She became hopelessly stalled on page twenty-six, which was saturated in pink. Her brain felt overwhelmed and begged her for rest. She imagined the pink words on the page transforming into sticky pink cotton candy in her head. The more she read, the more she needed to highlight to understand and remember what she was reading. The more she highlighted, the more her head became packed with pink, woolly sugar, clogging and muffling the circuits in her brain that were needed to understand and remember what she was reading. By page twenty-six, she understood nothing.

Beep, beep.

She tossed Dan’s thesis onto the coffee table and went to the computer in the study. She found one new email in her inbox, from Denise Daddario.

Dear Alice,

I’ve shared your idea for an early-stage dementia support group with the other early-onsetters here in our unit and with the folks at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. I’ve heard back from three people who are local and very interested in this idea. They’ve given me permission to give you their names and contact information (see attachment).

You might also want to contact the Mass Alzheimer’s Association. They may know of others who’d want to meet with you.

Keep me posted with how it goes, and let me know if I can provide you with any other information or advice. I’m sorry we couldn’t formally do more for you here.

Good luck!

Denise Daddario

She opened the attachment.

Mary Johnson, age fifty-seven, Frontotemporal lobe dementia

Cathy Roberts, age forty-eight, Early-onset Alzheimer’s disease

Dan Sullivan, age fifty-three, Early-onset Alzheimer’s disease

There they were, her new colleagues. She read their names over and over. Mary, Cathy, and Dan. Mary, Cathy, and Dan. She began to feel the kind of wondrous excitement mixed with barely suppressed dread she’d experienced in the weeks before her first days of kindergarten, college, and graduate school. What did they look like? Were they still working? How long had they been living with their diagnoses? Were their symptoms the same, milder, or worse? Were they anything like her? What if I’m much further along than they are?

Dear Mary, Cathy, and Dan,

My name is Alice Howland. I am fifty-one years old and was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease last year. I was a psychology professor at Harvard University for twenty-five years but essentially failed out of my position due to my symptoms this September.

Now I’m home and feeling really alone in this. I called Denise Daddario at MGH for information on an early-stage dementia support group. They only have one for caregivers, nothing for us. But she gave me your names.

I’d like to invite you all to my house for tea, coffee, and conversation this Sunday, December 5, at 2:00. Your caregivers are welcome to come and stay if you’d like. Attached are my address and directions.

I’m looking forward to meeting you,

Alice

Mary, Cathy, and Dan. Mary, Cathy, and Dan. Dan. Dan’s thesis. He’s waiting for my edits. She returned to the living room couch and opened Dan’s thesis to page twenty-six. The pink rushed into her head. Her head ached. She wondered if anyone had replied yet. She abandoned Dan’s thingy before she even finished the thought.

She clicked on her inbox. Nothing new.

Beep, beep.

She picked up the phone.

“Hello?”

Dial tone. She’d hoped it was Mary, Cathy, or Dan. Dan. Dan’s thesis.

Back on the couch, she looked poised and active with the highlighter in her hand, but her eyes weren’t focused on the letters on the page. Instead, she daydreamed.

Could Mary, Cathy, and Dan still read twenty-six pages and understand and remember all that they read? What if I’m the only one who thinks the hallway rug could be a hole? What if she was the only one declining? She could feel herself declining. She could feel herself slipping into that demented hole. Alone.

“I’m alone, I’m alone, I’m alone,” she moaned, sinking further into the truth of her lonely hole each time she heard her own voice say the words.

Beep, beep.

The doorbell snapped her out of it. Were they here? Had she invited them over today?

“Just a minute!”

She rubbed her eyes with her sleeves, combed her fingers through her matted hair as she walked, took a deep breath, and opened the door. There was no one there.

Auditory and visual hallucinations were realities for about half of people with Alzheimer’s disease, but so far she hadn’t experienced any. Or maybe she had. When she was alone, there wasn’t any clear way of knowing whether what she experienced was reality or her reality with Alzheimer’s. It wasn’t as if her disorientations, confabulations, delusions, and all other demented thingies were highlighted in fluorescent pink, unmistakably distinguishable from what was normal, actual, and correct. From her perspective, she simply couldn’t tell the difference. The rug was a hole. That noise was the doorbell.

She checked her inbox again. One new email.

Hi Mom,

How are you? Did you go to the lunch seminar yesterday? Did you run? My class was great, as usual. I had another audition today for a bank commercial. We’ll see. How’s Dad doing? Is he home this week? I know last month was hard. Hang in there. I’ll be home soon!

Love,

Lydia

Beep, beep.

She picked up the phone.

“Hello?”

Dial tone. She opened the top file cabinet drawer, dropped the phone inside, heard it hit the metal bottom beneath hundreds of hanging reprints, and slid the drawer shut. Wait, maybe it’s my cell phone.

“Cell phone, cell phone, cell phone,” she chanted aloud as she roamed the house, trying to keep the goal of her search present.

She checked everywhere but couldn’t find it. Then she figured out that she needed to be looking for her baby blue bag. She changed the chant.

“Blue bag, blue bag, blue bag.”

She found it on the kitchen counter, her cell phone inside, but off. Maybe the noise was someone’s car alarm locking or unlocking outside. She resumed her position on the couch and opened Dan’s thesis to page twenty-six.

“Hello?” asked a man’s voice.

Alice looked up, eyes wide, and listened, as if she’d just been summoned by a ghost.

“Alice?” asked the disembodied voice.

“Yes?”

“Alice, are you ready to go?”

John appeared in the threshold of the living room looking expectant. She was relieved but needed more information.

“Let’s go. We’re meeting Bob and Sarah for dinner, and we’re already a little late.”

Dinner. She just realized she was starving. She didn’t remember eating any food today. Maybe that was why she couldn’t read Dan’s thesis. Maybe she just needed some food. But the thought of dinner and conversation in a loud restaurant drained her further.

“I don’t want to go to dinner. I’m having a hard day.”

“I had a hard day, too. Let’s go have a nice dinner together.”

“You go. I just want to be home.”

“Come on, it’ll be fun. We didn’t go to Eric’s party. It’ll be good for you to get out, and I know they’d like to see you.”

No, they wouldn’t. They’ll be relieved that I’m not there. I’m a cotton candy pink elephant in the room. I make everyone uncomfortable. I turn dinner into a crazy circus act, everyone juggling their nervous pity and forced smiles with their cocktail glasses, forks, and knives.