Eternal

by George

It’s 12.43.

Sun streams through the window and I know from the ‘I’m sorry’ look in your eyes that this will be the last time I see you. I take in the room to make the moment more vivid; the smell of the margarine on the sandwiches, the flowers on the side, your kind and patient mouth. I’m astonished at how you’re able to stay in control despite the frantic energy of the hospital, the constant beeping, the people rushing in and out. Your kindness and the stillness you have brought to my world has left you silhouetted in my mind.

But these are the facts, the infection is deep in the lungs and the heart is too old and weak. After a point there is nothing left to do. We had agreed an advance decision to prevent resuscitation.

I had tried to insulate myself by insisting you not refer to them as ‘my’ lungs but the lungs, not ‘my’ heart but the heart. You told me that no matter how I dress it up it the facts are the facts. I see the knit wear by the side of the bed, you look at it too, a present that will never be worn.

You tell me it will be OK, that there will be no more pain, but how do you know? Pain and fear are everywhere. They are in the faces of everyone who has passed through this ward, fear for what happens next, pain that the morphine can’t stop. For all you know this pain will be eternal. I’m angry at you then, and I find I don’t have the words.

The sun continues to stream through the window. We are next to each other, the light reflecting off stethoscopes and IV bags.

My life is now run to the the rhythm of the cardiac monitor, every second punctuated by beeping. A visitor, I can’t remember who, had tuned their string to the note.

‘It’s a B! Isn’t that amazing?’

Don’t you know that this is not about you? That this is not an open mic night? That a heart monitor is not a fucking tuning fork? Your smile, the same then as it is now, brings me back to the present and as the beep of the monitor slows, I am ashamed to say I cry. The thought crosses my mind to beg you to reverse the advance decision, to exchange the pain and humiliation of cracked ribs and plastic tubes for more time, but you just look into my eyes, mop my brow and stay with me in silence.

I gather myself.

‘It’s 12.55. Time of death is 12.55.’

I feel guilty then, for having stayed so long when there are others to see, then I feel guilt about the guilt.

I was prepared for losing my first, theoretically speaking, and when they told me it would hurt I had assumed it would not, that I’d have the ability to see you as a number.

But the love and kindness you showed me destroyed my ability to think of your lungs as ‘the lungs’ or your heart as ‘the heart’, and for that I will be eternally grateful.

I look at your limp silhouette in the streaming sunlight and I etch it in my mind.

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