The elderly man looked up at her, bit his lower lip, confused.

"Yes ... yes my dear, I suppose it is time to retire. I think that would be best. Would you mind showing me to my room?"

Justine put her hand over her mouth, eyes closed, and nodded slowly. She looked upset but managed to maintain her composure.

"Yes, of course I can."

She took the quilt, folded it neatly and laid it on an ottoman. Then she took both of the man's hands in hers, helped him get up, and led him out of the room.

After a few minutes I felt myself rising up through a mist that had mysteriously filled the upper part of the room. The mist closed in below me and I found myself in the dark.

I woke up naturally the next morning. For a minute or two I looked up without really focusing on anything, slowly emerging from that groggy, semi-functional state that I always found myself in after a deep sleep.

"Well, let's find out how we're doing this morning" I said to myself.

I reached over and picked up a small stack of cue cards that was lying on my night table. On each card there was a question written on the front in my own handwriting, shaky but legible. I knew that I had written the correct answer on the back of each card.

Question #1: Who are you?

This was my favourite question. Mostly because I could usually get it right. But also because I liked to play a game with it. I would pretend that I was a contestant on the old TV game show "To Tell the Truth"; one of the impersonators pretending to be me. I tried to concoct a new way to enunciate the answer to that question every time I answered it.

"My name is Lawrence Kendrik" I said out loud in a very exaggerated and unnatural way. I turned the card over knowing that I got that one correct.

Question #2: Do you have any children?

Sometimes I struggled with this one but today the answer came immediately.

"I have a daughter Justine and a son, Henry. I don't see Henry much because he lives in Toronto."

I turned the card over but I knew I had got that one right too.

The third card had the question scratched out. I had wanted to erase that question from my "sanity test" but somehow I never got around to throwing away the cue card.

I could still read the writing if I squinted.

Question #3: where do you live?

I repeated the question to myself one word at a time.

"Where ... do ... you ... live?"

"I live with Justine. I live with Justine because I am a selfish prick. And a coward."

I hate this question - almost as much as I hate the answer. But I force myself to read it and answer it so that I fully accept my culpability.

Because I live with Justine, she has lost her husband and custody of my grandson. Because I live with Justine she has no life. She works all day at the bank analyzing loan applications and then she comes home and takes care of me. It is an unbearable situation but I refuse to consider any other arrangement.