FanStory.com - Keeper of Imagesby Michelle D. Carr

Mrs. Durkin slowly wheeled her walker down the long hallway toward her private room. She was grateful for the room and that her family could afford to keep her in it. Assisted living facilities, or ALFs, as the staff referred to them, could be costly. She didn't harbor any bad feelings toward her children for placing her in one. The physician recommended it, and, like many others who need assistance, the word “burden” had become the absolute worst description she could imagine. As she entered her room, she passed the full-length mirror leaning against the wall. Sometimes it would startle her because she would think, for a split second, that someone was in her room. Then she remembered, no, it was just a mirror. Upon taking a closer look, she would see the image change. She was thirty-five as she caught her image this morning, but as the day wore on she would appear closer to her 78 years. She had gotten used to her wrinkles and sags over the past few years. She even supposed they weren't so terrible. After all, she could still get around, even though she broke her hip last year. That was what she got for believing she could rake up leaves from her front stairs, left slippery, following a rain. She worked hard with the physical therapist to achieve an almost complete return to functioning, but her balance was an issue, hence the walker.

Her daughter had the mirror delivered to her room from her old bedroom in the house she shared with her husband for fifty years. Half a century of images lived in that mirror. Sometimes she would see one and laugh or cry. It was as though this six-foot-high flash drive stored her subconscious, and long-forgotten moments appeared randomly to calm or taunt. A reflection of the two of them enjoying an anniversary dinner or the arrival of her infant daughter during the home delivery brought smiles through bittersweet tears. Sometimes she would see that beloved bedroom in the gold-toned frame and wish, with all her heart, that it would stay. She was disappointed when it faded away, only to reveal that those years were gone forever. “Please don't let it go.” she would say to the mirror. “ Memories are all I have.” The past was her constant companion and distracted her from a bleak future. Mrs. Durkin didn't share the mirror’s ability to show her the past with anyone. “What if they take it away or, for that matter, take me away? “ she thought. The staff would think Mrs.Durkin was hallucinating or becoming demented. She wasn't sure which was worse.

Sometime during her second year at the facility, she developed a fever, and the doctor diagnosed her with a “fever of unknown origin.” This diagnosis was given when the doctors were stumped. They started her on IVs, a full-fluid diet, and bed rest. Nothing seemed to help, and the doctor changed her diagnosis to “failure to thrive.”

Mrs. Durkin was very weak, and the nurses warned her never to attempt to get out of bed without assistance. However, the mirror was calling. She carefully climbed out of bed one night to sit and gaze at the mirror. The images were sad but compelling. She saw herself sitting by her dear Henry’s deathbed, dreading the final separation. “ Will I be with my Henry when I separate from this life?” she wondered. She hoped so.

Molly was the charge nurse the following day. She made her rounds after the morning report and consulted her notes.

“ Patient: Elaine Durkin.

The fever was down by the last rounds at 3:30 A.M. Patient rested comfortably.”

Upon entering the room, Molly was surprised to see the empty bed. “She must be in the bathroom,” she thought. She knocked and waited for a response. None was heard. Thinking that Mrs. Durkin must be taking her long walk down the hall, Molly walked toward the door to leave when she caught an image from the corner of her eye. It was a scene in the mirror. She approached it with disbelief and yet couldn't deny what she was seeing. Strangely beautiful, yet frightening in its detail, it was a youthful Elaine and Henry Durkin lying side by side on their bed as they would have on their wedding night. They were together again.