Mirari

"It's a tiger," he said to her, pointing toward a dried patch of dense brush.

He'd always had a fascination with those large frightening cats. When they were younger - much younger - they would routinely go on dates to the zoo. He'd spend all day in front of the tiger's cage, taking photos and writing notes in his small spiral notepad. He said they were powerful symbols bound in bodies striped with dark mystery, grace and danger. She remembered how resistant he was to leaving the spot where the tigers were. Their cage was less like a cage and more like an open plain, walled off by thick glass as tall as a house. He'd told her they made them that tall so the tigers couldn't break free - they'd been known to leap with ease over walls a dozen feet high.

"I was just over by the monkeys," she'd said, touching his arm, "on the way back from the bathrooms. You wouldn't believe how loud they were. They screamed and hollered and jumped and danced and all the children just went mad. Until one of them began flinging shit out over the fence at a group of teenagers on a field trip and..."

"Isn't that funny," he said, without letting her finish, his eyes never leaving the tigers' cage.

Now, fifty years later, she looked out toward where he pointed and tried to see the animal that she knew wasn't really there. All she saw was a dead shrub blowing in the wind.

"It's a big one," he said, "it reminds me of one I saw once while on safari in Africa."

He'd never been to Africa. There aren't even tigers in Africa, but he didn't know that. He'd never left upstate New York, where they'd met.

"Jesus, can you believe the size of that thing," he said. "The stripes could probably paint a barn black. Hand me the binoculars, quick! I want to get a better look at him."

"John, there's..." she paused.

"Come one Bridgette, you're wasting time. He's going to get away like the last time."

"Like the last time? Like in the Himalayas, you mean?" she asked.

They'd never been to the Himalayas.

"The Himalayas, then in Cambodia, again in Malaysia. There was Sumatra, too. And let's not forget Nepal, when you scared him off because you couldn't keep quiet," he replied, a bit scornfully.

In a detached pithy tone of subdued frustration, she replied, "Oh yes, how could I forget; the time I accidentally scared a tiger away."

At her own pace, she reached into the bag and pulled out the binoculars. She'd bought them for him years ago. John kept them meticulously clean, well oiled and shined, the glass clear as crystal. She handed them to him and said, "here," too tired to entertain the charade.

With unsteady hands made deft by excitement, he brought the binoculars to his old eyes, magnifying his illusion. Peering out into the distance, then looking down and scribbling earnestly into his worn out notepad, he documented his sighting. He always wrote things down, for as long as she'd known him, which is what was so puzzling about his condition. How could someone so obsessed with notation and documentation be so mistaken?

Bridgette wondered how long it had been now. She wasn't sure; two years, four? Maybe five.

At first it was little things, like leaving the fire on under the tea-kettle until all the water boiled out, until the bottom of the pot began to cook. The stink of burnt metal hung on the walls for days, its persistence a mocking reminder of his forgetfulness. They were lucky the house hadn't burned down. He began losing things; his wallet, keys, toothbrush, the tiger-stripped cufflinks she'd gotten him for his 50th birthday. One day he'd answered a call from their granddaughter, Kathleen, and he told her he wasn't interested in buying any girl-scout cookies:

"I mean, I like cookies as much as the next guy," he said, "it's just that, I don't know you. What assurance do I have that you won't just cash my check and keep the cookies for yourself? You sound like a really nice girl and all, but these days you just can't tell."

Bridgette had to yank the phone out of his hand and explain to her that grandpa was just playing a joke. Out of guilt she bought enough cookies from her to satisfy the Cookie Monster's most indulgent binge.

Then there was the night he'd walked to the grocery store to pick up his prescription from the pharmacy and bring in some bread for dinner. It had just started to rain when Bridgette had finished cooking, and after she'd finished setting the table she realized he hadn't come home yet. She called him but he didn't answer. Alarmed, she called the pharmacy and asked if her husband had been in to pick up his medication.

"No Mrs. Carlyle, John hasn't been in," the pharmacist said.

She got in the car and drove around looking for him, circling a dozen times, if not more, listening to the fluttering engine's lonely hum, the drumroll desperation of the rain. The soft heartbeat of windshield wipers echoed inside the car, hauntingly, her panic beside her in the passenger seat refusing to wear a seatbelt. She'd decided to go back home and wait, and told herself that if he didn't come home within the hour she'd call the police. He came in dripping wet, after the food was cold, after she'd driven around in the rain looking for him.

"My God John, where have you been," she asked rising up from the chair.

"You wouldn't believe it Bridgette; you just wouldn't believe it if I told you," he said, shaking his head. "I went out without my wallet, and I must've got turned around because you know, I couldn't for the life of me find my way back home. I was about to give up when I came up on the house of a guy named Fred; nice guy. He told me he remembered me; he looked familiar but I don't know where from. Anyway, he pointed me in the right direction and here I am."

These kinds of episodes had taken their toll on her. She was afraid to let him out of her sight. She started to develop eccentricities of her own. She found herself reciting things in her head; phone numbers she'd seen on infomercials, the numbers of injury law attorneys advertised in between commercials during The Price is Right, business names and addresses of buildings she would pass in the street. Their daughter, Cheryl, had gotten her and John a book of sudoku puzzles last time she'd visited. Bridgette would fill in the little squares every morning with her tea, and sometimes at night in bed. She finished the entire book and moved on to the puzzles in the morning newspaper. One Sunday the paper hadn't come and Bridgette called up the post office demanding to speak to the mailman who neglected to deliver her paper. When John told her he'd used it to line the cat's litterbox she stormed out and bought her own paper from one of the dispensers in town.

Then she stopped buying catfood.

She didn't want to resent him, but she did. As his condition worsened he began to spend more and more time with their cat, Mirari; he was a Bengal. The doctor said it was good for him to spend time with the cat. She resented the cat, too. She started leaving the doors and windows open just enough for the cat to fit through, hoping it would sneak out. After dinner one night, the night after John's 61st birthday, Mirari got out and didn't come back.

John was devastated. He started forgetting more, faster. He'd forget to eat - which made him tired and weak - and he started sleeping a lot. Drawing pictures of lions and tigers distracted him briefly, until he would realize Mirari was gone and then lose interest. To pull him out of his depression, Bridgette bought him a pair of binoculars and started taking him on drives. They'd go to parks and he'd stare out through the binoculars spotting imaginary cats and phantom panthers. It hurt her to see him so irrevocably lost.

He looked up at her after he finished writing in his notebook.

"John, it looks like rain," Bridgette said.

"The rain brings them out, you know. Most people think cats are afraid of water, that they don't like to get wet, but it's simply not true. They just like it to be on their terms," he said.

"I don't have an umbrella, John."

"You can head to the car, it's okay. I don't mind, honest" he said. "These cats are camouflaged by the clouds; they can hide behind drops of falling rain."