Pia grabbed her favourite pyjamas. She pulled the pink trousers with blue dots high above her tummy button, then quickly put on the blue top with pink dots. She snatched up her teddy bear and ran to Grandma.
“I’m ready. Will you tell me a bedtime story? The one about Little Red Riding Hood?”
“Why that one in particular?”
“Because you tell it a little differently every time. It’s always funny.” Pia scrambled onto the bed, slipped under the duvet printed with tiny red hearts, and curled up like a little snail. She pulled the duvet right up to her nose. She hugged the teddy bear close — the one who had lost his right eye in a battle with the other toys.
Veronica switched on the night light beside Pia’s bed, went over to the window and drew the curtain. Then she bent down to Pia and pressed a small kiss to her forehead.
“Goodnight, princess. Sweet dreams,” she said, and turned towards the door.
“Granny!” Pia called after her. “The story!”
Veronica stopped short. It was as if someone had pressed pause on a remote control, and her eyebrows shot up.
“The story — ah, yes, of course,” she muttered to herself. “How could I forget that I promised you a story?”
Pia watched her curiously.
“Granny, is it because of your dimension? Mummy said you have dimension. Will you still have it tomorrow?”
Veronica gave a wry little smile and sat down on the bed beside Pia.
“Yes, my darling, I’ll still have dementia tomorrow. And the day after tomorrow. And the day after-after-after tomorrow, it will probably still be stealing my thoughts and tangling them up.”
“Does it hurt?” Pia asked, snuggling closer to her grandmother.
“No,” Veronica laughed. “It doesn’t hurt at all. It’s just a bit funny. You know how your mummy and daddy sometimes laugh when I lose something or forget something. You can laugh too.”
“Then I’m not worried,” the little girl said, wrapping both arms around Veronica’s arm. “Now please tell me the story!”
Veronica leaned back against the thick pillow, though she had to shift a few more times before her lower back stopped complaining. At last, she pulled her legs up onto the bed too. Now they were lying side by side: the grey-haired lady with so much of her life behind her, and the tiny girl with so much of hers still ahead.
“All right. Close your eyes. And make sure you fall asleep before I do.”
Pia giggled and closed her eyes. Veronica settled herself a little more comfortably into the hollow of the soft pillow, closed her own eyes too, and then began in a gentle voice:
“Once upon a time, in a land where trees could talk, and teddy bears went to school, there lived a little girl called Little Red Riding Hood. In fact, that was only her nickname, because she always wore a blue hood.”
“Grandma, no, she wore a red hood,” Pia protested, her eyes wide open.
Veronica thought for a moment, then continued.
“She wore a blue hood because the colour red had been eaten by a hungry crayon.”
A small chuckle sounded, and Pia’s eyes were closed again. The teddy bear, wedged tightly beneath Pia’s elbow, stared at Grandma with his one remaining eye.
“Little Red Riding Hood — ah, sorry, Little Blue Riding Hood — lived on the edge of a small town with her mother, who worked as a secret-service agent rescuing lost socks. There were lost socks everywhere, so she had no time to tell stories or go wandering about. She asked Riding Hood to take a basket of urgent things to her poor grandmother, who lived on the other side of the parliament.”
Here Veronica stopped and asked, “Do you know where that is?”
A long mmm-hmm could be heard, and Veronica went on.
“In the basket, her mother packed pumpkins, cabbage, a floppy disk with the minutes from the town council meeting, and instructions for using the remote control. On her way through the forest — which wasn’t a forest at all, but a big city with heavy traffic — Little Blue Riding Hood met the mayor.”
Pia opened her eyes.
“Grandma? Didn’t she meet the wolf?”
“Oh, yes, you’re right. The wolf. But this wolf was no ordinary wolf. He was a vegetarian, which means he didn’t like meat. In fact, he had always wanted to become mayor. So they met on Ljubljana’s Triple Bridge, and the wolf suggested stopping at the market on the way to Grandma’s. They could buy fresh carrots and some crayons, and afterwards they could all draw the farm where Grandma had lived when she was young.”
At the word crayons, Pia opened her mouth and half-opened her eyes, then giggled and turned onto her side. She wound her right leg around Veronica’s. Teddy bear had no lungs, so he had no particular trouble breathing, even though his snout was now buried deep in Grandma’s shoulder.
“Little Blue Riding Hood thought about the wolf’s suggestion for a moment, then she agreed. And off they went.”
Veronica took a deep breath and exhaled even more deeply. The warmth of the small body beside her flowed straight into her tired heart. A thin trickle of light from the streetlamp slipped through the curtain, brushed a strand of white hair on the pillow, and rested softly on the wrinkled forehead.
“Granny?”
Veronica opened her eyes wide. She looked around as though she did not know where she was. Her gaze came to rest on the little girl, who was watching her curiously. She saw her son, her little boy, who… But that long hair…
Through the half-open window came the piercing sound of an ambulance siren. For a while it seemed to be coming straight into the room, then the sound dissolved into the silence of the evening.
“Little Blue Riding Hood and the mayor-wolf went to the market,” Pia helped.
Veronica closed her eyes.
“Shhh, let’s close our eyes,” she whispered, and continued. “While Little Blue Riding Hood and the wolf were getting ready for a performance at the market, Grandma, who was actually a retired superhero, parked her flying bicycle beside the flower stall. She bought some purple primroses, apples, eggs, biscuits and felt-tip pens, packed everything into the boot and flew off. Jane and the wolf watched her go for a moment, then looked at each other. ‘Let’s follow her,’ said the wolf. And off they went. But they did not find Grandma in her little house at the edge of the forest. She had discovered that her remote control was actually a time-travelling device. She pressed the purple button and quickly jumped into the past so that she could meet her childhood friends once more.”
Veronica’s voice was growing quieter and quieter. Beside her, the little girl had already drifted off to sleep. Somewhere in the distance, a church bell rang: bong, bong, bong, and five more bongs after that.
“They were all there: Tilly-Willy, Maggie-Peggy, Joey-Bowie, Dora-Cora, Anna-Banana… They sat… around the fire and…”
Then the room fell silent. Veronica’s head slowly slipped to one side, towards her shoulder. Leaning against her from the other side were the one-eyed teddy bear and the sleeping princess.
Dementia had crept into the family with its first signs, and Grandma herself gently explains to her granddaughter, in a way the child can understand, that she has dementia and that it does not hurt. The bedtime story conjures a tender closeness between grandmother and granddaughter. At the same time, forgetfulness as an early sign of dementia also leads to comic situations that everyone understands and sometimes laughs at openly. Old age and the dementia connected with it can also bring pleasant memories. In the family described here, there are no great secrets. Everyone knows about Grandma’s illness, emotional bonds remain intact, and they help everyone move into a different way of living together.