The Clock-Drawing Test

“Now, that’s absolutely stunning, now, isn’t it?” came the abrupt coo that had me pause my shuffling.

After bending down to retrieve the iridescent feather glinting in the day shy light, Alice slowly straightened, letting out a hiss of air as she did.

“A little too early for this, aye old gal?” I laughed.

Rolling her eyes long-sufferingly, she placed the bit of plumage in the pouch she was carrying “for pretty finds” before adjusting her white visor and attempting to untangle some of her long silver hair from a branch that had snagged it.

“Not too early to murder you once we get to the cabin,” she retorted, clearly about to give me a good earful.

Something in my heart beat quick yet I couldn't quite pinpoint what about such teasing words brought the reaction. I tried to remind myself that this was Alice after all.

While time had carved canyons and healthy wrinkles into her face, it hadn’t made her any less beautiful. Even now I could still see the little girl with the missing front tooth and bush nest of a head who demanded that the shy nerd come play with her when no one else would. This had been back when I was a grade schooler who was hungry for friends and she had been hungry for a gofer.

“Aren’t you supposed to wait until dark to tell campfire tales,” I muttered loudly, interrupting her and smirking at the grouchy look she flashed at me. “And it hasn’t really been that long since we’ve been there, right? Why, we went just last year with Rufus and them, running around like hooligans. And we haven’t brought any candles, just lanterns. Your storytelling needs better work, doll.”

“It’s been almost a decade, Jonas,” was all she said in soft reply, kindness in her brown eyes that didn’t soften the confusion that I felt. “Darius, Rufus’ kid, has been taking care of it off and on and he’s meeting us there. Rufus is no longer with us, dear.”

“Oh,” I said, swallowing, trying to reorient myself. “...I believe you, Alice.”

There were often times where I felt that memory had failed me. An infiltrating fog had settled in my brain at some point, a weariness that covered all things without me knowing exactly what was wrong.

There were moments like this when I was painfully aware of this gaping hole in my memories, everything irrevocably tangled up, but I knew there were probably even more where I wasn’t aware, my brain betraying it to keep my reality stable.

“Jonas,” she said, worry in her eyes but whatever she was going to say was lost as there was the sound of branches cracking underneath heavy boots quickly coming our way.

We both whirled around, Alice’s wrinkled hands tightly clutching the straps of the giant backpack she was lugging. My heart was in my throat before we both relaxed, the tension seeping out of us.

It was just a man and his daughter emerging from the lesser traveled adjacent path that joined with this main one.

The bloke was rather tall and muscular, just the type of man I had wished I had been in my youth but I had always been more of the stomach pouch guy. With honey blonde hair and a strong jaw, he was certainly a looker. His dark clothes were rather rumpled and a few leaves were in his hair.

Kicking irritatedly at rocks in her way behind him was a redheaded child.

More relaxed, Alice and I began to resume our trek on the windy path, the sound of footfall an uncomfortable background. Our banter had petered out with the new company.

“Looks like we’re headed the same way,” I pointed out aloud after a minute of awkward walking, unable to handle the silence in the air besides the sound of multiple feet hitting the dirt. “It’s a straight shot from here for a bit,” I mentioned in a brief moment of clarity, the path unrolling before me in my brain before it was gone again like a ghost of a memory. “We’re going right at the fork! Headed to a cabin we used to frequent.”

“You’re oversharing again,” Alice chastised, hissing the words under her breath.

“Ah,” the man finally said after realizing that I was talking to him, “Looks like it. We’re headed back up the trail then going left at the fork towards Tambertin campgrounds. ”

“Why don’t we be trail buddies, then?” I suggested, trying to ignore Alice surely rolling her eyes at my “extroverted nature”.

“Jonas,” I said, coming to a brief stop and holding out my wrinkled hand. “I trade in stories, though it’s been a long time since anyone has listened to me.”

“Jeff, I’d trade in beer but I have none to share,” he said, clasping my hand gently in care of my age but still with a firmness that showed respect. I liked him already. “And this,” he gestured to the teenage girl lingering on the edge of the path, closer to Alice, “is my daughter Elaine.”

She couldn’t have been more than thirteen, with red hair that brushed her back and awkward limbs that spoke of a recent growth spurt. She was wearing a striped blue and white shirt and jeans with fashion tears as was popular these days. When her eyes nervously glanced up at me, I caught that they were the color of stormy seas.

“She’s a little shy, sorry,” he apologized when she made no move to wave or introduce herself further than he had.

“That’s not a problem. That one,” Alice jerked her thumb back at me, “used to be a shy one too and now he won’t shut up. Hasn’t for decades!”

“It’s true,” I laughed, though slight pink heated the tips of my ears in my embarrassment I’m sure. “I used to not say a word and now people beg me to stop talking.”

While Jeff laughed, Elaine did not.

She seemed nervous, more nervous than a girl her age should be. But, then again what did I know? I hadn’t been a teenager in quite some time nor did I have kids of my own. That explained though why Alice had quickly sidled up next to her as we all started to walk again, always having a penchant for troubled souls, especially youth. Despite her clear attempt at jokes, however, the girl barely gave more than a polite smile here and there and even that seemed to be a struggle for her.

Poor thing. I remembered those days well.

“Anxiety and depression,” Jeff explained sheepishly when he caught me looking, rubbing a hand on the back of his neck. “I wish I knew what to do about it besides having her in therapy but I’m just really stressed about the idea of putting her on medication so young. Read lots of things about how it can mess with their hormones and just make everything worse.”

“That’s a shame. Where’s her other parent?” I asked, knowing it was rude but you tended to get away with a lot when you were older such as a lack of filter and it was something I, admittedly, took advantage of quite often when I was tired of social propriety.

His face was swept over with shadow, like someone turning a light off in a previously bright room. “She died from cancer last year. It was quick. We barely had time to accept it or prepare.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” I murmured, suddenly feeling ashamed I had pushed. “How truly awful. You’re doing the right thing by having her in therapy. Losing your mother so young,” a flash of my own mother, dark hair pulled into a bun and laughing eyes as she whirled around the room with a babe on her hip flitted across my memory, “that’s something you shouldn’t handle on your own.”

“Elaine used to be a bright girl,” he then said softly, his mouth twisting. He clenched his fists tightly before letting them release. “I just wish I knew what to do to bring that girl back. Now, she’s like this. I still love her, of course, I just wish I could see her smile again is all.”

“It sounds like you’re doing all you can for her,” I replied, a little taken aback at his forthcoming nature but then I remembered how common it was nowadays for people to talk about their problems. Their “mental health” as they now called it. It was honestly refreshing.

“Oops,” Alice tsked, picking up the sheath that had fallen away from my backpack, “Maybe I should carry the machete, it’s not staying on yours, Jonas.”

“Your machete?” Jeff said, startled, shooting an understandably nervous look at her. “At your age? Not that I mean anything by it but—”

“She likes to kill wayward hikers,” I deadpanned and for a second everyone went still, even the birds. It was as if the entire forest was holding its breath, a chill creeping in where previously warm sunlight had been.

That is until Alice walked right up to me and slapped me over the head though it lacked the heavy handedness of previous years. “Ow,” I said anyways to make her feel better, a callback to all the decades of her doing this to me, “Watch it. What did I do?”

“You’re being a git again,” she muttered, “scaring those poor people.”

“Scaring them with the truth, you absolute hungry murderer!” I squawked indignantly, holding on to my bucket hat for dear life.

“If not killing wayward hikers, what brings you both out here?” Jeff questioned, a teasing tone to his deep voice as he interrupted our banter before it could go off the rails.

“To be honest, sonny,” I began, feeling everything twisting up in my chest again, “I just had a doctor’s appointment this past week and got some terrible news. We’re going to the cabin for old times’ sake to cheer me up.”

“Oh god, I’m so sorry. Is it–”

“Cancer?” I caught on, understanding where his mind had instantly gone to given his wife’s recent passing. “No. No, it’s dementia, they say. Early stages but definitely it.”

Like a messy chalkboard, my memory was wiped clean sometimes when I tried to call on something. The clock face I drew that day still stunned me, distorted and wonky as it stared mockingly up at me from the doctor’s hands.

“Jonas, the appointment was last year, darling,” came Alice’s hesitant but soft voice, adding reality to the conversation.

I furrowed my brows. “Was it really, doll? Are you sure?” I asked, looking back at her, trying to ignore the undercurrent of discomfort that I could feel brewing in my mind.

Something quite sad stole her face, and she didn’t answer besides a nod.

“Oh,” I said, discomfited, “I believe you, Alice.”

This had become a mantra, I was sure because while I didn’t remember saying the words that much, they felt very familiar in my mouth.

Embarrassment started to creep in as I remembered our audience.

“Sorry about that. I’ve supposedly been down this trail hundreds of times when we were younger,” I admitted ruefully, “but I can’t remember the way for the life of me. Apparently we’re the ones who cleared this trail. Can you believe it? I almost couldn’t. I believe Alice when she says we have, of course. She likes to pull jokes but this would be a rather elaborate one, don’t you think? With all my doctors, friends, etc.?”

“I’m a lad who likes to tell lots of jokes if that wasn’t obvious. So I’ve tried to joke through all of this. It’s how I cope. But, I will share…what I’m scared of the most, I think,” I mused, unable to stop the words from coming forth. There was just something about Jeff and his little daughter, them both having been through so much, that made me feel like they would understand even just a little bit, that they wouldn’t judge. And even if they did, we would soon be parting ways anyways with each other's stories tucked in our pockets to be treasured or forgotten. “What if I forget their faces?” I wondered aloud. “What will I do when such a day comes? I fear that maybe more than forgetting my own name sometimes.”

“We never forget the people we love, not truly,” Jeff said quietly, and I knew in that moment that he was remembering Elaine’s mother just as I was remembering my dear Ali.

Sometimes, I wasn’t quite sure what our daughter looked like or our grandchildren but I thanked the stars every day that his face remained in my mind as clear as a bell, always watching over me no matter how many years passed without him.

“Thank you for those words,” I murmured before attempting to switch the topic once more, “Alice has been my best friend for as long as I can remember, which admittedly I’m not much for a reliable narrator,” I chuckled, hoping the self-depreciating joke would help relieve some of the tension I had introduced into the conversation. “But we’ve definitely been friends for decades and decades.”

Alice laughed in response, “Almost five decades, Jonas, yes. Our friendaversary, as the kids call it now, is coming up in a few weeks. Cake will most definitely be in our future. I can already smell your mother’s red velvet recipe.”

A warm smile lifted my lips. Alice and my mother had always been thick as thieves in the brief time before her passing.

“What about you, Elaine?” I asked, hoping maybe I could draw her into the conversation and out of her shell a bit too.

Though, I doubted I would have much luck given the lack of success warm-hearted Alice had already had. Clearly lost in thought, however, Elaine didn’t respond, eyes downcast and fixated on the light stream the rain had running down the hill like a race of nature.

“Elaine,” her father called sternly, this seemingly jolting her out of her musings as she looked at him with questions in her eyes. “Mr. Jonas was asking you a question.”

“Oh,” she muttered, her ears pinking in her embarrassment, “I’m sorry. I was daydreaming again, I guess. I do that a lot.”

“I used to do that too, sweetie,” I hummed, “Still do. Nothing to be sorry about. I daydreamed my whole childhood and grew up to become a writer. Now I make me a pretty penny just lying back and collecting royalties. Not all daydreaming is bad so long as you do something with it. I was just asking if you had any friends like I do Alice is all.”

Her eyes stared meaningfully into mine and for the first time in my life I felt as if I had actually helped a child who truly needed it though I wasn’t quite sure how. Something seemed to warm in her gaze, like a flower unfurling in sunlight for the first time.

“I had one friend,” Elaine said suddenly, more strength to her voice than we had heard all evening; it rang out clearly in the forest air. “A best friend,” she added passionately, tucking a red strand behind her ear.

“Really?” Alice said, interested and overtly happy that the younger girl had brought up something on her own volition. “Tell me all about her. Best friends are the best, right, Jonas?”

Masterpiece of a sentence, Alice, I wanted to tease but held my tongue to avoid yet another smack. I hummed in agreement, also eager to see what the young girl had to say.

“Her name was Eloise. Eloise Farmer,” she stated like ‘Bond, James Bond’.

“What a movie star name, very shaken not stirred,” I whistled teasingly, though she seemed very visibly disappointed with the compliment, the reference flying over her head. “My granddaughter has a similar name but I haven’t seen her in years and years. Maybe we should visit next, huh, Alice?” I asked behind me but she ignored me in favor of looking at Elaine with furrowed brows.

“Was?” Alice caught on where my tactless brain hadn’t, “What happened, dear? Did you have a falling out?” She placed an aged, sympathetic hand on Elaine’s shoulder.

“Sh–”

“That’s enough, Elaine,” came a frigidly stern voice when Elaine went to continue and the young girl wilted, returning back to her silent brooding.

My eyes shifted to her father who had come to a stop in the middle of the path though after a moment of calming resumed walking. Elaine trailed after him grumpily.

“I’m sorry,” Jeff apologized in the face of our confusion, “Eloise, she used to be a nice girl but then she got into some hard drugs and when I caught her trying to get Elaine into them too I told her they couldn’t hang out anymore. She hasn’t forgiven me for it yet but what else was I supposed to do,” he said, lost and distressed. “I had to protect my daughter even if it made her hate me.”

“That’s too bad,” Alice clucked her tongue in pity, eyes now sad once more, “To be that young and already addicted. You’re a goo—”

“She wasn’t an addict!” Elaine suddenly shouted almost as if unable to help herself, her eyes insistent and her fists clenched tightly. She had stopped walking, drawing everyone to a stop as well. It looked as if someone had suddenly blown life into her like a furnace, her hair seemed redder and her eyes alight like blue fire. “That’s not why she was out there that night and you know it! She was looking fo–”

“Elaine,” Jeff said tiredly, rubbing a hand over his clean shaven face. He held it there for a few seconds to regain his composure, his form incredibly weary with a conversation that must have been revisited time and time again. “Please. Let’s not do this here. We will talk about it when we get home. Okay?”

Her face screwed up like she had eaten something incredibly sour, the fire whooshing out of her quietly like a deflating balloon. It was like watching her become an entirely different person than a moment ago, one who was smaller and defeated, already having known that she wasn’t going to win the impending argument with her father. “Okay,” she agreed unhappily.

I wondered if there was something more to the story, call it author’s intuition. What if her friend hadn’t really been doing drugs like she said and maybe it was a big misunderstanding. I hoped so because that was better than the two alternatives: that she had actually gotten mixed up with the wrong sort or that Jeff was actually a helicopter parent unrightfully stopping her from hanging out with someone he didn’t approve of.

As a gay man it wasn’t that unusual when I was growing up for parents to tell their kids not to hang out with me being I was a “bad influence”. Their kids had been in danger with me, they sure had been. In danger of having the best friendship of their life. Alice could attest to that once she moved past her protests, of course.

Hopefully, they could come to see eye to eye on whatever was truly going on.

For a while there was nothing but the sound of everyone shuffling down the path, leaves crunching beneath feet. There was also the occasional bird trilling or suspicious shuffling of brush that surely belonged to curious critters.

“You two must have been married a long time,” Jeff said conversationally in an obvious attempt to move on from the clearly uncomfortable air yet it made me start chortling much to Alice’s amusement. “You mentioned you’re headed to the old cabin that you played in as kids, right? It’s been abandoned for as long as I can remember.”

“Ah, no,” I smiled, “Alice is my best friend in the whole wide world. A true doll of a person, she is, but I’m afraid she’s the wrong gender for me. The world’s greatest travesty, honestly.”

At my words, Alice glanced back at me with a smile that seemed to bring the youth back to her worn face. “See, you two. He’s pretending to be sweet right now but he’s a menace alright. Don’t believe a word he says.”

“I put a compliment in there for you too, dear, so does that mean they shouldn’t believe that too?” I teased, ignoring her muttered, “hush up” and the light retaliatory smack against my arm.

“Are you still married?” Elaine asked before her father shot her a chastising glare and her eyes fell briefly before they rose again, curiosity in them.

“It’s alright,” I chuckled, “I’m not offended,” I said to reassure him, pleased with the way he seemed to relax. “I was married to a wonderful man named Ali, God rest his soul. Worked himself into an early grave though, he did. Wouldn’t take a break for anything but now he finally has time to get the rest he deserves.”

Ali’s kindness pushing me to say more, I looked at Jeff, saying softly just for him, “It gets easier, after it gets harder.” Our eyes met, pain that only widows know reflecting between our gazes, a tragic type of kinship, “I promise that, lad.”

Swallowing heavily, emotion rising in his face, he nodded. “Thanks.”

“You dropped this,” came a shy, quiet voice like gentle wind chimes then something was pressing tentatively in my hand.

Looking down I saw that it was my blue step meter, gleaming the numbers I hoped like the lottery would win me something good.

“You’re a life saver!” I crowed, “Thanks there, little lady! I don’t know what I would have done if I lost this. How else would I prove to Alice that these old bones got more go than hers do!”

“Not on your life!” Alice laughed throatily, kicking her steps into high gear, high kneeing ahead like she had never high kneed before.

“You’re going to break a hip!” I laughed, “Cut it out now, doll! No need to show off!”

Abruptly, her antics came to a stop at a noticeable branching of the path in the road. She turned around, her smile tight. “Oh, would you look at that!”

“Well, it looks like this is where we’ll be parting ways,” Jeff said, almost as surprised as I was at the appearance of the fork in the trail.

“Ah, ‘parting is such sweet sorrow’,” I quoted, scratching absentmindedly at my neck, unsure what to say. I had never been the best at saying goodbyes. Endings were the part I had always hated writing the most for I never wanted the stories to end, too enamored with and invested in the characters I had nurtured and journeyed with.

“Forgive him,” Alice laughed, though there was a sadness in it as well. She clearly didn’t want to say goodbye either. “Always an author at heart, that one. It was lovely meeting you both and getting to know you. Now, Elaine, woman to woman—”

Elaine was awkward in the face of Alice’s earnestness but clearly listening to whatever heartfelt words I’m sure she was departing.

“You won’t forget their faces,” Jeff promised to me, a strong hand on my shoulder and I had to bite back a well of tears, “I know it. And even if you do, your heart will remember them.”

“I do hope so,” I said, “I do hope that if I do forget, I’ll never know. But I do hope so.”

“Elaine,” I said as Jeff turned to bid Alice adieu, “It was lovely meeting you. I can tell you’re already a wonderful person and it will only get better from here, star.”

“You remind me of my grandpa,” she mumbled, almost so quiet I couldn’t hear her, “He called me star too.”

“I hope that’s a good thing,” I said, smiling down at her though the smile dimmed as I noticed the grief striking her face.

He must have passed too. Poor child.

She nodded, her red hair a curtain around her face, tears in her winter eyes which threatened to spill over her freckled cheeks. Pink colored her cheeks in upset patches, her complexion splotchy.

For a second she looked just like our beautiful Hannah Ali and I adopted, who went on to have many children of her own. It didn’t help that not long after Ali passed Hannah found the church and wanted nothing more to do with me. In the same year I had lost both of my greatest loves. And now my mind was to follow.

“You must have loved your grandpa very much,” I started then swallowed with the unexpected emotion this was bringing up, “I’m sure everything will be alright, Elaine,” I said then, not quite knowing what else to say but wanting to say something to comfort such a troubled girl. “Things will get better. I promise. You’re never as alone as you feel so chin up, star, okay?”

I had to remind myself that often. That despite being isolated from my family, I still had Alice and knew I would until the moment I breathed my last. Sometimes your family was your chosen one.

“We better get a move on before the sun sets,” Jeff said, coming up to us and resting his hands on Elaine’s shoulders.

“Goodbye,” she mumbled, eyes downcast to her worn shoes.

“It was nice meeting you both. Thank you for sharing the journey. I’m happy it was you guys instead of some crazy serial killers,” he smiled, “Though I did wonder for a second with Ms. Alice’s machete.”

Without much else, the two then began on their way down the left path that twined into the distance, disappearing beyond the trees. It felt anticlimactic. And sad somehow. Very sad.

“I hope that poor girl will be alright. She’s going through so much so young. Makes me worry for her,” came Alice’s worried voice. She was biting her already chapped lips in her anxiety and though I should have told her to stop gnawing on herself, now didn’t seem to be the moment.

Our hearts sat with the departure of our brief friends, of our ‘trail buddies', momentarily then I went to reach out to her with comfort, “There’s nothing much we can do. We got some kind words in. Hopefully they’ll be seeds that’ll grow and stay with them.”

“You’re right, you’re right,” she nodded before taking a deep breath to re-center herself. “We should hurry as well. Darius is going to be angry we made the trek by ourselves but just because we’re old doesn’t mean we’re out of shape! Why, I could easily outrun him if I tried, I bet!”

“You can outrun that boy alone,” I quipped, though unease still coursed through me like I felt any time I had forgotten something incredibly important.

I still wasn’t quite sure who Darius was. But if Alice said she could beat him, I’m sure that she could. Her boasting aside, she had always been rather physically active.

“Speaking of which,” Alice suddenly sang. With quick fingers she turned around in effort to locate her step counter on her belt loop and check her progress, reminding me of my own.

When she wasn’t looking I quickly gave my fist as vigorous of a shake as I could give, hoping to rack up as many steps as I could cheat before she noticed.

Grinning, I went to unclench my fist and put my key to victory back on my belt loop when I realized something.

In my hand by the step counter was also a tightly crumpled up piece of trash. It was so small, the size of a large pea almost, that I had almost dropped it entirely without noticing it.

She must have accidentally given me her garbage, I realized. It had been a long time since a trash can after all, but curiosity niggled at me. Kids. Well, at least she hadn’t littered. While troubled, she definitely had a soft heart on her and that would do her well.

After I unfurled it I realized the writing was just a blurry mess, too tiny to be clear to my old eyes. The setting sun casting orange and pink hues through the trees wasn’t much help.

Pulling out my bifocals, I held them up to my face then a bit away while humming as I tried to adjust them at the right distance to get the almost illegible text to come into focus.

And then it did.

The words written there had my heart sinking down, down, down through the forest floor and straight into hellish fire and brimstone as I whirled around, eyes scanning the left path but finding nothing. Jeff and Elaine were already gone.

Please help. He’s not my dad. -Eloise Farmer