There’s a story of a nurse with a gentle aura. And we sat there dreading tomorrow, but she walked up and levelled out the dread with something sweeter — something beyond.
She’d ask if we’d be okay here. We gave the habitual yes, but her eyebrows curled upward and the dams in me cracked a little. She walked us through the schedule with the whiteboard hung in front of the bed. So she did mark down and patted through the rest — it was the fifth hospital transfer, so we were used to it. Little interjections, holding up a conversation on our behalf, whether we wanted food a bit earlier — aren’t you famished? But the way she said it was as though a spade cracking soft soil to a cave-path with vines and a light. With a caramel voice she somehow soothed the rough waters.
Earlier I struck so deep into my arms the nails had some trace blood and she curled once more looking at them. She helped me let go for a bit; she put her hand on mine and I couldn’t hold it in any longer.
The sickness burst and I wasn’t sure why it had to be with her. I didn’t want to leave my slobber and sop on her aura. But she sat still beside me, waiting. And I couldn’t stand it anymore.
The harrowed walk six a.m. sharp. The small battles asking for a bit more morphine because of that pained look. Late night researching because you can feel the currents of the damned, the indifference in the doctors, the ones at best doing bare protocol — a shrug of shoulders for them, but for me it meant the world may as well end.
Clenching my way through highway lights, blotting out all my emotions for a breath and waiting for a surprise, waiting for a moment I can rest my shakiness. Please just one bit of good news. But instead I’m peeking down the hall to see the hollowed child, then the hollowed parents, then an empty room a week after before we transfer again.
Some nights I’d vomit a bile hue red — ulcers from stress, but the tension felt right, felt like an atonement. Maybe a silent offering, a wish that if I could just grit through it a bit more God would forgive me. Forgive it and fix this rotten mess — any source of strength left me long ago but never would my loved one know. She was going through leagues worse. And she’d smile at me. She’d smile for god’s sake. What was I supposed to do but lift my lips too while clenching? What was I to do with this boiling anger and helplessness and lodged rocks in my skull, throat, stomach?
I would’ve gave everything. Please, trade my life for hers I’d say. I would’ve rip out my intestines and let the flies feed on me if it meant I could finally see it end there. Maybe as a passing dream I would see her run to me from the bus stop with her lunch box that glittered a bit. Looking at her test scores and the teachers told me she’d help others up when fell on the playground. She never asked where Mom was at; she’d tell me she has me and that’s that.
I just wanted an answer. The tiredness sunk into my bones, and into my blood, and into my shoes, and now I’ve dug up my arms trying to get demons to leave me.
By then she was in a morphine sleep.
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…..
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.It’s going to be okay..
So said the gentle hand on mine, as we sat outside the room door.