Well, that was slightly distasteful, but it's a task I get called on to perform from time to time. And if it helps the older ladies without any added embarrassment, I'll do my part. So now, all I need to do is get seventy-five year old Mrs. Brody covered-up and lift her back on to the sofa because she is still too dizzy to walk unassisted.
So, I button the sweater across her wrinkled, sagging breasts and tug her slightly-damp undies down and off her spindly legs. Then I cover her with a hand-sewn quilt and make her comfortable on the couch. She is still disoriented but mumbles some "thank-yous." Tomorrow, we will both remember what happened but never need to mention it.
That's my outlook for summer.
I'm a fix-it guy in a condominium building that caters predominantly to seniors. I do odd jobs for a lot of older, helpless folks. And because I've worked here awhile, they sometimes ask me to help in ways that the yellow pages doesn't have a listing for. Like this one. Mrs. Brody, a retired librarian with two grown sons, whose main interest in her, is her paid-off condo and her classic Jaguar. She rarely ventures outside any more, due to painful arthritis and advancing dementia. She is too private an individual to call on neighbors and feels too independent to rely on caretakers. So when she confuses her medications and falls half-naked and dazed, to the floor, she pulls an emergency rescue cord and is assured that I'll come running.
The job is mostly changing light bulbs and installing storm windows. With the occasional helping hand to someone who slipped in the bath or shower. The building is home to mostly women, retired and/or widowed. There are some "golden years" couples and also a smattering of Yuppies. And a few of the ladies are real characters. It took awhile for me to get used to senior citizens making lewd remarks and comparing their sex-lives, or lack of it, to each other. They joke and gab infront of me like I am one of them. I appreciate the easy acceptance and laugh to myself or smile at them.
I'm twenty-six. Laid-off from a construction job and hoping this pittance will stretch my unemployment checks to cover all my bills. My name is Jon. I'm six-foot three and 220 lbs. Brown hair, brown eyes and what's left of a high-school athletes build. I don't mind the job and was raised to help and appreciate older people. I work the evening shift. Consequently, most of these retirees are in bed by nine and I still have five hours to read and drown in caffeine. I had never had a "Dear Penthouse" moment until Sue moved in.
I got to know her during her move-in week. Showing her the facilities and hooking up her electronics. She was in her early fifties and had a full mane of glossy, black hair. She said she would wear it "full, dark and long," until she "had to cut it off or dye it blue." Her face was full and round with a smile and a laugh that set her dimples shaking. She had warm, liquidy blue eyes and a fleshy pug nose. She insisted I call her Sue. "No ma'ams or Ms." Sue had gone through a bitter divorce and moved two-thousand miles away so she could "run through one-half of the bastards money!"
I liked her immediately and she soon called on me for every little thing. When the office phone rang after ten o'clock it was either an ambulance service coming in, or Sue calling to chat. She said that in this building, she felt like she was at an awkward middle-age. "Too old for the marijuana crowd and not ready for tea and Geritol."
In a few quick weeks our late night phone calls took on a mixed tone of depression/comedy and phone-sex. She would ask if I remembered "which box her dildoes were in," and I would answer that, "if my enormous cock wasn't strapped down to my leg, I would run upstairs to help you look."
I was working in the hallway of her penthouse floor one evening when I heard her voice from the unlit entryway. "If you were a true handy-man, you'd come inside and help a troubled lady." I peeked around the corner and saw her silhouette back-lit from the floor to ceiling windows. The red glow of a cigarette was reflected in the jewels at her wrist and throat. When she stood up I could see the shapely out line of her torso through a gossamer dressing gown. And I heard the tinkle of ice cubes in her crystal cocktail glass.
I was familiar with the layout of the suite, but still it took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the darkened room. Only the pale sliver of moon cast any light on the scene. "The problem," she said, "is in here." She proceeded to lead the way towards her master bedroom. That gave me a quick view of her voluptuous body as she glided barefoot, to the door. A vision I will carry forever.
As I entered the room I was instantly disoriented. The windows were hung with heavy drapes and the entire room was black as tar. I banged into something and kicked something else before I halted in place. After a few choice swear words, I muttered, "Why don't we try some lights?"
Sue laughed from somewhere to my left, and I heard the bedsprings coil, then she answered, "if there was any electricity I would put on a lamp, dah." I laughed with her and quickly managed to solve the power outage problem. When I returned to the bed chamber, she was reclined on the king-size mattress, it's pedestal two-feet above the floor. Sue was propped on large, fluffy feather pillows, her slinky gown straining to conceal her lovely curves. Everything a cool pink.
