“Charlie will be down in a few minutes,” Sean said, as he served me a cup of coffee. “I sent word to him upstairs that you were here.”
As I sat at the table at Estel’s, Mike Green came in and sat with me.
“Well, we’re leaving tomorrow,” he said. “I sure do hate to go back to Arkansas after spending two months here.”
“We’re going to miss you,” I told him.
“Where is Charlie this morning?” he asked.
“Sean told me he was coming down but that was twenty minutes ago.”
“Maybe he forgot,” Mike said.
Fifteen minutes later Charlie finally wandered down and took a seat.
“Sean, bring me a beer,” he said. “I hope you guys haven’t been waiting long.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Mike said. “We figured you had forgotten the message that we were here.”
“Don’t laugh,” Charlie said. “That’s exactly what happened.”
“Maybe you’re getting senile,” I told him. “At your age it’s probably just Alzheimer’s setting in.”
“It could be but I don’t think so. I was trimming my beard and my hand was shaking so bad it took me twenty minutes.”
“Maybe you’re getting Parkinson’s disease,” Mike said. “The one that makes your hand shake.”
“No,” Charlie said. “It was tequila. It was all of those shots we did yesterday. When I finally got my beard trimmed I had already forgotten that you guys were down here. Forgetfulness also comes from tequila.”
“Well, at least it’s not Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease,” I said. “If I had to choose I don’t know which one of those old age diseases I would take.”
“That’s easy,” Charlie said. “I’d rather have Parkinson’s than Alzheimer’s.”
“Why do you say that?” I asked.
Charlie said, “Well, I think it would be better to spill half of my beer than to forget where I left the glass.”
