“Alright, I’ll tell him,” Kelvin said. Ronnie’s brother nodded his head up and down rapidly then turned and headed for his car. He stopped halfway and turned back around.
“Hey, you wouldn’t be holding, would you?” he asked.
“Why would you think I’m holding? Because I’m black?” Kelvin asked.
The man frowned. “Nah. It’s just most everybody in Red Hill be holding. I was just asking,” he said. He got in his car and slammed the door. He tried to spin his tires on the gravel but the car stalled. He started it again and eased out of the parking lot.
Kelvin chuckled. He hit the “up” button on the lift and raised Shane’s truck until he could walk under without ducking. “He gonna spin tires like I offended him. Motherfuckers will look high and low for a reason to feel disrespected,” he muttered as he began inspecting the undercarriage of the truck.
* * *
The Lake Castor Convalescent Home took great pains to not look like a nursing home. The front of the building had an elaborate brick portico that covered the automatic doors at the entrance. Lush green boxwood shrubs that appeared to have been trimmed with lasers lined the sidewalk like verdant sentries. The brick carport had a pair of flying buttresses at each end. The whole campus seemed more like a small community college with a decent alumni organization than a nursing home. Beauregard stepped through the automatic doors and was smacked in the face by the pungent scent of urine. All that fancy architecture couldn’t do anything about the smell of piss.
A blond receptionist smiled at him as he entered the building. He didn’t return it.
“Hello, sir, can I help?” she asked.
“I’m going to see Mrs. Talbot,” he said without breaking his stride. He was intimately familiar with the patient coordinator’s office. He had hoped that putting his mother in the nursing home might make his life just a tiny bit easier. She could yell at the staff not putting her drink on a coaster or being too rough wiping her ass. The fact that she only had one coaster or that her hemorrhoids were inflamed never seemed to cross her mind. Instead putting her in the home made her meaner and in turn made his life harder. In the two years she had been in Lake Castor, he had been called in for corrective-action meetings at least thirty times.
Ella Montage was not a model patient.
In the beginning, he had smoothed things over with an extra payment here or donating a piece of equipment there. A few times he had even straight up handed the administrator an envelope. The money had been rolling in and he had still had some savings from the jobs he had worked. Those days were long over now. He wondered if this was the day they finally rolled his mother out to that lovely exposed aggregate sidewalk and told him to take her. He could see the administrator telling him she didn’t have to go home but she had to get the hell out of there.
He knocked on Mrs. Talbot’s door then checked his watch. Almost noon. Kelvin was probably already at work but it would take two of them to get Lulu’s transmission out.
“Please come in,” Mrs. Talbot said. Beauregard did as he was told. The slim and neat woman sat at a glass-top desk. She had her hair pulled back in a severe bun with a pair of decorative chopsticks jutting out of the back of her head. She stood and extended her hand.
“Mr. Montage.”
Beauregard gripped her hand lightly and shook it.
“Mrs. Talbot.”
She gestured toward the chair and Beauregard sat down. It struck him how many times his life had been changed by sitting across from someone at a desk.
“Mr. Montage, I am glad you could come in today to discuss this issue,” Mrs. Talbot said.
“You didn’t make it sound like I had much of a choice.”
Mrs. Talbot pursed her lips. “Mr. Montage, I’ll get right to the point. There is a discrepancy with your mother’s Medicaid coverage.”
“No, there isn’t,” he said.
Mrs. Talbot blinked a few times. “I’m sorry?” she said.
Beauregard shifted in his seat. “You said there’s a discrepancy. That makes it sound like some books ain’t adding up. My Mama’s Medicaid ain’t got no discrepancy. Now is there something wrong with her coverage?” he asked.
Mrs. Talbot’s face reddened and she leaned forward in her chair. Beauregard knew that he sounded like an asshole, but he didn’t like the way she had framed the situation. Mrs. Talbot didn’t like his mother and Beauregard couldn’t really say he blamed her. At the same time, it was no need to make it sound like his mother was a thief. Cruel, insensitive, manipulative, yes. Thief, no. The Montage men held down the thievery crown in his family.
“I’m sorry, I used a poor choice of words. Let me phrase it this way. Your mother kept up a life insurance policy that she didn’t declare when she entered the facility that now puts her over the asset limit for Medicaid assistance,” Mrs. Talbot said.
Beauregard’s mouth went dry. “Can’t she just cancel it? Or cash it out?”
Mrs. Talbot pursed her lips again. “Well, she can cash it out but it’s only fifteen thousand dollars. The discrep—um, the mistake was noted by Medicaid two months ago. They immediately ceased subsidizing her care. As it stands now, she has an outstanding balance of…” She touched a tablet sitting on her desk. “Forty-eight thousand three hundred and sixty dollars. She could cash out but that would leave her owing—”
“Thirty-three thousand three hundred and sixty,” Beauregard said.
Mrs. Talbot blinked hard. “Yes. The facility is requesting that payment in full by the end of next month. If you and your family can’t find the resources to pay the outstanding debt, Mrs. Montage will have to leave the facility. I’m sorry,” she said. She didn’t sound sorry to Beauregard. She sounded positively delighted.
“Do you know if my mother has agreed to cancel the policy?” he asked. His mouth was so dry he felt like he could spit sand.
“She has been made aware of the situation, but she insists this is an inheritance for her grandchildren,” Mrs. Talbot said. The arch of her eyebrows told him she didn’t believe that any more than he did. His mother tolerated her grandchildren. No, that policy was all about control. His mother reveled in being in control. Whether it was not allowing him to get his license unless he broke up with Ariel’s mom or holding on to a life insurance policy, Ella Montage liked having leverage. She might quote the Bible from time to time but that was her religion.
“Let me go talk to her. Could you print me something with the date the money has to be paid on it and I’ll pick it up on my way out,” he said.
“Of course, Mr. Montage. If you like, I could also print you up a list of nearby facilities and their waiting lists.”
“Yeah, sure,” he said. He didn’t need to see a list of other places. If his mother got kicked out of here, she would probably be dead before a bed opened up somewhere else.
Beauregard got up and headed for his mother’s room. As he walked down the hallway, he thought about what Boonie had said. A quiet, dignified death in one of these dimly lit rooms didn’t seem so bad. That is, until you realized that no death is dignified. It’s a messy process. The Grim Reaper sneaks up behind you and squeezes you until shit fills your adult diaper and an artery bursts in your chest. He works his bony fingers in your guts and makes your own cells eat you alive from the inside. He skull fucks you until your brain retreats inside itself and you forget how to even breathe. He guides the hand of a man you’ve wronged and aims his gun at your face. There is no dignity in death. Beauregard had seen enough people die to realize that. There’s only fear and confusion and pain.