess, given the circumstances. But her memory has been getting worse after the stroke."

"Yeah that sounds about right."

Cyrus couldn't help but chuckle as he took a sip of his pop. "Just when you think it couldn't get any worse, huh?"

"That's how it goes usually." Rob chuckled. "Life will kick you when you're down."

"Just the way Grandma talks sometimes... saying she can hear people she once knew, see visions of her parents, friends who have passed on... sometimes I wonder how much time I have left with her."

"That very well could be her body getting prepared to die." Rob figured. "It's unfortunate to hear."

"Yeah." Cyrus frowned. "Dude, this has been a very hopeless situation. I hate to call it that way."

"I get it. You want to help her, but you really can't. You can only be there for her."

"I don't know how much longer she can stay at home at the rate its going."

"What's your family saying?"

"We keep asking Norma to maybe help us look for an assisted living place with a long term memory care unit... and she just won't do it. It makes my Dad so upset."

"She'd best do it now, or else her doctor might and she won't like that outcome."

"That's what I tell her, and she's like 'I won't go'. Well you won't have a choice!" laughed the blonde wolf.

"Norma sounds like a fiercely independent woman."

"Yes." Chuckled Cyrus. "And extremely Irish."

"That says everything right there too." Rob chuckled. "Two most disgruntled, stubborn European types. Germans and the Irish~"

"I'm just afraid of what assisted living is going to cost..." grimaced the wolf. "Yay no healthcare system for the vulnerable!"

"Well if you need help, I'll help you." Rob offered.

"Rob, c'mon, I hate taking money from you."

"It's for a good cause." Rob shrugged. "Just remember and don't be afraid to ask."

"I feel bad enough you gave me that money last year to keep us afloat when gas was expensive."

Rob brushed it off. "Tax write-off, tax write-off, tax write-off~"

"Oh boy." Laughed Cyrus.

"This whole system this country has... it's really fucked up when you think about it." Rob admitted.

"Yeah I agree." Cyrus nodded.

"I'm not asking for a socialist utopia and that whole bill of goods fuckery, but the system we have... our laws, our healthcare, everything is just so fucked up. Nothing makes sense and everything and everybody is out to make money. I don't think people's healthcare should be seen as profit. That's kind of fucked up. But whooooooo late stage capitalism!"

"Next thing you know crematoriums will be used to generate power or something."

"I don't know, don't tempt some people, they'd that try that." Rob chuckled.

"Scary, right?" Cyrus grinned with a sardonic laugh.

---

Surrounded by tables and tables of colorful summer annuals, Norma looked happy as she went shopping with Cyrus. The little old wolfess, dressed in gray slacks with a pink blouse and big wide brimmed hat with sunglasses, wandered the nursery of Albyn's. Cyrus kept a close watch as he pushed the flat cart, which had a number of potted petunias and marigolds sitting in colorful plastic pots. Cyrus wore gym shorts and a blue tanktop with a blue bandana tied atop his head. He had his camera backpack thrown over his burly frame.

"Hey, Cyrus. What do you think these are?" Norma asked, holding up a selection of purple and white flowers.

"Those are petunias, Grandma~"

"What are these?" Norma asked, holding up the next set of petunias, which were red and white.

"Those are petunias~" chuckled Cyrus.

"Are these petunias too?"

"Yes, Grandma, those are petunias too."

"I want to get these! With the red and white ones too!"

"Sure!"

Cyrus looked happy seeing his Grandma all happy. As she shopped for some more perennials to replace some perennials that didn't make it in the winter, Cyrus grabbed his camera from his backpack. He had his fancy Sony Alpha, with a fast portrait lens attached. He turned it on, fiddled with the settings a bit and took some pictures of Norma looking at some colorful flowers that she was holding. Cyrus fired the shutter at Norma's happy expression on her aged face.

"Hey, Grandma! Look over here!"

Norma looked at Cyrus aiming his camera her. She gave a warm, loving smile that Cyrus got captured in a set of photographs.

"Hey what flowers are these?" Norma asked.

"Those are daisies."

"Do they come up every year?"

"Yeah~"

"These would look good at the other house I own!"

"No, Grandma." Cyrus chuckled. "You own one house, the one on Brown Street!"

"Why do I think I own that house on Clearview?"

"I don't know?" Cyrus shrugged.

"So I own just one home?"

"Yes, Grandma." Smiled Cyrus.

"Oh, okay."

"Why don't we get this paid for, and we'll get some mulch too?"

"Sure!"

Going through checkout, Cyrus paid for all the flowers and mulch, totaling $250. He told Norma that it was for her birthday, which was tomorrow. Cyrus loaded all the flowers into the long bed of his truck. He threw a single strap around them, and then threw twenty bags of dark brown mulch towards the tailgate. One more strap secured the mulch before Cyrus hopped down and slammed the tailgate shut. He helped Norma into his heavily laden Sierra, and they took off to head back to her home.

"I'm so happy we got these flowers!" Norma exclaimed. She sounded as happy as she looked.

"Happy birthday~" Cyrus said with a grin. "Eighty-five years young tomorrow!"

"I never thought I'd live to be eighty-five, Cyrus." Norma admitted. "I thought I'd have to settle for eighty... but I'm having a good time~"

"Mind over matter~" Cyrus quipped.

"How are you feeling?" Norma asked.

"The week off has actually been pretty nice~" Cyrus nodded. "Been helpful to take some time off and mentally recover."

"You shouldn't let stress get to you!"

Cyrus pursed his lips and just smiled.

"My goal Cyrus is to make it to ninety~ I think I'm in pretty reasonable health... You think so?"

"Well nothing's promised, Grandma."

"I think I'll make it to ninety. I know it."

"You never know, Grandma~"

"I'm pretty confident!"

"Okay, Grandma. If you say so!"

---

Spreading mulch down around some freshly planted summer flowers, Cyrus glanced up to see Norma fiddling around with her hose as she untangled a kink to get the water flowing again. She walked over dragging the hose to go water her pots of flowers and some of the other flowers Cy had planted for her. Norma looked very happy as she watered her newly planted and mulched garden bed. It brought a smile to Cy's face as he gathered up the empty plastic bags for the trash can.

Norma kneeled down to turn the spigot off and slowly rolled the hose back up on the reel. She shuffled over and gave Cyrus a tight hug.

"Oh my god, I'm so happy at this. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you~" Norma smiled. She pulled Cy's head down to give him a kiss on the cheek. "I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you~"

"Anything for you, Grandma." Smiled Cyrus.

As Cyrus threw the trash away, he saw his boyfriend Ben pull up in his dually Silverado. The big 3500HD parked out front as the young husky hopped out, fresh from work in his uniform. Cyrus walked over and gave his boyfriend a tender kiss on the lips.

"How was the drive, studly?" Cyrus asked with a smile.

"Thankfully uneventful." Ben smiled. "Hi Norma!"

"Hello, Ben!"

"Hey this looks real pretty." The husky complimented. "You should landscape our garden back in Westerville. You can plant my flowers, sexy~"

Cyrus chuckled and patted Ben's rump. "Don't you tempt me, cutie~"

Norma walked up carrying some trash in her grip. "You have the best boyfriend in the world, Ben. His name is Cyrus Darryl Filton, and I love him to death!"

"Well I love him to death too, 'cause they don't make 'em like Cy!" Ben laughed as he put his arms around Cy.

"I guess there's plenty of love to go around with me!" Cyrus grinned with a laugh.

Saying goodbye to his grandma, Cyrus hopped back into his truck and followed Ben back to his house. As always, he would spend the weekend with his boyfriend.

---

"Your Grandma looked pretty happy today!" Ben said as he reached back to untie his ponytail. He gave his head a shake and soaked it in the hot stream of water in the shower with Cy. Cyrus stood away from the stream, massaging soap into his chest and fur and stomach.

"She was very happy today. I bought her a bunch of flowers and mulch for her house for her birthday." Cy responded. "I love seeing her so happy."

"I can tell." Smiled Ben. He grabbed the soap and rubbed it on Cy's backside and butt. Ben traded places and got soaped up by Cyrus, who couldn't help but molest him a bit jokingly, to Ben's amusement.

"I'm kind of surprised she bounced back from that stroke... because usually you don't."

"Does she have any impairment from it?"

"Her memory took more of a hit I notice. She gets confused a lot easier, and more often, and the hallucinations... oh lord..."

"She's still having those?" the husky asked while soaking his long hair in the water stream. He grabbed some shampoo and lathered up his long hair and massaged his scalp.

"Yeah. The usual. Sometimes during the night, sometimes during the night. It's never a set pattern." Cy explained as he helped massage Ben's head.

"Oooh..." Ben groaned, relaxing a bit to Cy's massaging. "Poor Norma. That makes me sad."

"It's just the progression of the disease..." Cy frowned. "Dad and Uncle Ronnie are starting to get some idea for assisted living, because the nurses that help are kind of tired of her... as mean as that sounds."

"Well from what you tell me, Norma seems like a hard one to deal with!"

"Now THAT'S an understatement!" laughed the big wolf. "She's pissed off that she can drink alcohol being on blood thinners."

"Jesus Christ, that's a bad idea." Ben grimaced.

"She already had to go to the ER for throwing up blood one morning because they gave her too much fuckin' blood thinners... Jesus Christ."

Ben just shook his head. "Poor woman."

Cyrus dunked his head into the water again and lathered his head up with shampoo. Ben had to reach up to massage his scalp. "Jesus, why are you so tall?"

"Why are you so short?" Cyrus chuckled.

"Genetics, motherfucker." The husky laughed. "At least my cock's fucking huge!"

"Yes!" Cyrus grinned big. He and Ben laughed as Cyrus tipped his head back to rinse his long red hair out. Spinning around his wet hair flowing and slapping against his back, he put his arms around Ben and kissed him. Ben smiled and gave him another deep kiss as they played with each other's tongues.

"I am horny as fuck." Cyrus admitted.

"Well fuck, me too. Sounds like some fun times in bed in a bit!"

"Yeah!" Cyrus grinned.

"Now I know you're feeling better." Chuckled Ben. "Wreck my asshole when we dry off."

"If you really want your asshole wrecked, you should try the IRS!" Cyrus teased as he smacked Ben's bottom.

Ben blankly stared at him before laughing. "Jesus Christ... Now I know you're feeling better!"

"Yeah, I am." Cyrus nodded in a more serious tone.

Ben rinsed his body off. "Norma's birthday is tomorrow right?"

Cyrus nodded. "Yeah. I'm gonna bake a cake and cook her favorite southern fried chicken for her birthday party."

"Oooh~"

"But in the meantime..." grinned Cyrus as he put his arms around Ben to make out with him in the shower.

---

At nine o'clock in the morning, the front door to Cy's home swung open. Out stepped Ben carrying a big sheet cake that Cyrus had baked and made from scratch. It was a chocolate-hazelnut cake, coated in nutella. Ben was casually dressed in shorts and a red tanktop. Cyrus stepped out with his rolling cooler filled with all the stuff he needed to cook food at Norma's place. He was similarly dressed in black gym shorts and a blue and white tanktop, his red ponytail braided up neatly. It was loaded into his truck, and they took off to go celebrate her eighty-fifth birthday on a bright and cheerful Saturday morning.

In the backyard of Norma's house, Linda and Aunt Becky set up the folding table and some chairs. A red and white checkerboard patterned plastic table cloth was laid out, and some plates and cutlery were sat out. Aunt Becky brought an ambrosia, and Linda and Dan made a couple pies to go with a big bowl of pasta salad. Norma enjoyed her family's company while Cyrus sat up his gas fired turkey fryer on the concrete porch slab. As Cyrus worked, he was under the observation of Rob Barion and his camera, a vintage BVP-30 Betacam. He and his best friend Maverick Tokarev, were invited to help document Norma's birthday for home movies.

Cyrus glanced up at the camera. "Today we're gonna see Norma Filton's world class southern fried chicken, and I know the secret recipe!"

Ben stood talking to Talon and his boyfriend Ronnie Samson. Ronnie was an imposing red Doberman, a tough looking Hells Angel with tattoo sleeves like his boyfriend, and long flowing wavy brown hair that poked out from under his bandana tied atop his head. Ronnie had an acoustic guitar strapped around him, to sing a song for Norma's birthday. The laugher of children filled the yard as Ed's kids played with Darryl's daughter and Talon's daughter.

On camera, Norma assisted Cyrus as he prepared raw chicken to deep fry. Norma nitpicked at little things as Cyrus dredged the chicken in a small bowl of buttermilk and then flour that was seasoned with some salt and pepper.

"Grandma, why don't you tell our photographer here what the Filton secret recipe is?" Cyrus asked with a smirk.

"Everyone always talks about all these elaborate seasonings or spices... but to hell with that... the best spices for chicken is just good ole' salt and pepper!" Norma exclaimed.

"You heard it!" Cyrus grinned.

Cyrus cooked up a big batch of chicken, which he sat out to rest on some metal racks, before stacking it on a giant serving platter. The chicken came out perfect, to Norma's delight. She remarked that she could still do it given permission, a comment that made Cyrus chuckle as he safely turned off his turkey fryer to cool off. Some candles were lit on Norma's cake, and everyone gathered around as the cameras rolled. Norma sat at one end of the table, surrounded by family as the candles glowed on her cake.

Ronnie started to play a tune on his guitar as everyone sang "Happy Birthday". Everyone looked happy as photos and video were taken, and at the end of the song, Norma blew out the candles to a happy applause.

"Let's eat!" Norma exclaimed.

Sitting at the long table, everyone dug into a home cooked meal. It was a happy affair; there was no arguing, no disagreements, nothing. Everyone looked actually relaxed and having a good time surrounded by nature under the cheery bright skies.

---

Rob sat his Betacam on his tripod boot and locked it into place. He plugged a microphone into the input on the VTR and handed it to Cyrus, who adjusted the cord a bit. Norma looked relaxed as she sat on her couch, ready for an impromptu interview. Rob loaded a fresh Betacam tape into his recorder and slapped the lid shut for it to spool up.

"What are we doing again?" Norma asked.

"We're gonna do a little impromptu interview, Grandma!"

"Over what?"

"Just general stuff. Why don't you tell us about your life?"

"I'll try." Norma nodded.

Rob adjusted his headset. "Audio sounds okay." He leaned in to look into the viewfinder and adjust the shot as he lined up on Cyrus. "Whenever you're ready."

"So what are we doing again?"

Cyrus chuckled. "Just an interview. Tell us about your life, Grandma!"

"Okay, fine." The wolfess shrugged.

"Action."

"Hello! Cyrus Filton here for Filton's Finest Landscaping Company! So as you know... my business was started by my grandfather, Gary Filton, about sixty years ago right here in Hanover. Now my Grandpa gave the family many things, many great and fantastic things, and one of the greatest things he did was marry our very best, beloved matriarch, a lil' woman with spunk from a little village in rural Ireland, Misses Norma Merle Filton!"

The camera swung out to show both Cyrus and Norma.

"Is this where I speak?"

"Yeah, just speak into the microphone here." Cyrus pointed out as he held the microphone out.

"What is it again we're talking about?"

"You! Tell us about you, Grandma!"

"Oh okay. Well. I'm Norma Filton, and I am celebrating my eighty-fifth birthday today. I never thought I'd make it to eighty-five! I always thought dying at eighty would be good enough! I'm a bit beyond my expected warranty phase!"

"Outside of the head, you're still going, Grandma."

"A little worn out." Norma laughed. "I was born in Ireland, in May of 1938. My family were farmers, from the village of Clifden, near the sea. I spent my first thirteen years of my life living in Ireland."

"Can you tell us a bit about life in Ireland?"

"Well it was really slow... I remember. I grew up in a brick home near the outskirts of town. Devout catholic family, always going to mass. That's what royally screwed my life up... before dementia... or whatever you call it..."

"I'm not gonna make you talk about that..."

"No, I am going to talk about it, because I want it on record for the family for the future! And for other girls who may have suffered this indignity." Norma brushed it off. "I had my first child when I was thirteen years old. I was... raped by a priest and my son Neal was born in April of 1952. He was given up for adoption. My parents, my family were so shocked that they sent me to live with relatives in the United States. The whole family scraped together every little penny they could get to send me here on a plane. I grew up here in Hanover."

As the camera rolled, Norma recalled her life. Her memory held up for the camera as she talked about growing up in Hanover, and meeting her husband and starting her family. She talked a bit about the disappointment of losing the ability to do things and not drive, but reminded Cyrus again her desire to try and make it to ninety. Cyrus just smiled and held the microphone out. He was happy to see his Grandma lucid.

---

As the sun faded away, Cyrus stoked the bonfire in his backyard. He and Ben hung out with some of their friends around the fire as Cyrus threw another log into the flames. Talon and Ronnie sipped some beers with Marty and Jason as they all talked about the day. Cyrus sat back down, dug another beer out of the ice and popped the cap on it for a swig.

"Your Grandma looked really happy." Ronnie said as he kicked his feet up on a log propped up on end.

"I think we made Norma's day." Ben added.

"I was so happy to see her like that. She was pretty lucid." Cyrus nodded.

"I think your Grandma needs more company." Jason quipped.

"Ha, you'd think she'd get that with the nurses? Ohh nooooo..." Cyrus laughed. "One nurse told me that Norma was 'very difficult'. I think she had other words she wanted to use."

"Yeah, like 'bitch'." Talon grinned. Everyone laughed.

"Yes. I would say that too. My Grandma can be a stubborn bitch!"

"My Mom's Mom has Alzheimer's real bad." Ronnie revealed to Cyrus. "I saw her only one time back around Christmas, and she was just all lost and confused."

"That's sad." Ben frowned.

Ronnie shrugged. "She never wanted to be in my life, so I don't know her. I feel for my Mom though. She's exhausted taking care of her."

"It is exhausting." Cyrus acknowledged. "You know you read about this, you read about caretakers being mentally and physically drained, but you never know the full extent of it until you're actually the one doing it!"

"Exactly." Jason nodded.

Cyrus fumbled his brow. "I kind of wish my Grandma would go into assisted living. She'd be around people, she'd have company and all the help she'd get... but she's stubborn like an ox. She just won't do it. And I'm afraid she's gonna get herself killed one of these days."

"I get it." Talon nodded. "You know my Grandma is worried sick after she tried walking to our store."

"Well yeah! And I'm afraid she's gonna do that again!" Cyrus exclaimed.

"Be prepared because she probably will wander off eventually." Marty grimaced. "God, now you make me think about my parents since they're both in their mid seventies!"

"My parents' are getting there too." Jason cringed. "Aging sucks you know? I'm almost forty-three and hell there's days where I get out of bed and feel like I got in a damn car wreck!"

"Wait till you're fifty-two!" Marty exclaimed.

"Old fuck!" Cyrus grinned.

"You're gonna blink motherfucker and be my age too one of these days!" Marty pointed.

"And aging does suck! You get out of bed wrong, twist your neck or leg wrong and it's a sick day!"

"Yeah!" Talon laughed.

"I can only imagine what my Grandma is dealing with..." Cyrus said more sympathetically.

---

Lightning flashed, casting a blue light through the windows of Norma's home. The wall clock read 5:30 in the morning, as the distant, deep rumble of ominous thunder rolled outside. The wind rattled the shutters to Norma's old house.

Getting up from her bed, Norma felt confused. She turned the light on and looked around at her bedroom, which didn't seem normal to her. It didn't feel right. She looked around at her room and felt like it wasn't hers. Was this her house? The elderly wolfess looked confused.

Getting dressed, Norma ventured downstairs as another flash of lighting lit the living room up. She turned on a lamp and looked around. The living room didn't look right to her. A rumble of thunder spooked the elderly wolf.

Taking a deep breath, Norma looked around. She saw a young boy, a little gray wolf with tousled red hair running around, laughing and giggling. "Neal!" she called out.

"Morning, mother!" he giggled before running off around a corner.

"Neal, what are you doing?" Norma called.

"Hey, Norma!" she saw her husband Gary come walking by. He slipped around the corner and disappeared from view.

"This can't be my home!" Norma exclaimed as she saw the telephone on the coffee table. She quickly dialed Cyrus' phone number. It rang and rang and went to the answering machine. She asked if he could pick her up. She hung up and dialed her son Dan's number.

"Hello..." came the groggy voice of Dan.

"Dan? It's your Mom..."

"Mom is everything okay..."

"Hey look, could you come and pick me up? I don't want to be at this house anymore. I want to go back to my other home..."

"God fucking damnit, Mom, you don't have another home!" snapped Dan. "You are having a hallucination, and I want you to sit down and rest and wait for this spell to pass. You are at your home on Brown Street."

"This home is for sale, Dan! I need to get to my home on Clearview Street! Can you please pick me up?"

"No."

"Please? I'm lonely here."

"Mom... I want you to sit down in a chair and rest. Turn on the TV, relax, wait for the spell to pass. I love you Mom. Good bye."

The line went dead after Dan hung up. Norma looked scared as the flash of lighting startled her. She tried calling Cyrus again, and got no answer, only the answering machine. Norma hung up and breathed a bit heavier. Looking frantic, she shuffled her way to the kitchen to only suddenly freeze up. Her blue eyes went huge.

Emerging around the entry to the kitchen was the ghostly figure of Father Hubbley. He was an imposing looking gray wolf in his black priest attire with white collar. Clutching a bible in his grip, he smiled at Norma as he walked very slowly towards her.

"Norma, where is the boy?" he asked. His voice had a deep echo to it.

"No!" Norma growled. "NO! You're not getting Neal!"

Norma turned and ran as fast as her frail legs could take her. She stumbled and caught herself on her letter desk, where a mug containing some pencils fell over and shattered on the floor. Looking panicked, Norma bent down to frantically pick up the busted pencils when she noticed two keys lying amongst the busted ceramic. One was for a suitcase she had thrown away many years ago, but the other key looked familiar. Norma picked it up and noticed the Buick symbol stamped on it.

"Norma... I need the boy..."

Lightning flashed through a turbulent, dark sky. The wind rustled the trees as the thunder clapped, deep and ominous. Big heavy sprinkles began to drop as Norma rushed out her front door. Clutching her coat, she shuffled to the Skylark and quickly unlocked it.

"Come on, Neal! We must go! We must go!" Norma yelled. She fired the car up and backed up quickly. Screeching out onto the street, she threw the shifter into drive and peeled out. Her headlights peered out into the darkness as she screeched away.

---

"Hey, you be careful going home!" Talon told his boyfriend as the rain and wind whipped around in the storm. Talon gave Ronnie a kiss on the lips.

"It's a Monday!" Ronnie laughed.

"This is how you start a Monday!" laughed Talon. "Little Colt! You have a great day at school!"

"Will do!" the young Dober grinned. "Come on Dad!"

"Let's go!" Ronnie exclaimed.

Rushing through the torrential downpour, they hopped into Ronnie's Silverado, a mid-2000's red 3500HD. He fired up the diesel engine and backed out, and with wiper blades at full blast, began their journey back to Newark.

"Boy, it's raining a lot!" Colt remarked. The seven year old clutched his dampened backpack as Ronnie drove slow. His headlights peered out to an almost blinding rainstorm, the downpour practically overwhelming the wiper blades.

"Good call on the truck, Colty!" Ronnie exclaimed. "How'd you know it was going to rain?

"The weather channel!" grinned his son. Ronnie just gave a sarcastic gaze back.

"Why didn't I think of that?"

"Whoa!" Colt exclaimed to a blinding flash of lightning, followed by a massive clash of thunder that rattled the truck.

"That was right overhead!" Ronnie exclaimed. His laughter stopped when he noticed a headlight coming into view. But it didn't seem right, it was really off to his left, where the road wasn't at. Ronnie put his foot on the brake and began slowing up as he saw debris on the road. Car debris. There were skid marks that Ronnie's blue eyes followed, which led to the mangled wreckage of a car off the road, smashed into a tree near the bridge over a creek.

"Holy shit..." Ronnie exclaimed. He came to a stop and pushed the column shifter into park. "Colty! You stay right here!"

"Okay! Be safe, Dad!"

Jumping out into the downpour, Ronnie lifted his leather jacket up to try and protect his head in a futile attempt to stay dry. Ronnie approached the mangled wreck of a Buick Skylark. The entire front end was busted and crushed, and its windshield was cracked all over. Steam hissed from the radiator. One headlight continued glowing. The driver side door was open. Ronnie fumbled his brow at what he was seeing. From the looks of it, the vehicle hydroplaned and struck the guard rail on the right side before hitting the tree. He ran around to find nobody inside the vehicle. A flash of lightning provided some illumination, and Ronnie noticed the tall grass looked trampled, as if someone had just walked on it. He followed it to the edge of the embankment, when another bright flash of lightning revealed a person lying at the bottom of the embankment. An elderly woman lying on a bunch of rocks that lined the embankment.

"OH FUCK." Ronnie exclaimed. He ran back to his truck. "COLTY!!!!!"

Colt threw the door open. "Dad!"

"Colty! I want you to call 9-1-1 for me! There's someone badly hurt down in the creek! Can you do that?"

"Yeah!"

"We're on County Road forty!" Ronnie pointed. Colt dialed 9-1-1 as he watched his Dad run back into the torrential rain and disappear in the gray abyss.

"Licking County Fire and Ambulance, what is your emergency?"

"Hi, my name is Colt Samson, and I am reporting a car accident on county road forty near Hanover." Colt said very calmly into his Dad's cellphone.

"You're reporting a car accident?"

"Yeah."

"Are you involved in the car accident?"

"Me and my Dad came across a car that crashed into a tree on the road. Dad says someone is laying in the creek area badly hurt. We need help!"

"I am sending you help. Can you stay on the line for me please?"

"Yes I can."

"How old are you, Colt?"

"I'm seven."

"You're going a really good job, Colt. Just stay with me."

Braving the storm, Ronnie gingerly made his way down the rocky embankment. Another flash of lighting gave him a second of illumination, and to his sheer horror, he saw Norma Filton lying bloodied and hurt on the ground. Both her legs looked clearly broken; he dare not move her. But Ronnie watched the creek start to swell in size from all the rain, the water turning a turbid brown color from the runoff that was building up.

"Oh fuck... no, no, no, no, no, no..." Ronnie muttered. He pushed wet locks of hair out of his face as he desperately grabbed Norma, who cried out in pain. "I know it hurts! I know it hurts! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

The Doberman dragged the frail wolfess up the embankment, as thunder clapped overhead. She cried out, she screamed in pain as Ronnie moved her. He dragged her towards his truck, and Colt jumped out with the phone to try and help his Dad. "Oh my god she's badly hurt!" Colt exclaimed.

"Colty! Get in the cab! Get in the cab!" Ronnie yelled. He took his leather jacket off and tried to cover Norma up in a futile attempt to protect her. "Colty! Do you have your windbreaker!"

Colt took his windbreaker off and handed it to Ronnie, who held it up over Norma's head. The elderly wolf had passed out from the pain as Ronnie held his fingers to her neck to check for a pulse.

Emerging through the blinding rain was the flashing strobe lights of a Sherriff's interceptor. The Ford Taurus screeched to a stop, and a deputy came running out in his rain suit. He was a middle-aged gray wolf who had brown hair poking out from a baseball cap.

"Oh god what happened!?" he exclaimed. "Oh no, oh no, Norma!"

"You know her?"

"I'm Deputy Hansen, I'm Linda Filton's brother." He announced. "Licking County forty-five, send for an ambulance immediately, I have a single elderly woman who has been involved in a car accident."

"Colty are you still on the emergency call?" Ronnie asked.

"No, they ended the call with the deputies arrival." Colt responded.

"Let me see that phone please."

Colt handed his Dad the phone, who struggled to use it with his wet paws. He went through his contacts and called Talon.

"Hey babe, you okay?"

"Norma Filton wrecked her car!"

"WHAT!?" Talon shouted. "How the fuck did she get a key!?"

"I have no idea! I don't have Cy's number. You gotta get ahold of their family. She's really badly hurt."

"How bad?"

"Pretty fucking bad!"

"Okay! I'll call him! Is help there?"

"Deputy just showed up, ambulance is coming."

"Oh god... Okay. I'll call them."

"Norma?" called Deputy Hansen. "It's John~ Can you speak to me, Norma?" He checked for any breathing sound and a pulse. "She's still breathing... god damnit, Norma... how the hell did you get the key to the vehicle!?"

---

Looking like a convoy, the Filton's arrived at Licking Memorial Hospital. Cyrus and Freddy in his Sierra, Dan and Linda in the Tahoe, and Darryl carrying his girlfriend, and Ronnie and Becky. They pulled into the emergency parking area, with Cyrus parking beside the red Silverado he sold to Ronnie last year.

As the rain trailed off, Cyrus hopped out and ran as fast as he could for the ER entrance. As he ran, he heard the sound of rotors, and momentarily stopped. The big wolf watched as a medevac helicopter arrived, a white and green Eurocopter touching down on the helipad. That helicopter was certainly for his grandmother.

Rushing inside, Cyrus and the family checked in at the receptionist's desk, but were unable to see Norma as she was loaded up in the helicopter. The emergency room doctor wanted to meet with the family, and they were taken to a consultation room to await for Dr. Cromwell. The minutes agonizingly ticked by before he showed up.

Dr. Cromwell, a gray wolf in his forties, with brown hair combed back atop his head and wearing green scrubs, carried a clipboard in his grip and a stethoscope around his neck as he stepped inside and closed the door. He sat down and greeted the family. The room was somber as Dr. Cromwell explained the situation.

Norma was critically injured. She was severely injured from the car accident, and the subsequent fall down the embankment. Norma broke both her legs, broke both her hips, and multiple ribs. She had significant internal injuries and bleeding. When she was brought into the trauma unit, she was in cardiac arrest and the paramedics were doing CPR until her heart got restarted. There was nothing more Licking Memorial could do, and she was sufficiently stabilized for the flight to OSU in Columbus. Cromwell was not optimistic about the prognosis. He told the family to "brace for the inevitable."

Cyrus left the room looking shocked and disappointed. His expression seemed numb as he walked back to the emergency room waiting area, where Ronnie ran up to greet him. Holding a statement for the police in hand, Ronnie still looked dampened. His long locks of hair had a sheen from being damp, and locks of hair clung to his face. He wore dampened jeans and his white tanktop while he tried to dry his shirt out by the room's register vent.

"Cyrus, man, I'm so sorry about Norma."

"How the hell did she get the key..." Cyrus pondered out loud. He looked so shocked that it was registering as a numb look on his face. Everyone had that expression from what Ronnie could see.

"What did the doctor say?"

"It's...not good." Cyrus shook his head.

Ronnie frowned and nodded. He understood.

"Thank you for trying to help her at such a critical time." Cyrus said, hugging his friend tightly.

"Anything for a friend." Ronnie smiled. "Cyrus~ Wishing the best for her."

"Thanks, man~"

---

OSU's Wexner Medical Center, a sprawling medical complex of several brick and glass clad buildings, was one of Columbus' largest hospitals. Norma was airlifted from Licking Memorial to OSU and rushed immediately into surgery. The Filtons hopped onto the highway and rushed up to OSU to be there for her. The only Filton not present was Ed, who had to stay back and run the family business. But they all stayed in touch with him.

Arriving at OSU, the long wait began in the surgery waiting room. Hours felt like centuries as the clock on the wall quietly ticked away. Cyrus sat with his Mom and Dad and brother Darryl, while Ronnie and Becky looked out the window to pass the time. A great tension filled the room.

At two o'clock, the surgeon appeared and asked all of them to join him in the consultation room. They piled in and he shut the door. Like Dr. Cromwell at Licking Memorial, the news was not good.

Sticking X-rays up on the display board, Dr. Sandberg turned on the light to show the extent of Norma's injuries. The X-rays painted a grim picture.

"She broke both her hips, and both her legs just below the knee are broken, as are these ribs here." The husky pointed out. "These are very serious injuries, and even more serious when you're eighty-five years old."

Dr. Sandberg talked about the extent of internal injuries he had found. She had a large amount of internal bleeding in her abdomen, and her spleen had to be removed.

"The orthopedic surgeon is currently working on the hips right now." Sandberg concluded as he turned the display off and pulled the X-rays down.

"The prognosis is not good, doctor?" Dan asked, looking serious but glum.

"I'm going to be real honest with you, Mister Filton. If she leaves the hospital, which at this point, is probably unlikely... she'll never live at home again."

Dan nodded.

"Her injuries are pretty severe. And given that you have told me that she has memory problems with dementia? Then I would suggest to her PCP that she needs to go into a home. Rehabilitation will be mandatory if she can even get out of this hospital. I don't want to be an alarmist, or a downer, but I want all of you to start preparing any end-of-life decisions. Nothing is set in stone yet, and I don't want you to be under pressure... but I want you to start preparing and getting your ducks in a row. Because this is a serious medical situation where death is very likely."

"I understand." Linda calmly said.

"Cyrus, can you run home and grab the legal packets at your place for your grandmother's power of attorney and insurance information?" Dan asked Cy.

"Yeah, I can do that."

Cyrus excused himself and left the consultation room for the elevator. He climbed aboard and hit the button for the lobby as the doors slid shut.

Exiting the hospital, Cyrus walked quickly across the expansive parking lot to his Sierra. He unlocked his truck and momentarily paused after opening the door up. Cyrus looked down at the pavement and shook his head before climbing in.

---

Chirping birds sat in Cy's flowering crabapple in his front yard as he quickly made his way back inside. Rushing through the living room, Cyrus went past his desk to his filing cabinet tucked away in the corner. He slid the second drawer open, fiddled around with some folders and pulled out his copy of the medical and financial power of attorney packets. He slid the cabinet door shut and sat them on his desk. Rubbing his paws on his face, a frustrated Cyrus took a moment to collect his thoughts. The situation with his Grandma was dire.

Realizing that he needed to call his half-uncle who lived in Ireland, Cyrus picked up the handset to the phone on his desk, but realized that he did not know the number. He hung the phone back up, grabbed the packets and quickly ran out the door.

Rushing over to his Grandma's house, Cyrus made his way inside where he heard the phone ringing as usual. He picked it up to hear a spam call and immediately hung up. Going to the letter desk, Cyrus threw it open and grabbed Norma's contact booklet. He sat it down, flipped it open and flipped through to find Neal Magruder's phone number. Grabbing the other phone, Cyrus dialed his number and heard it ring multiple times, only for it to go to his answering machine.

"Hi Neal. This is Cyrus Filton. I need you to call me back at my cell phone number, seven-four-zero, four-zero-nine, -eighty-nine-eighty-nine. Norma is in the hospital in critical condition from a bad car accident early this morning. ...It's not good. Please call me when you get this message. Thank you. Bye."

Cyrus hung the phone up. He knelt down to start picking up the shattered pencil cup, when he heard footsteps. The big wolf turned around to see his Dad running inside.

"I thought you'd be here." Dan said as he approached. "I gotta fill out some paperwork at the Sheriff's Department, and I need the vehicle information on that Skylark as part of their investigation, since Mom didn't have the paperwork in the damn glovebox, like I told her..."

"I just left a message for Neal." Cyrus told his Dad.

"Okay, good." Dan nodded. He sucked in his lips and rubbed a paw over them as he thought. "How the hell did she get a spare key... why didn't I know about the spare... oh no... oh no... Dad used to keep spare keys in his pencil cup... and... why didn't I think about that... why didn't I think about that..."

Dan stomped a foot onto the ground and stood still for a second. Cyrus watched his Dad's face light up in a fit of rage as he grabbed the letter desk flipped it onto the floor. Everything inside came exploding out in a mighty crash.

"MOTHERFUCKER!" Dan screamed as tears began streaming from his eyes. "I killed my Mom... I killed her... I killed her."

"No... no..." Cyrus told him as he rushed over to hug his Dad tightly. Dan put his head into Cy's shoulder and sobbed as his son held him.

"How did I fucking forget the spare key!?" he yelled.

"It happens... you forgot about it. It's okay..." Cyrus frowned. "We all knew something bad was going to happen sooner or later..."

"God fucking damnit..." Dan sobbed. "I shouldn't have hung up on her... I shouldn't have... but how the fuck would I have known this would be it?"

"There's no point freaking out about it now... it happened... and we just have to accept it." Cyrus calmly stated.

Dan sat down at the table looking dejected. Tear filled, bloodshot eyes blankly stared out.

Cy's cellphone rang. He quickly grabbed it from his shorts pocket to see a foreign number matching Neal's calling him.

"Cyrus speaking."

"Cyrus? It's Neal. Sorry, I was out in the garden. What happened?"

Cyrus sat down and talked to Neal, bringing him up to speed about Norma.

---

Two Days Later.

Westbound on I-70, Cyrus and Freddy made their way to Wexner Medical Center. The Sierra shared the lane with the flow of early afternoon traffic as Cyrus limped his truck along with a missing tire on the back left. While out mowing and heading back to the headquarters, he struck road debris which shredded his back left outboard tire. With no time in his schedule, Cyrus simply threw the rim and shredded tire into the bed.

"You know for five tires...it drives pretty solid." Chuckled Freddy as he texted a friend.

"Oh you can feel it on the turns..." chuckled Cyrus. "Just what I needed huh?"

"When it rains it pours, Cy."

"I guess." The wolf cynically chuckled.

Pulling into the parking lot, Cyrus parked beside his Dad's Tahoe and they hopped out to quickly make their way across the blacktop. Catching the first elevator available, they went to the third floor where Norma was, in the ICU.

By some miraculous act, Norma defied all expectations and survived the complicated, multi-hour surgery. She endured two hip replacements, and her legs were set and put into casts. They operated and stopped the internal bleeding. Despite all the trauma her body endured, she woke up the next day and was able to be weaned off the ventilator. But the odds were still stacked against her. Some of her organs were still displaying some dysfunction.

Cyrus stepped in with Freddy, carrying some colorful balloons to cheer her up. Norma laid in her bed, practically looking like a mummy with all the bandages and casts on her body. An oxygen mask gently sat on her muzzle. Cyrus tied the balloons to the stand beside her bed and pulled up a chair to be close to her. Dan and Linda stood on the other side of her bed.

"Hi Grandma~" Cyrus smiled.

Norma weakly turned her head to Cyrus. "Cyrus, is that you?"

"Yes Grandma, it's me. I'm here."

"Hey Grandma Filton." Smiled Freddy.

"Freddo... nice to see you..." Norma responded. Her voice was very weak and gravely.

Norma gulped oxygen and winced in pain, as morphine slowly dripped from an IV line. "Jesus, I'm in pain..."

"I understand, Grandma."

Norma sighed slowly. "I really fucked up..."

"No, no, it's okay." Cyrus assured. "Let's get you better."

"I... I got scared... and I found the key... and wanted to escape... the priest and protect the boy..."

"Is that what you saw, Grandma?"

"Yes. I thought it was real. I was really scared."

Cyrus nodded with a sympathetic look on his face.

"Nothing makes sense anymore."

Gently grabbing his Grandma's frail paw, Cyrus held it in his grip and stroked it tenderly. Her paw was rather cold, and he gently rubbed it to warm it up.

Norma tried to explain what happened. But her memory was very spotty. She drove for a while, but got lost in the storm and the blinding rain, and in a turn, lost control and struck a tree. From what Cyrus figured and what Ronnie had told him, she most likely tried to get out, was already severely injured, and then fell down the embankment. Ronnie's efforts to save her from drowning probably did more damage as well. It was a very unfortunate situation. Norma tried to apologize multiple times, and Cyrus and Dan told her it was okay. What else could they say? There was no point in being upset.

After spending some time with her, Dan and Linda decided to go grab a late lunch in the cafeteria. Freddy joined them. Cyrus stayed back to keep his Grandma company. He watched them depart, sliding the glass door closed to the ICU room.

Norma struggled to turn her head some to look at Cyrus. "Cy... I want to see Neal."

"I understand, Grandma. I'll see what I can do, but he lives all the way over in Ireland." Cyrus explained.

"I want to see Neal. Then I can go." Norma said bluntly. "I want to see my first born one more time... then I know my mission here is completed."

"I understand, Grandma."

Norma was brutally honest. "I am ready to go, Cyrus. I already told your Mom and Dad. I am ready to go. I'm tired of living this... this nightmare. I can't do anything anymore. I can't enjoy living my life... I feel like a god damn prisoner. I can't even drink my favorite alcohol anymore. I'm not having fun anymore. I've lived my life, Cyrus."

"If that's how you feel, Grandma."

"I've seen my children grow up... my grandchildren grow up... and now I got to start seeing my great-grandchildren grow up... At least with Freddo... I got to see him reach adulthood. You really did a wonderful job, Cyrus, taking your nephew in and raising him."

"I had to." Smiled Cyrus. "And I'd do it all over again if I had to."

Norma smiled a bit. "Cyrus, you remind me so much of Donald." She had to take a moment to think of the words. Your Uncle Ron was always about just having a good time and partying it up with his friends. Your Dad was always too hard on himself. Took everything too seriously... your father was meant to be a military man just like your grandfather... But Donald. He was really level headed. He was just perfect. So brilliant, so easy going. You remind me of Donald. It's a shame I never got a chance to have him in my life for long... he died too young... But I got to have him again in you, Cyrus."

"Well, thank you Grandma~" smiled the wolf, who continued to hold her paw.

"I remember the first time I got to hold you, on the day you were born. I was so excited because you had the same kind of bright red hair like me. I was so excited that me and your Mom weren't the only blatant redheads around!" Norma weakly exclaimed with a pain filled snicker.

"It is very red isn't it~"

"Not mine anymore..." Norma quipped. She stopped to gulp more air. "Everything wears out... time waits for no man or woman."

"You mean so much to me Grandma. When I didn't really have anyone in the family to talk to except for Ed, after I came out, you and Grandpa were always there."

"I'll let you in on a secret. I didn't have my head shoved up my ass like the others." Norma said quietly. Cyrus chuckled as Norma smiled. "It never once bothered me that you are gay. And it shouldn't. I mean... I got raped by a guy who everyone endeared in my hometown. They couldn't believe such a morally upstanding prick like him could do something like that. So being gay is nothing. All this bullshit I hear... fuck 'em, Cy. Fuck 'em..."

"Indeed, Grandma."

"I don't want you to be sad when I die, Cy. I want you to be happy because I made it this long. I want to see Neal one final time. Then I can go. I'm ready."

Cyrus mustered a reserved smile as he patted Norma's frail paw. "I don't know if I'm ready, Grandma."

"I know, Cy. Nobody is really truly ready... I thought I was when my parents went... it hurt. Not as bad as when Donald died. That really hurt. It's when you're young... that's when a death is really tragic. An old bird like me? It's a blessing."

"I wouldn't exactly call it a blessing..." Cyrus chuckled a little bit.

"I would... you wanna trade places, Cy?" Norma joked. "When I die...I want you to hold my paw... just like that. So that's the last thing I feel."

"I can do that, Grandma. I promise you, I'll be there at the end."

"You're the best, Cyrus. I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you. I want you to know that... I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you."

"I love you too, Grandma." Cyrus said as he leaned in to kiss her forehead. "I'll always love you forever more."

Norma motioned with her eyes. "Why don't you grab lunch with your parents. I'll be right here. Not like I'm going anywhere..."

Cyrus nodded. "Alrighty, Grandma. I can do that."

Norma weakly smiled. "I'll see you when you get back~"

Cyrus nodded as he got up. He walked to the exit, slid the door open a bit, and excused himself as he slid it shut.

---

Cyrus was a true believer in the saying "it's not what you know, it's who you know". And once again, that saying came true for the wolf. Trying to figure out how to bring Neal over to the US on such short notice got a huge boost of help from his friend Rob Barion.

The tarmac was wet from an evening rainstorm, the bright spotlights of the airport glistening off the splattered puddles streaked with oil. The clock struck nine o'clock, as Cyrus arrived at the Newark-Heath Airport with his nephew, and Dad. Cyrus was borrowing Rob's bright red one-ton, an almost brand new Silverado 3500HD. He turned and parked and everyone quickly got out, where one of Rob's sentries held the gate for the tarmac open for them.

Rumbling on the tarmac was Rob's personal VIP propliner, the immaculately polished "Coneflower", a 1954 L-1049E. The Lockheed was in the finishing stages of preparation as all four engines ran at low power, the exhaust stubs to the big turbocompound radials glowing with blue flames. Rob climbed down from the rear airstair casually dressed and welcomed them aboard. Cyrus, Dan, and Freddy quickly climbed aboard, and the ground crew pulled the stairs back as Rob locked the hatch.

Taking a seat, Cyrus was shocked at how soon they were rolling. The plane rattled and shook on the slow taxi ride on the service road. It slowly turned onto the runway, and Cyrus watched and listened to all four radials spool up to maximum power. Brilliant flames erupted out as the engines were run rich at maximum power. Bright red flames, trailing halfway back across the wing roared out of the engines as they began their takeoff roll. Lightly loaded, the Constellation easily lifted off Newark-Heath's runway, and began a slow climb eastbound, to New York.

Cyrus earlier had spoken to Neal, who managed to find a late evening flight from Shannon to New York City. But there was no available connecting flight from the big apple to Columbus. Cyrus managed to solve that problem with a phone call to his friend, who without hesitation told him to get ready and meet him at the airport at nine o'clock.

Leveling off at ten thousand feet, the narrow cabin lighting was dim and calm. The very executive interior was filled by the muffled drone of four radial engines and their synchronized propellers keeping them aloft. "Coneflower" flew alone in the moonlit sky, aided by a tailwind.

Under a spotlight, Cyrus, Dan, and Freddy went over some insurance paperwork. Dan read through some of the policies of Norma's health insurance plan that she got through a company named AmBetter.

Dan looked disgusted as he read through the fine print of the packet. "God fucking damnit... this health insurance plan sucks!"

Cyrus and Freddy looked dejected.

"Why have fucking health insurance if it's not gonna cover shit!?" Dan groaned. "God damnit Mom... Why the fuck did you switch from Anthem..."

Cyrus just shook his head. "Too late now."

"Yeah, no fuckin' kiddin..." Dan grunted as he closed the packet up. He shook his head and took a sip from a short tumbler filled with coke and some ice.

"I have a feeling once Grandma Filton sees Neal, she'll die."

"Yeah." Dan quietly agreed. "I have that same feeling too."

"Me too." Cyrus nodded.

"I feel like it'll be a blessing." Freddy shrugged. "At least to me."

"I can't believe I forgot about the spare key..." Dan shook his head.

"Don't beat yourself up, Grandma." Freddy assured.

"I shouldn't... but all the years I went down hard on Ronnie for accidentally killing Donald... now I'm the hypocrite."

"All the stuff you've had to do in such a short amount of time, it was bound that we'd miss one thing or two." Cyrus reasoned. "It was an accident, it happened, and there's nothing more we can do about it. We can only be there to comfort her with what time we have left."

Dan silently nodded and took another sip of his drink.

Excusing himself, Cyrus ventured up through the empty cabin and through the bulkhead into the cockpit area. Stepping into the empty navigator's compartment, he stepped into the cockpit, which was dimly lit in red light. At the controls were Rob's adopted son Felix Barion, and his best friend Ivo Horvat. Ivo's boyfriend, Jordan Hoover, served as the flight engineer. Rob sat in the redundant radioman's seat, sitting quietly in rather casual clothes of work pants and a gray sweatshirt.

"Hey Rob, can I talk to you?"

"Yeah, meet me in the tail office."

"Okay."

Cyrus stepped out of the cockpit and walked back to the tail. Rob's Constellation had a fancy interior divided up into three sections. The forward fuselage was a big lounge area with some couches and card seating by the windows on the right side. Through a bulkhead, the middle section was mostly traditional airline seating, for about twenty-eight people in six rows of four seats each. The second bulkhead had a space for the chrome lined galley and restrooms, and finally Rob's private quarters. It was the usually restricted part of the plane, which served as Rob's bedroom and office on long flights.

Rob followed in a minute later and closed the door behind him, almost as if it was second nature to the rather reclusive wolf-hybrid. He took a seat on his bed as Cy sat in Rob's plush office chair.

"So what's the situation on the insurance stuff? I saw you and your Dad looking over it."

"Fucked." Cyrus admitted with a sarcastic laugh.

"That bad, huh?"

"Why have insurance if it barely covers anything?" Cyrus quipped. "My Grandma had a good supplemental plan through Anthem for Medicare, and then just abruptly changed it to this AmBetter shit, and now we're fucked."

"Don't worry. I'll take care of it."

"Rob, I don't know how to thank you for all this. I don't know how the family can repay you."

"Don't worry about it~" Rob pointed with a smile. "You're a friend. You take care of friends."

"Rob, my mind feels like it's going a million miles per hour."

"I get it. You're going through a crisis." Rob nodded. "Been there, done that."

"Do you think I'm doing enough, Rob?"

"You're doing everything that you can do." Rob responded. "Look, I used to think that shit too. But at the end of the day, you can't save the whole world. You can't pile all that emotional weight on your shoulders. Just let it be, Cy. Everything will be okay."

"Okay~"

"So when all is said and done? Just hand me the bill. No questions asked."

"Well lemme get my electric bill and garbage bill..."

"Wanna get your head split open?" Rob joked with a smile. "That's how you get your head cracked like an egg!"

"Noted!"

"As for your truck. I'll take it to my shop and get new Firestones put on. You use the same type I put on my trucks, so it'll be easy-peasy."

"Thank you, Rob~"

"No problem."

---

The clock nearly struck one in the morning. At JFK, Cyrus and Dan waited, in the somewhat empty lobby of the huge glass and steel terminal building. Sitting and watching the arrival board, they monitored the status of the incoming American Airlines flight, fresh in from a direct flight from Shannon Airport. Time felt like it took forever as Cy monitored the board and the clock.

"Do you think we did everything that we could, Dad?" Cyrus asked.

Dan glanced over. "Yeah. All of us did what we could. But your Grandma was gonna do what she wanted to do, and we told her the dangers, and she didn't listen."

"Yeah." Cyrus frowned.

Dan shook his head. "That damn key."

"I don't think we have much time left with her."

"No."

Cyrus sighed a bit. An outburst of passengers at the arrival-departure area caught his attention. Cyrus watched the line for immigration and customs, and he took notice of an older gentleman and his wife, carrying their onboard luggage. Cyrus stood up and started walking towards the entrance. He reached into his pocket and unfolded a sign he had made, which read "NEAL MAGRUDER". It didn't take long for him to meet his half uncle.

"I think I'm the Neal Magruder you'd like to see!" came an older gentleman wolf. He was as tall as Cyrus, had gray fur just like Norma, with wavy gray hair neatly combed back atop his head. Neal wore neat dress shoes with dark slacks and a green sweater with a shamrock design on it. "Neal Magruder! You must be Cyrus."

"Yes!" Cyrus greeted as he held out a paw. "So nice to meet you, Neal!"

"I believe we may have met once, but it's been a dreadfully long time!" he said with his thick Irish drawl. "I want you to meet my wife! This Camilla!"

"How do you do?" she smiled. Camilla was a gray wolf with neatly permed gray and brown hair. She wore a white jacket and light gray pants.

"As good as the situation allows. Come. We don't have much time."

Grabbing his luggage, Neal and Camilla followed Cyrus and Dan back to their plane to take them to Ohio. Neal was amazed at seeing such an old propliner awaiting them. He took a moment to take a picture of Rob's L-1049, which glistened under the bright spotlights of the tarmac. He happily met Rob and his flight crew, and they all boarded and quickly took off into the night to head back to Ohio.

Leveling off, the flight back was relatively quiet, as Neal got to know more of Norma's family. They sat in the lounge area, conversing and listening to the radials burble, as the engine's exhaust glowed blue outside their windows on the right side.

"I did not know that I was adopted until I was about thirteen, when I was told." Neal recalled. "I mean, I always had a suspicion... being the only redhead in a family of thick brown hair!"

"So you used to be a carrot top too huh?" Cyrus joked.

"Yes! Until about ten years ago." Laughed Neal. "I used to have the reddest hair that you could get! Until I turned sixty, and it turned gray!"

"See, my boys Cyrus and Ed have red hair, and Darryl has ginger, but me and my brother got our father's hair color." Dan pointed.

Neal chuckled. "It took a long time to, well, come to terms about being adopted. At first I didn't think much about it, but as the years went by, and my parents got older... I wanted to know more about my birth mother. When I was told the story of my... conception... it made me kind of sad. It made me more determined to meet my birth mother, but I was afraid she would never accept me."

"So you knew." Dan asked.

"Yes." Neal nodded. "Father Hubbley was, and I say WAS a respected member of the town, but after that came out, and other women came forward, he was basically disgraced. He passed away in 1980 in his sixties, but I never cared to meet him. He could have sod off for all I care. It took a very long time. I asked the church, the orphanage, and it was a very difficult process. It wasn't until 1995 when I finally got her address and wrote her a letter."

"Mom is one of a kind." Dan chuckled.

"She's a very wonderful person. I love both my mothers. My adopted parents are my parents because they were there from the time I was a wee baby. But Mother Norma gave me life, and I'll always be thankful for that. She's a wonderful person to know."

"Heh, heh. She can be a hellraiser." Cyrus laughed.

"Oh boy... I guess I'm not seeing the full side of Norma!"

"You are seeing nice Norma. All of us got to have hellion Norma!" Dan exclaimed. "Now let me tell you about Mom..."

---

The sun was low on the horizon, as Cyrus drove everyone to the hospital. Making his way on the interstate in Rob's 3500HD, Neal sat in the backseat with his wife and Dan, as Freddy rode in the front seat of the dark gray crew cab interior. An hour later, they arrived in the parking lot of OSU Wexner, and they all took the elevator up to the third floor ICU. Linda Filton had already beaten them by taking Ronnie and Aunt Becky to Columbus.

Cyrus saw Ronnie and Becky leave Norma's room, looking extremely sad. Cyrus walked up to his Mom as everyone else walked by him.

"How is she?" Cyrus asked.

Linda shook her head slightly. "It's not for long."

"I understand."

Neal stepped into the room with his wife and Dan. Norma laid in bed, looking dazed, confused.

"Mom? It's me." Dan greeted.

"Dan?"

"Yes, Mom. It's me. I have someone who wants to say hi to you~"

"Mother Norma." Neal said real softly.

Norma looked over and blinked. "Neal... Neal is that you?"

"Yes, Mother Norma. I'm here." The old gray wolf smiled. "It's me, your son."

"Oh my god..." Norma said, with tears welling up in her eyes. "Oh my god... I thought I would never see you again."

Neal pulled up a seat. "I'm here, I'm here. My, what a pickle of a situation we're in~"

"You're telling me..."

Cyrus went with Dan to the consultation room, where he sat with Dan, Ronnie, Linda, and Becky, to talk with the doctor assigned to her care. The doctor entered and gently closed the door behind him. Dr. Sandberg was a short husky with sable colored fur and icy blue eyes and short brown hair between his pointed ears. He took a seat at the end of the table.

"Good morning. Thank you for coming here." He said in a formal voice. "I think you know why I've gathered you here."

"Yeah." Dan said rather quietly.

Dr. Sandberg nodded in understanding. "Norma's organs are starting to fail. And, I don't want any concrete decision made yet? But I want you to understand that we may have to start looking at end of life decisions."

"I understand." Linda responded.

"How... how much time do you think we have?" Ronnie asked.

Dr. Sandberg pursed his lips as he thought. "Maybe... two to three days, tops."

"Everything has just overwhelmed her body now." Dan frowned.

"I'm afraid so. And at this point, it seems futile to continue an aggressive approach when the prognosis is not good."

"Okay." Nodded Dan.

Cyrus stepped back into Norma's room, and stopped at the door to watch Neal quietly read bible verses to a visibly suffering Norma. Cyrus frowned as his grandmother looked to be in immense pain as Neal softly read from her bible. Cyrus was very impressed at Neal's kindness, his composure, his gentleness.

"By Christ, Jesus, world without end. Amen." Neal concluded.

Neal gently backed up as Cyrus walked over to see his Grandma.

"Grandma?" Cyrus said as he knelt down to see her. "I have to go back and check stuff on the office. Ed will be coming up."

"Okay." She faintly said. Norma mustered a smile for him. "I love you. I love you."

Cyrus smiled back and kissed her forehead. "I love you, I love you!"

"I love you more. Just in case." She practically whispered. "One more I love you, 'cause I love you."

Cyrus smiled and got up to depart. "Neal, I will be back in a few hours to pick you up."

"Okay." Neal smiled at Cyrus as he watched the big wolf depart.

Cyrus hopped back into his borrowed truck with Freddy, and they took off to head back to Hanover. Hopping on Route 315, they took the left-hand I-70 exit and merged on through the construction zone of the 70-71 split in downtown, to begin the long drive back to rural Hanover. Not much was said as they drove listening to the radio. The mood between Freddy and Cyrus both was one of introspection.

Returning to Hanover an hour later, Cyrus parked in the gravel lot and went inside to relieve Ed of overseeing things. Ed rushed out and hopped into his truck to head to Hanover, and Cyrus went to his office to notice some paperwork clipped together on his desk. There were three more job applications he could review. As Freddy sat down at his desk and opened his laptop up, he heard Cy's phone go off.

Everyone knew.

"Yeah, Dad?" Cyrus asked.

His Dad choked up a bit. "Cyrus... your Grandma went into cardiac arrest about twenty minutes ago... they managed to restart her heart... but... I think that's it..."

Cyrus frowned and leaned back into his seat. "Do you need me to come back?"

"Yeah."

"Alright. Gimme me a moment and I'll be back."

"Okay."

"Thanks, Dad. Bye."

Cyrus threw his phone down onto his desk. "C'mon, Freddo."

"Yeah." Freddy said as he closed his laptop up.

As they left, Cyrus called his ex Talon, and asked if he could help oversee the office while he was gone. They hopped back into the red Silverado, and quickly turned around to head back to Columbus.

---

It was the moment that Cyrus knew was coming. They all knew it was coming. But the final decision still felt like being hit by a freight train. Norma had gone into cardiac arrest; ICU personnel were able to restart her heart, but the damage was done. Her frail, tired body, injured so badly, just could no longer function. Her organs were failing, her kidneys, liver, lungs, heart, everything was just barely working. The family reconvened together in the consultation room, for the final say with the doctor. Cyrus and Dan, the medical power of attorneys, were given the final call. But they wanted a family consensus. Everyone agreed it was best. And at three o'clock in the afternoon, life support was terminated for Norma Merle.

The room was quiet, illuminated by just the afternoon sun filtering through the window blinds. All the medical alarms, the machinery, everything was silenced or turned off. The breathing tube was removed, and Norma's hair was gently brushed and cared for by one of the nurses. The Filtons gathered around close with Neal, saying their goodbyes as the doctor, a nurse, and the hospital Chaplin, stood back a distance. The heart monitor showed that her vitals were slowly fading. Norma looked at peace; her eyes were closed, and her face looked calm. She did not move, as if she was asleep. Cyrus sat in the chair beside her bed and gently held her paw, as he had promised her. Her paw was ice cold.

"You were the best Grandma ever." Cyrus remarked as he gently stroked her paw. "I love you Grandma. Goodbye."

"Mom...I love you, and I'm sorry for yelling at you." Dan said all choked up with tears streaming from his eyes.

"I love you. I love you." Ronnie frowned.

"You were the best mother-in-law I ever had." Becky said as she dabbed a tissue to her eyes.

"The best ever. One of a kind." Linda said with a quivering smile as she fought back tears. "Goodbye Norma, take care."

Neal wiped tears out of his eyes as his wife held onto him. "Mother Norma, you gave me life in such unfortunate circumstances. You gave me everything. I love you."

Darryl had his arm around a grieving Ed, who sobbed with his head bowed. Darryl wiped tears out of his bloodshot eyes.

Norma Merle Filton passed away at 3:11 in the afternoon, eleven minutes after the termination of life support. Her vitals slowed down until her heart gave its last beat, having never regained consciousness. The doctor watched the monitor for ten minutes as the family grieved around her deathbed, until he called her time of death at 3:11PM. Cyrus gave her forehead one final kiss goodbye, before he gently covered her up with the blanket. After seeing her suffer for months, slowly fading away from them in the mental fog of dementia, death was seen as a blessing, after so much pain and trauma. The family matriarch of the Filton family had passed on to the ages.

---

The evening sun cast long shadows in Cy's backyard. The wind driven ripples of the pond sparkled golden from the sunlight filtering through the trees. The ambience was quiet and calm, the gentle chirping of robins providing a happy backdrop to a largely dejected Cyrus.

Sitting on the steps of his deck, Cyrus looked glum, exhausted. He propped his head up by leaning it on the railing. His blue eyes were unfocused, just staring off into space as he reflected on the loss of his grandmother. He felt sad, but relieved; the loss of their matriarch stung, it was a huge void in his heart. But the fact that she wasn't suffering anymore, she wasn't lost in a fog of confusion, at risk of hurting herself or getting lost, or having to spend her final years in a lockdown memory unit of a nursing home, it was a huge relief. Cyrus figured that Norma's death was as best of a death one could get given the circumstances. She got to die surrounded by her family.

The sliding glass door slid open to reveal Neal. The old wolf slid it shut and stood for a moment, seeing the sad pose Cyrus was in at the base of the deck steps. He quietly walked over to sit down next to his half-nephew.

"Are you okay, Cyrus?" Neal asked him.

Cyrus blinked a few times and turned his head to gaze at Neal. "Yeah. Just... thinking."

"I know the feeling."

"I feel conflicted." The blonde wolf admitted. "I feel sad... and relieved at the same time."

"She's not suffering anymore, Cyrus. You're sad because she's gone. You're relieved because you saw her suffer for so long." Neal comforted.

"I wanted to help facilitate a good death. I don't consider that a good death." Cyrus shook his head a bit.

"I think given the circumstances, that was a peaceful end. Norma didn't suffer the indignity of just being kept on machines for weeks and weeks at a time, until the almighty himself says 'that's enough'."

"I guess it was better than slowly fading away in a nursing home. That was the death I really feared. To the point where she didn't remember any of us. That's what I feared. I just wish she didn't have to suffer like that all broken up."

"Norma lived her life the way she wanted to live it. She was a very strong willed, independent woman, shaped by her youth and the trauma in it. It was in the end, an accident. She didn't know any better not to drive."

"Especially in a storm. All scared from a hallucination..." Cyrus frowned.

"Look at this way, Cyrus. Norma is freed from that slowly constriction prison of dementia. She's not eighty-five anymore. She can go home and be at peace."

Cyrus nodded slowly. "Yeah." He mustered a bit of a smile.

Neal smiled and looked out at the woodland that was turning more green. "I wasn't sure what I was going to get when I wrote that first letter to her in the spring of 1995. But three weeks later, she replied back, happy to hear from me. Maybe if I was born much later... we could have been together all those years. But religious dogma, societal shame of being a bastard... we've come a long way."

"Life ain't fair sometimes."

"Unfortunately not." Neal acknowledged. "You got to have someone that special in your life... you were very lucky."

"We never truly appreciate someone until they're gone." Cyrus remarked as he got up.

"It's gonna be okay, Cyrus." Neal assured as he gave his nephew a tight hug. Cyrus returned the hug.

"We've met under really sad circumstances, but all of you have just been so wonderful." Neal smiled.

"Likewise!" Cyrus grinned.

The sliding glass door opened to reveal Ben stepping out. The husky ran over to give Cyrus a big hug and a kiss.

"Condolences Cy. My deep condolences~"

"Thanks, lil' Benny~"

"Big Cy~" the husky smiled.

---

Three Days Later.

Norma was buried on Sunday, a quiet sunny morning, in the local Hanover cemetery. Never wanting anything elaborate, a few kinds were spoken by her family as they gathered around the Filton burial plot. Her cremated remains were interned next to her husband Gary, and her youngest son Donald. Her minister gave a final prayer, and the grave diggers gently covered her urn back up with the earth. A dark granite headstone, etched with a portrait of her in her youth, was gently placed atop.

"Norma Merle Filton

May 6, 1938 - May 11, 2023

Beloved Wife. Dearest Mother."

Deciding to keep it a positive vibe, the Filtons decided to have a celebration of life event at Cyrus' home. Everyone who knew Norma was invited; her minister, church friends, neighbors, and the Filton's family friends. The Bradley family was all present, and some of Cy's friends, like Rob Barion and his husband Joey Paulo were there to offer their condolences. It was a happy environment, as people stood and sat around, watching the last home movie made of Norma, of her eighty-fifth birthday party that Rob and his friend Maverick had videotaped. Cyrus cooked up many of Norma's "secret recipes", like her favorite dish of deep fried chicken, and a "secret" dessert pear dish she liked to make for everyone.

Cyrus worked with his turkey fryer to cook up a big batch of chicken that sizzled away. His boyfriend Ben helped him. All the kids entertained themselves by feeding and petting Cy's little army of wood ducks that enjoyed the company. On the deck Neal and his wife Camille stood talking to Dale Bradley and his mother Phyllis, with Talon and Ronnie Samson listening in and joking with them.

Inside, Linda opened the door to welcome in Marty and his boyfriend Jason, who carried flowers and a condolence card. Linda pointed them to a table that was set up, that held vases of colorful flowers and condolence cards. The portrait of a happy Norma at the garden center that Cyrus took, was nicely framed on the table for all to see. Jason sat the flowers down, and Marty placed their condolence card on the stack. Linda pointed where Cyrus was, out back cooking.

In the end, Norma left the family a lot in her will. For her two surviving sons, Dan and Ronnie each got one of her IRA and CD accounts, totaling $68,000 each. Her home went to Darryl and his girlfriend, who always wanted to buy a house but could never afford it. Darryl and Hanna decided to let Ronnie and Becky live with them, and they planned on adding onto the house to give them more space. Cyrus, Ed, and Freddy got some money split from two CD's, and Cyrus split some of his with Neal to be fair. And the family was spared the massive medical bill by Rob Barion's generosity. A strategically timed "donation" of $750,000 to Wexner Medical Center by Rob got the debt "wrote off".

"Who wants chicken!" Cyrus exclaimed as he came in with his big serving tray piled high with crispy fried chicken. He sat the freshly cooked food onto his table and brought the pear dessert out from the oven to place it on the table with the paper plates and cutlery. Everyone dug into a nice home cooked meal.

"You know, Grandma would be very jealous that you could cook as good as her." Dan chuckled as he nudged Cyrus as they ate some drumsticks together.

"She probably would~" Cyrus chuckled. "Oh Norma... one of a kind!"

"That's an understatement!" laughed Dan.

"We'll never see her like again." Linda remarked to Cyrus.

"Heh, that's probably for the better." Uncle Ronnie quipped as he grabbed a chicken breast to put on his plate. "Fiery Norma!"

Cyrus laughed with his family as he gazed out to his living room wall, where his favorite portrait of his grandmother now hung, a young Norma and Gary posed together shortly after getting married. Cyrus hoped that wherever his Grandma's tired spirit went to after death, he hoped she would be with Gary forever, happily ever after.

"Godspeed, Norma!"

---

Dedicated to my Grandma, who is battling Dementia at this time.