Monday, September 22, 2014
{{Almost didn't put this up, but decided to. It's not part of my ongoing Star Trek: Beyond the Federation novel (nearly finished, but not quite), but at least it's a short story. Which means done and over with! So enjoy a quick jaunt to the side of the normal fare here. Also: I seem to be having trouble with the formatting I didn't used to have, so that when I copy and paste text from my saved file to here, it appears without the correct paragraph spacing and indentations, even though they are in my original file document. Not sure what's causing this quite yet, hope to correct it eventually. Hopefully doesn't detract too much from the reading. }}
He made his way to the last room
of his rounds for the night, the aching tautness in the back of his
calves yelling at him to finish his shift already so they could get
some relief. At least the final patient in this room was pretty cut
and dry. He rarely ever spoke, if he was even conscious, and other
than checking his vitals and ensuring he had taken his meds, there
wasn't anything else that needed tending to. The patient was mobile
again, and was expected to be released soon barring any unforeseen
circumstances.
The bedside lights were on when
he entered, though the patient didn't seem to be doing anything other
than simply sitting there, his eyes fixated on some cross-stitch
hanging on the wall to the right of his bed that had been donated to
the hospital. The TV was off, his book sitting on the table next to
his empty water cup. His gnarled, spotted fingers clutched at the
homemade blanket his wife had brought in weeks ago loosely.
“Not feeling too horribly
sleepy tonight, huh?”
The patient shook his head as the
nurse came around the bed to check the myriad readings from the
machine tucked out of the way. It made a low, steady humming noise
as it broadcast the man's inner workings, and the nurse copied down
the numbers onto his clipboard in all of the appropriate places.
“You know, there's so many of
those things in all the rooms, I don't even really look at them
anymore. You probably know the details of this room a lot better
than I do.”
He glanced over at the frame on
the wall, curious what this one was. Most of them were some
inspirational or supposedly insightful statement on life and death,
that sort of thing. This was some vista of outer space, however; a
background of blacks and dark blues, with what he could only guess
was some sort of colorful gaseous cloud or nebula, maybe? He wasn't
really sure; it was pretty, though. He wondered how he had ever
missed it before; he used to look at everything when he had first
started here.
“It stirs up some memories. A
lot of little things seem to do that when you get this old.”
The nurse grinned as he jotted
down the last of the readings, the man's voice always welcome when he
heard it. It had a warmth to it, despite the coarseness that he
could only guess came from the guy's age. An easy-going drawl he
couldn't place. From what he'd gathered from the other nurses, the
guy seemed to be social during the latter half of the day, while he
was working, more than any other time. He looked up from his
clipboard to smile at him.
“Funny how things come out of
the blue like that, huh? Good memories, I hope?”
The patient's eyes shifted to
lock with his own, the blueish-gray seeming to expand as his pupils
focused on his face.
“You're about to get off for
the night, aren't you?”
His brow pinched together
slightly at the switch in their conversation, an involuntary tingling
in his stomach as he wondered why the guy was interested in knowing.
He responded reluctantly.
“About, yes...”
The patient's eyes switched back
to the cross-stitch, his shrunken-in chest rising and falling slowly
as he seemed to consider something. “Please don't let it be some
weird last minute request,” the nurse thought. “A sponge bath, a
walk around the floor, some fucked up fetish or something...”
“I don't suppose you'd indulge
an old coot and sit and talk for a while? Hear a memory or two.”
The nurse made sure to keep his
expression neutral, but inwardly he sighed. He was really looking
forward to walking into his shabby little apartment where his overly
thrilled dog would be waiting, heating up a frozen dinner, and
parking his pajama-clad ass down in front of the television for a few
hours watching one of the movies he had lined up. He was off for the
next few days, and the aches and pains in his lower back, feet, and
legs had been pining for that extended relaxation for a while.
Besides, the facility didn't exactly encourage extended fraternizing
with the patients like that, for the patient's sake as well as the
employee's. Then again, the guy would most likely be gone before he
came back to work. And he just wanted to talk, share a few stories.
The nurse thought about his situation for a moment; he wasn't really
that hungry yet, and at least he could sit down. Who knew, maybe
they'd be better stories than one of the movies he was going to watch
anyways. Old people were full of surprises. What if the guy was
going to confess to some awful crime or something, though?
“Wouldn't perhaps want me to
get one of the patient consultants...?” It was a last ditch
effort, but worth a shot.
The man's gaze was back to his
again, his own expression seeming to grow somber.
“It started with the pigs on my
ma and pa's farm, when I was about twelve, but eventually I couldn't
stop myself, it felt so good, and...and before I knew it, I was...I
was...I was drawing Sharpie mustaches on everything I could find!”
The man's guffaw was punctuated
by a smack to his own thigh as his lips parted, baring the
too-perfect rows of false teeth in his mouth. The nurse's shoulders
sagged as he exhaled in relief, shaking his head. For a minute, he
thought that was going to go somewhere really bad very quickly.
“Hell, son, I don't wanna talk
to no mental fiddlers. Put whatever name to em you want, I know what
they're used for.”
The patient had a strange sense
of humor, no doubt about that. He felt like he had a weird one, too,
though, so maybe this really would be worth it.
“You know what, why not. Lemme
go finish up and clock out, then I'll swing back around. Need
anything else before I no longer have to listen to you?”
The man cracked a smile at the
nurse's levity, seeming to sit up in his bed a little, adjust the
blanket in his lap.
“Just a fresh pitcher of water,
that's all. Can't talk with a dry mouth.”
*************
He padded down the hallway back
to the man's room, holding a bottle of water and a honey bun he had
left over from his lunch in his locker. The nurse on duty had raised
an eyebrow when he mentioned what he was doing, but had simply
shrugged her shoulders as she turned back to her computer screen
dismissively.
“Long as you're gone before
Cindy comes in; you know she'll shit kittens if she finds out.”
Cindy was their supervisor, but
she wouldn't be in for hours, yet. This wouldn't take that long, the
guy would probably talk himself to sleep first. Thinking of his dog
again, locked up in his crate, he considered simply turning around
and just going home. He owed nothing to the man; sure, it'd probably
be a disappointment for the guy, but it simply wasn't his job. He
wondered, not for the first time, why the guy wanted to have a talk
with a relative stranger, anyways. The guy had family; a wife, at
least two different adult kids, from what he could remember. Maybe a
couple of friends, too? The other bed in the room had been empty for
a while, they must have been there for him.
He found his feet continuing to
stride forward, though. Found the last room at the end of the hall
approaching even as all of that ran through his head. And before he
knew it, he was seeing the man crawl into the upright bed stiffly,
the sound of a toilet tank refilling coming from the bathroom.
“For a minute, I thought you
had changed your mind and weren't comin back.”
The nurse chuckled a bit as he
crossed over to the chair in the corner, dragging it over near the
occupied bed so the guy wouldn't have to make his voice carry so
much, so they could have a bit of a private conversation. He
positioned it on the side away from the machine, so when the nurse
came by to check in, he'd be out of the way. The old man was still
getting himself re-situated; tucking the sheets in just right,
pulling that faded, gently tattered blanket up over his lap.
“Honestly, I thought about it,
won't lie. Work so hard here, I usually try to run out of here as
soon as I can.”
The man had a twinkle in his eyes
as he smirked towards the off-duty nurse, who was settling in the
chair.
“I bet you'd be lingering if
that cute lil auburn-haired nurse with the freckles was working the
shift after you, instead of before.” He chuckled softly. “Though
I suppose you'd be at that station out there, versus here...”
The nurse's cheeks flushed at the
old man's remark, wondering if he was that blatant about his interest
in her. He had always thought he was doing a good job of downplaying
his attraction...maybe he was talking about someone else? They
didn't interact that much in front of the old man, surely.
“I uh...I'm not sure...”
The man waved his hand as he
rolled his eyes.
“Oh please; I'm old, I'm not
deaf, blind, and stupid. And we both know the girl I'm talking
about. You should ask her out; she likes you, too, ya know.”
The nurse shifted in his seat
uncomfortably, not liking the direction of this talk so far.
“We're coworkers, that wouldn't
be professional.”
The man snorted.
“Son, fuck professionalism.
Neither of you are supervisors over each other or anything, and your
job isn't your life. If the two of you are adults about it, the rest
will all work itself out.”
The nurse cleared his throat,
fiddling with his water bottle cap for a moment as he dropped his
eyes and shuffled his feet.
“Look, sir, if you were wanting
to talk, that's fine, but I'd rather...”
The old man sighed, shrugging his
shoulders a bit.
“You're right, you're right, I
know....”
The nurse looked up as the man
trailed off, to find him staring up over his shoulder, at the
cross-stitch on the wall again. There was an awkward moment of
silence, and the nurse suddenly decided this had all been a big
mistake; he was trying to come up with something polite to announce
his departure, when the old man spoke again.
“Truth is, I've never really
talked about this with anyone before. Can't. Or couldn't, I
suppose.”
The nurse frowned, part of him
curious, but another part wary of finding out. Why the hell did this
have to happen on his last shift...? The man's gaze shifted back to
look at him.
“You're...what, in your
twenties...?”
“Twenty-six, yeah.”
“Hmph...to be that young
again...I'm sure you're thinking 'why doesn't he talk about this with
his family, with his wife? Why me?'. Well, son, if there's one thing
I learned, even if I didn't always obey it, is sometimes it's best to
just keep your damn mouth shut. Some things, they just don't want to
know!”
The nurse opened his bottle to
take a sip of water, wondering where this was going. The guy cheated
on his wife at some point, that had to be it. He found himself
imagining the liver-spotted, wrinkled old man in his prime, flirting
with the girls, chasing tail. Probably being an asshole, too,
whether it was intentional or unintentional. Some of the things his
parents had said while he was in high school were appalling, let
alone this guy, who was probably old enough to be THEIR parent,
possibly even the grandparent of his parents. Social interaction
between genders had come such a long way...
“You ever been in love before?”
The old man's question broke him
from his reverie. Had HE ever been in love before? He sure hoped
this wasn't going to turn back on him again. He had no desire to
talk with this guy about his love life, or lack thereof.
“Well, I mean...I've dated,
sure, even had a girlfriend for a while there, but...”
“But...? Two of you dated
long-term and you can't even say that you loved her?”
The nurse frowned a bit.
“Well sure, we said it to each
other, but I mean...hell, we were just kids, really. We didn't
really know what love even meant.”
The man settled his head back
against the pillows, staring up towards the inoperative TV for a
moment.
“You know, I've heard that a
lot through the years, people talking about how kids don't know what
love means. I think it's bullshit. You got your phone on you?”
“Uh...yes...”
“Look up 'love' for me. Read
me what they say the definition is.”
The nurse had a puzzled look on
his face as he dug out his phone from his pocket, but proceeded to do
as the man asked. He actually had a dictionary app on his phone;
working in a hospital, there were times he came across words he
didn't remember from school, and it helped. He read from the screen.
“Well, there's a long list of
them...'profoundly tender and passionate affection for another
person', 'a feeling of warm attachment or deep affection', 'to have
affection for', 'sexual intercourse or copulation'...”
“Those dictionary definitions?”
When the nurse nodded, the man grunted. “Wikipedia?”
The nurse was surprised the old
man even knew what Wikipedia was. He routinely had to explain to
most of the patients this guy's age how to operate the TV; they
seemed like they'd be equally unqualified to use the internet. He
started skimming over the article after pulling it up.
“Uh...'a variety of feelings,
states, and attitudes that ranges from interpersonal affection to
pleasure'...can refer to an emotion of strong attraction and personal
attachment....can also represent human kindness, compassion, and
affection...oh, unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good
of another, I like that....”
“Okay, okay...now, notice a
common trend there? Amongst all that?”
“Well...affection. Feelings of
affection for someone or something, I guess.”
The old man nodded, as if this
explained everything.
“There ya go. I'm sure you
knew what love, or 'feelings of affection' were when you were with
this girlfriend of yours, just like I'm sure she knew, too.”
The nurse frowned, turning off
the screen of his phone while he put it back into his pocket.
“Affection, maybe, yeah,
but...not REALLY loving someone...”
The old man lifted his head from
his pillow to look over at him again, his eyes narrowing.
“How would YOU define love,
then? This 'REAL' love that you seem to be hung up on...”
The nurse's brow furrowed even
deeper with frustration. He felt like the old man was purposefully
trying to get him riled up; the guy knew what he was trying to say,
surely.
“Real love, as in...the love
you have for your wife, or your kids. You know, not like...puppy
love, or sexual attraction. Love that stands the test of time, that
stays through thick and thin; the love you get married over.”
The old man was grinning.
“Now see, THAT is something
else entirely.”
The nurse's expression became
incredulous, but the old man held up his hand before he could
respond. He was quite a moment, his bottom lip being sucked into his
mouth briefly before he continued.
“You'll at least agree that
everyone loves differently; they define it differently, they express
it differently and all?”
The nurse mulled that over for a
bit, but made a face and shrugged his shoulders a little.
“Sure, that makes sense.
That's why 'love' is so hard, everyone has a different concept of
what it is.”
“But that's just it. They
don't, really. You said 'real love' was what people get married
over, that it stands the test of time. But what you're describing is
impossible. Love's an emotion, right? Can you tell me you're happy
constantly, or you're sad constantly? Maybe that you're angry all
the time? Of course not; they're emotional states, just like love.
It comes, it goes. It ebbs, like a tide.”
The nurse frowned again, shaking
his head in disbelief.
“You mean to tell me the love
for your wife has come and gone?”
The old man rolled his eyes.
“I mean I've been married to my
wife for over fifty years. She's my best friend. That don't mean
there weren't times I didn't get annoyed with her, or get angry with
her. There were times I wondered why I ever married her, and I know
for damn sure she had the exact same feelings over the years.”
“Yeah, but...you guys still
loved each other. That's what I mean; sure, sometimes you felt those
other emotions, but throughout the years, you two still loved each
other.”
The old man's eyes drifted off,
glancing down at the blanket that rested over his lap.
“Not throughout, no. There
were times I hated her, times she hated me. See, it's not love
everyone is confused about. When I say 'love', people think of
different things. Different memories, different expressions people
they've loved shared, different concepts of what they want from it,
even. But love the FEELING, the EMOTION...that's not so different.
In fact, I'd say it's pretty much universal.”
The nurse scoffed.
“You mean to tell me the hot
cheerleader I drooled over back in high school stirred the same
emotion in me as that girl I dated, or the auburn...”
The old man grinned broadly as
the nurse stopped himself from finishing that sentence. He didn't
shift his gaze in the nurse's direction again, which was good; the
nurse felt a heat in his cheeks.
“Of course not. But you had
learned the difference between lust and love by the time you started
datin that girl, right...?”
The nurse seemed to mull that
over a bit, so the old man continued.
“Some guys, and even some
girls, are thinking with their loins well past high school. And
that's fine. But even most of them realize the difference between
physical desire and emotional desire. The phrase 'knowing what love
is' is about as outdated as I am. Generally, people learn what love
the emotion is pretty damn early, because love the emotion is pretty
much the same. Warmth, affection, a softening of your defenses.
What people MEAN to say when they say 'don't know what love is' is
people don't know what they want from a relationship. They don't
know how to express their deepest emotions to another person.”
The nurse's eyebrows rose as he
pondered that. That...made a lot of sense, actually. He looked up
at the old man, to find those aged eyes looking right back at him.
He cracked a bit of a smile, and found himself taking another sip of
his water bottle. The old man reached for his plastic cup and did
the same, holding it for a bit as he seemed to be gathering his
thoughts some more.
“As a kid-which lemme tell you,
was a damn long time ago-it always angered me when I heard people say
that phrase, whether it was about me or not. That never changed as I
got older. I knew what love was back then, what I didn't know was
how to express how I felt about the people I loved, or how to respect
them and myself. And I didn't know how to communicate what I wanted
from a loving relationship. How to foster a relationship. That, my
friend, is what people struggle with, and sometimes never understand.
Hell, I don't think even I understand completely. It's an ongoing
process that never ends, I don't think. And it's different for
everyone person. Because, and I repeat again, love is an emotion;
it's not a solid state of being that never changes. People change,
emotional states change, relationships change.”
“So...you're saying...love, the
feeling, the emotion, is the same, but...people express it
differently as they change, which...causes their relationship to
change? And they don't always love each other, even then?”
The man's wrinkled face beamed
with a bright smile.
“Well, seems like you were
listenin after all!”
The nurse chuckled a bit,
shifting in his seat as he gripped that honey bun package, creating a
crinkling sound.
“How the hell did we get here,
again? Wait! You asked if I'd been in love before...now, isn't
feeling love, and being IN love, two different things, at least? I
mean...okay, I can see that...that love the emotion is...well, real,
regardless. But...being IN love...”
The old man waved a hand
dismissively, his eyes dropping down.
“We'll get to that in a
minute...you going to eat that?”
The nurse followed the man's eyes
down to the honey bun he was clutching in his hand. He shrugged his
shoulders and looked back up.
“Well yeah, I mean...normally I
eat dinner when I get home, so I brought this with me in case I got
hungry while we talked. It's leftover from lunch. You can't eat
this.”
The old man's face scrunched up
in a pout.
“Why the hell not?”
“It's not healthy for you!”
“And you mean to tell me it is
for you?”
The nurse frowned, using the
honey bun to point at the old man.
“You're only supposed to be
eating hospital food.”
“You got that from the vending
machine here in the hospital, didn't you? That makes it hospital
food. At least just tear me off a few bites, what harm could that
do...?”
He was wavering, unfortunately
finding the old man's logic pretty damning, when he was rescued by
the on-duty nurse coming in to check the man's vitals. She smirked
at them both as she circled around the bed towards the machine,
picking up the clipboard at the end of the bed along her way.
“You two still chatting it up
in here?”
The old man turned his head to
glance up at her, a look on his face that almost made the male nurse
drop that honey bun.
“I'd rather be in here chattin
with you, but you sadly made it quite clear you couldn't be lingering
with your patients, apparently not even your favorites.”
She grinned, shaking her head as
she copied down the information.
“I never said you were my
favorite, and probably because you're absolutely incorrigible.”
“You forgot tenacious.”
She chuckled, her eyebrows
raising up on her brow.
“THAT goes without saying.”
“This man won't share his honey
bun with me. I'm wastin away to nothingness, while he's full of
youth and vigor, but he insists what's bad for him, is even worse for
me.”
Finishing her task, she moved
back to the foot of the bed to replace the clipboard, glancing over
at her coworker in the chair before resting her wrists on her hips
and looking at the old man.
“You want me to bring you a
snack?”
“I'd like a honey bun.”
“Well there aren't any buns of
honey you're going to be getting in here.” She lifted her left arm
to glance at her watch. “I shouldn't even be giving you anything,
it's too late. But I'll bring you some applesauce, if you'd like.”
The old man huffed, his lower lip
jutting out.
“Applesauce...hmph!
Fine...bring me some applesauce.”
The male nurse, satisfied the man
was going to get some food of his own, went to pull the plastic
wrapping of the honey bun down so he could take a bite. His coworker
smacked him on the shoulder as she walked by.
“The least you could do is eat
that thing outside so he doesn't have to watch you!”
He glanced over at the old man,
who was beaming triumphantly, a pink appendage sticking out from his
lips. He shook his head as he got to his feet, pointing that bared
honey bun at his adversary.
“Don't think I don't see what
you did there!”
*************
He settled back into the chair a
while later, waiting for the old man to get out of the bathroom, his
eyes falling on the emptied plastic cup with smears of applesauce
coating its sides. His tongue swiped across his lips, the taste of
sugary sweetness refreshing in his mouth as he caught a bit of
lingering icing. He'd had to go to one of the public bathrooms on
the floor himself while he and the old man had taken their respective
breaks; somehow it felt odd using the one in the room here. His
stomach rumbled a bit, and he wondered if he had time to run and get
one of his own containers of applesauce or something; that honey bun
just wasn't cutting it. About that time, however, the toilet
flushed, and soon enough the sound of the sink's faucet reached his
ears. He glanced up at that cross-stitch up on the wall, not for the
first time wondering what about it had gotten to the old man, and
where all of this was going, what the point was. The door opened,
the sound of the old man's slippered feet shuffling across the floor
filled the room. His back was hunched, and his hands would reach out
to grasp and press against things frequently for support as he made
his way to the bed, but he was moving on his own pretty well.
“Should've dropped one in there
so you'd be forced to endure the smell. Lucky for you, that just
wasn't happenin!”
The old man cackled as the nurse
shook his head with a grin.
“If you had done that, I'd just
have an excuse to leave, Mister Crude. I still don't even know what
we're really talking about here.”
“Bah, I'm just too old to give
a damn anymore.” The man made an impatient sound as he settled
into the bed, getting settled once again and then sighing a bit as he
pulled that blanket up close. “Love. Commitment. Relationships.”
The nurse nodded encouragingly as
he lifted a leg up to rest over the opposite knee. He waited,
holding what was left of his water bottle.
“Bein 'in love' with someone.
What does that mean, to you?”
The nurse's eyebrows shot up as
he started mulling that over, his right hand lifting up to stroke at
the stubble on his jaw idly.
“Well...a relationship, I
guess. Feeling so strongly about someone you're either in a
relationship with them, or want to be?”
“And by 'relationship', you
mean a...'committed to that person only' interaction with said person
you're in love with, yes?”
The nurse shrugged, nodding.
“Yeah. Monogamy.”
“What do you think our society
has constructed monogamy to be?”
The nurse squirmed in his seat,
his mind racing. Was that it, was this guy some sort of swinger or
something? He tried to put that aside to focus on the question,
tried to put into words his worldview, as it were. Not something he
was used to doing.
“Uh...well, someone loving
someone so much they commit to them. No one else, just that one
person. That...by that commitment, they're showing how deeply they
love that person above all others.”
“And loving someone else
outside that commitment...?”
“Well...I mean, someone other
than family? I guess that'd be cheating. Or at least...I dunno,
kinda immoral?” He frowned. “I mean, at least that, even if
there's nothing sexual going on...?”
“Lemme ask you something. This
ex-girlfriend of yours...why'd you two break up?”
The nurse shifted in his head
again, but didn't take long to respond.
“Well, we realized we both
wanted different things in life. Had different priorities.”
“So it wasn't some explosive
break up involving someone else, just a realization?”
The nurse nodded slowly.
“Yeah...basically. I mean...it
was far from easy or anything, for either of us. But no, there
wasn't someone else involved. When we realized things weren't going
to work out, we decided to stop before it got to THAT point.”
“THAT point being falling in
love with someone else. Tell me...do you still love her?”
The nurse's mouth opened to
respond almost immediately, but slowly shut without saying anything
as his brow furrowed. His gaze dropped down to his lap for a moment,
his fingers twisting the water bottle cap back and forth idly. After
a few moments of silence, he answered, his voice subdued.
“I guess...I mean, I know
things just...just wouldn't have worked out.” His face scrunched
up a bit. “But still, I WANTED them to, you know? I sorta
resented her for a while afterwards, for...for doing everything right
but still ending up alone. But I got over that, eventually,
and...and yeah, it's not like I hate her or anything...”
The old man's gaze had shifted to
look over at some blank point on the opposite wall, his eyes a
million miles away. The nurse looked back down at his water bottle,
reliving memories of his own, but the man's voice broke into his
thoughts.
“Sometimes you love someone and
the timing just isn't right. She needs to live there, you need to
live here. She's ready to delve into the next level of a
relationship, you're still trying to sort out the first one. You're
ready for one stage of your life, she's not finished with the other.
Even you're seeing someone else, and she's not. It's all timing.”
The nurse wasn't sure what to say
to that. Even if the timing had been different with her, he didn't
think that would have helped their outcome any. They wanted
different things in life. Then again, he had changed a lot since
then; what he set out believing he wanted had changed compared to
what he wanted now...
“Let's go hypothetical here.
You start datin auburn-haired girl. You two hit it off. You love
her, she loves you. Does that mean you suddenly don't love your
first girlfriend any more? Does that mean you're guilty of
cheating, because you love someone outside of that commitment to
Auburn?”
He frowned, but shook his head
slowly.
“Well no, of course not, I
mean...that's in the past. And...I mean, I love her, kinda, still,
but...I'm over her. We're over, I mean you just can't...”
The old man interrupted him.
“But the fact it was in the
past doesn't diminish it at all, the fact that you've moved on
doesn't make it less somehow. That feeling you two had, it was real.
You both knew what it was, the timing just...wasn't right. And now
there's Auburn. You don't love her less, somehow, because she's not
the first woman you've fallen in love with, right?”
“No!”
“Because love isn't some fixed
state! It's not some limited resource pool; once you've parsed it
out, it starts diminishing!”
The nurse blinked, his eyes
widening as he involuntarily leaned away from the bed. The old man
had sat up, was leaning forward slightly, his arthritic hand
clutching the side-railing of the bed firmly. His gaze was intense,
this singular point something the old man was obviously very adamant
about. He managed to fumble out an unsure response.
“Okay....?”
The old man stabbed a finger
against the railing, using it to emphasize three words.
“The concept of 'one true love'
is bullshit!”
The old man leaned back, his lips
tightly clenched-quivering a bit, even-his eyes alive with more fire
than the nurse had ever seen in them. The nurse swallowed around a
throat he abruptly realized had gotten very dry, and he found his
fingers fumbling with the water cap, unscrewing the lid so he could
take a quick sip. He wasn't sure what to say, felt like to break the
silence would incur the old man's wrath. Was he being too loud
swallowing? The old man continued, his face dropping to look down at
the blanket in his lap as he moved his hand from the railing to curl
his fingers into it.
“You don't stop lovin other
people when you get married, or when you commit to a relationship.
It doesn't make you an adulterer, or a bad person, or an immoral
sinner. It just means you're still human.”
The nurse stared at the old man
as he lowered his water bottle, hearing a trembling in the man's
voice, a vulnerability, he hadn't heard before. He sat the water
bottle down on the floor next to his chair, absorbing the old man's
words, his mind awhirl with implications. The old man wasn't
finished, however.
“There's no 'happily ever
after', no 'perfect relationship' or 'one true love'. You make
relationships with people every day. You nourish and nurture
relationships with people you care about all the time. Sometimes,
you encounter other people you grow to love; that doesn't mean you've
stopped loving everyone else.”
The old man paused for a moment,
whether to collect his thoughts again or for breath, he wasn't sure,
but the nurse had to tentatively ask.
“What...what does that make
monogamous relationships, then? If...if not a choice to only love
one person?”
“Commitment. A promise that
we're in this together; that regardless of loving other people, our
lives move together, side by side. Lives of mutual trust.”
The nurse watched the old man run
his fingers along the weave of the blanket tenderly, as if he were
stroking a newborn kitten. He thought about all of that, about the
frail old soul in the bed in front of him, the man he had barely
heard a dozen words from before tonight. What kind of life had he
lived, what would a conversation with him had been like back when the
old man was his age? He tried to assimilate that, the familiar
noises of his work place the only sounds in the room.
“Sir, I...well, that's a lot to
take in. And I can't say I've ever thought about any of that like
that before, I really appreciate the wisdom. I'm just...I really
don't understand why you're telling me all this. Why this wasn't
something you couldn't have told anyone else.”
The old man sighed; a soft, long
exhalation of air that was filled with weariness and the full weight
of so many years lived. His jaw moved a few times, but he didn't
speak. His eyes lifted up, and the nurse was surprised to see
moisture welling up through his eyelashes. He looked at the
cross-stitch on the wall again for a few moments, then looked back
down, pulling that tortured blanket even closer.
“Years before I met my future
wife, there was a woman I loved more fervently than I ever thought
possible. She emotionally supported me, bolstered me, and touched my
very soul. I became a better person for her having been in my life.”
The nurse felt his throat
constrict at the raw emotion laid bare in the old man's voice. Tears
were painting their trails down the wrinkled, lined face shamelessly.
The nurse swallowed roughly, trying to wet his mouth enough to
speak.
“What happened?”
The man choked back a small sob,
but a faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. After a few
moments of regaining some degree of composure, he managed to rasp
out.
“Bad timing.”
The nurse smiled grimly, sadly;
curious though he was, he dared not press further.
“Amongst everythin else, I
still had a lot of growin up to do.” He paused for a moment,
glancing up at the cross-stitch again, lingering for a bit this time.
“She hurt me more deeply than anyone else ever has, too. Not that
I didn't have it comin, to some degree.”
The nurse waited for the old man
to go on, but he seemed lost in gazing up there at the wall, just
over his shoulder. He went to grab his water bottle, but remembered
too late he had already emptied it. He licked his lips nervously,
glancing up at the old man, then back down to his feet.
“So why...”
“I never stopped loving her. I
met my wife, we made a family together, shared more than half of our
lives together, but I never stopped loving her. Was hardly a day
that went by I didn't think about her, feel the ghost of her walkin
through my mind.” He coughed suddenly, his bony shoulders hunching
forward as he lifted his arm to cover his mouth, his entire body
convulsing with the force of it. He shook his head, lowered his arm
and cleared his throat loudly. “You can't tell a spouse that, no
matter how much the two of you love each other, no matter how much
you trust and share everything else together.”
The nurse's hands clenched on his
thighs, his teeth gnawing at his lower lip thoughtlessly, simply
overwhelmed.
“I'd give just about anything
to see her one last time, before I die, but I don't even know what
I'd say to her after all these years. If she's even alive. If she
even remembers me, or doesn't hate me.” He lifted a hand from the
bed, pointing a shaking finger towards the cross-stitch. “That
thing right there...it's been a long time since I saw something that
so vividly reminded me of her. And for it to be now, here, of all
places...” He coughed again, shaking his head as he withdrew his
arm and swiped his hand across his face.
The nurse turned in his chair to
look at the cross-stitch, blown away by the depth of emotion coming
from this man, wondering how long he'd been carrying this along with
him, how deeply he had buried all of this inside. He found himself
talking without thinking, not even aware where the thought was coming
from fully.
“Do you think she truly loved
you the way you always thought she did?”
He hated himself for saying it as
soon as he did, wishing he could take it back. He turned to look at
the old man, about to ask him to forgive his rudeness, but his aged
eyes had shifted to stare right at him, and the nurse found himself
unable to speak. There was no anger in that gaze, no shock or
betrayal; simply acceptance. The old man's eyes glided back up to
that cross-stitch, going back to a different place, a different time.
“I can still remember the way
her eyes lit up when I opened that door the first time, the joy that
filled me when I finally got to wrap my arms around her, bury my face
in her luscious hair, inhale her scent for the first time.” He was
silent a few moments, then slowly shook his head. “I don't have an
answer for you, you know that.”
The nurse tried to keep the
disappointment from his features, the burning need to know, to
understand, but the old man could see. Understood the frustration.
“I trust she did. I believe
that smile that captured my heart and made it sing...that it was born
from love. That the feelings she elicited from me were rooted in how
she felt for me, too. That all those memories, those feelings,
weren't the misbegotten hopes and wishes of a lonely man. In the
end, that self-belief, that trust? That's all any of us ever really
have.”
*************
He came back into work an hour
early, hoping he could spend some time with the old man again. He
had asked the on-duty nurse before leaving that night if she could
let him know if the guy was going to be released while he was off.
“You're here early, lose track
of the time or something?”
He felt the heat involuntarily
flare to life in his cheeks, stammering a bit as the bob of auburn
colored hair swished past him as he was heading to the old man's
room.
“Um...well uh, I was actually
coming to see one of the patients. Think he's going to be released
this evening, and...well, we talked quite a bit the other night.
Kinda wanted to say my farewells, ya know? He's a
pretty...interesting guy.”
She turned to look at him, her
eyes widening.
“Which...which guy...?”
Something in her face made his
throat tighten.
“Room 426...?”
She bit her lower lip, her
expression softening, her voice quiet.
“Oh, I'm...I'm so...he...he
died this morning...in his sleep...”
“What?! But he...he was
recovering! He was going to be released!”
“I'm so sorry, I...I don't...”
He spun around and took off down
the hallway, almost bowling over one of his coworkers just outside
the room as she was hefting a plastic bag of used linens onto her
cart.
“Hey! Watch it!”
“Sorry!” He tossed over his
shoulder, his shoes squeaking on the floor as he stuttered to a stop
inside the room, his eyes sweeping around. Empty. Empty and
scrubbed clean, sanitized like so many other rooms he had dealt with
over the years. Nearly ready for the next occupant. His head
whirled around to look at the wall, where one of those plastic
adhesive pull-tab hooks was perched. They never used those to put
things up on the walls. He turned to look back at his coworker, who
was frowning at him from the doorway as she wiped a stray lock of
hair from her face.
“There was a...a cross-stitch,
up on the wall right here.” He pointed at the hook.
“Yeah, the space one, right?
Never saw that up there before until that guy was in here.”
“What happened to it, did one
of his family take it?”
Her face scrunched up, her eyes
darting up towards the ceiling in recall.
“Erm...I dunno...the wife and I
think one of their kids came in to get his things. Neither of them
paid any mind to that. They left, and I had already started cleaning
up the room when this other woman stopped by, though.”
He felt his breath catch in his
throat, his eyes widening.
“What'd she look like...?”
“Short; as old, if not older,
than that guy. Beautiful hair. She'd been crying, clearly had to
have known him. Asked if she could get that thing, I said sure. I
just assumed she was a relative or something. Why, was it yours?”
His vision started getting
blurry, his eyes filling with hot, burning tears as he glanced at the
bed, now empty; crisp, stark-white sheets pulled taut over it.
“No. No, it wasn't.”
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About Me
- Erratic Writer
- These will all be original short stories, novellas, one-offs, fan fictions, serials, and possibly even novels written by me, the Erratic Writer. These will mostly be science fiction, fantasy, or paranormal in genre. Each post will be prefaced by an introduction by me as well, to explain what follows.
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