~
Betrayal in the Dementia Unit
He wore a navy and white-checked
shirt under a cerulean blue sweater.
Perfectly normal except for the
plastic bib they’d hung around his neck
and his pained look of confusion.
A flashback to me at ten, lying
across the freezing hood of
his royal blue Satellite Sebring in
my light-yellow polyester pajamas,
begging him not to leave.
He stayed.
Now I prayed that the tau tangles
prevented him from knowing
what was happening. He
asked me with a look of fear,
“This is what it’s come to?”
I knew he knew.
I left him there.
~
Karen P. McGee
Karen P. McGee lives in Baltimore, Maryland with her husband, Emmett, and dog, Jasper. She currently writes poetry and creative nonfiction. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Fauxmoir, The Sunlight Press, and Agape Review. She can be found on Instagram at @karenpmcgee.