Pomegranate purée sloughed from the spoon, wet and raw in a way that nauseatingly resembled ground beef or offal. He could usually trade it off to another resident for a juice carton or one of those soft raisin bars, but by the time the notion reached him today the red-and-orange bristles of dusk had already crept through the windows and slept the other geriatrics to bed.

Jeff didn't mind it too terribly. He was always a solitary man, and after awhile he had even begun to reason he liked it -- these were supposed to be his golden years after all. In the old days, he'd use these opportunities to hone his craft, sometimes jotting what he figured to be true zingers down on loose pieces of paper.

"It's almost time for bed, Mister Tiedrich. Did you enjoy dinner?" A sweet voice asked of him gingerly.

"It was O-K, I asked for applesauce I don't know how many times and I was promised I'd get it, but you know -- it's fine. The chicken wrap was a nice treat." Jeff tried not to sound too obnoxious, too rude, too like.. him.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I'll make sure to remind the cafeteria about your tastes, Mister Tiedrich. " She cooed apologetically and it occurred to Jeff that he didn't recognize her voice, a new nurse? He turned his head to search for the little letters, the names stitched in red that all staff wore.

"Like I said, don't worry about it, it's okay-.." His eyes grew to saucers.

Wendy.

"Mister Tiedrich?" Jeff realized he was gawking and diverted his gaze sheepishly.

"It's nothing, just your, uh-.. your name reminds me of a old joke. You see, when President Donald Trump was in office -- I don't know if you're old enough to remember Cheeto Benito -- but back in those days, I played this loudmouth character on twitter before it shut down, right? And the guy'd just ramble on and on, so I replied to him again and again with -- are you ready? -- Sir, this is a Wendy's drivethrough. Must have driven the narcissist nuts! And if you thought that was funny? I even scribbled another little doozy-.."

The nurse's forced smile faltered a little as the man lifted the napkin.

"I'm sorry, but it's my first day and there's a lot of residents I have to check on, Mister Tiedrich."

"Come on, it'll be really quick. Look." Pleading inched into his voice. This was a funny one, if twitter was still around, it'd get fifty thousand likes at least, Jeff thought, to say nothing of retweets.

"Mister Tiedrich, I'm really sorry, but-.."

"People used to pay me for this!" Decades of rage and indignation burst forth at once. Wendy the Nurse visibly recoiled.

"I grew up in a time where if you had an axe to grind against someone you'd take out an ad in the local newspaper and hope the prick happened to read it over breakfast. That's how I lived. I had no voice, no power, the ground could swallow me up and people would give more of a fuck about swatting a gnat!" He spat. "And then this fucking orange ass-clown came around on twitter. "

"Suddenly, my profession was berating the most powerful man in the world. The guy who could bathe the world in a nuclear inferno in a instant and everyday I woke up and treated him like a little fucking kid. And they paid me for it! A thousand patrons, five hundred dollars a month -- more money than most people in human history would earn in their lives, tens of thousands of likes, an audience of a hundred different countries and backgrounds egging me on berating the President of the United States! I was somebody, Wendy! A reply guy, sure but.." The anger passed, and in it's wake a yawning abyss, an profound yearning for a reason to even exist.

"I was someone, Wendy. I lived. I existed. Even if it was only for five years in the shade of some bigot. Better a reply guy than no one at all."

Jeff felt a dozen pairs of eyes upon him; the orderlies were staring at him in awe, he realized. His behavior, until now, had always been impeccable leaving them blindsided by the outburst. Silence consumed the room, all but the distant drone of drills and cranes of the construction project that always seemed to perpetually be in progress a few blocks away. The discordant chorus of jackhammers filtered in like a dirge.

"Maybe now they'll finally give me my fucking applesauce, at least." Jeff mused ruefully.

The sun sank below the horizon, and Jeff Tiedrich onto the mattress with it. His thoughts sublimated into mist as the dreamless long sleep settled. The box-springs did not trouble him that night, nor stomach aches or the morning call for a cocktail of pills from the nurses. The mist dissipated into nothing with the first rays of the morning.

"We've been waiting for you, Jeff." They said.

"Am I dreaming? Am I-.." Jeff begun, bewildered.

"No. Maybe what you lived before was the dream. This is real, Jeff, and we all need you."

Jeff felt a vibration. He looked to his palms and found the screen staring back to him, the blue-bird-- the portal to his digital battlefield of volleys of witty retorts and clever ripostes. There, he saw it -- the 45th President had tweeted some incomprehensible tirade against Antifa and 'the immigrants' again.

"Impossible." Jeff said in disbelief. "He's-.."

"Suspended?" The figure that had greeted him had coalesced into a man adorned in a ill-fitting suit, pelvic tilt and an horrific spray-tan.

"I need you, Jeff. Many fine people have told me you're my greatest opponent -- it's true. I'm nothing without you." Trump waddled forth and clasped Jeff's shoulder. "Here, you'll always have a purpose, believe me. What do you say?"

He felt a burden that had weighed him since Trump departed office all those years ago finally be lifted, a warm light after wandering in a dark purgatory bereft of meaning for so long.

"Sir," Jeff Tiedrich began, smiling -- he had almost forgotten what it felt like to smile.

"This is a Wendy's drivethrough."