7:15 am
Today, there is more of you missing. I almost walk past your door in the Intensive Care Unit, as I no longer recognize what is left of my husband. All but a few inches of your Adam’s rib-length wavy hair remains, cut jagged and frayed at the ends.
I know who did this. I call her Nurse Ratched because my brain is no longer capable of original thought. It seems to be missing parts too. She is the same one who ordered the straps to tie your arms to the bedrail. Yesterday, I watched mutely as she roughly swabbed the oozing surrogate mouth, cut into your throat, which holds the tube poked through your trachea that allows you to breathe. Your whole delirious body jerked at the insult, your arm shot out and smacked her leg. You now have the large purple triangle sign on your door. Labelled as violent.
Nurse Ratched is at the door now. I don’t want to hear her words, so I focus on the refrigerator-sized machine that filters and warms your blood. Like R2-D2, it flashes and spins, communicating through electronic beeps. She is talking again. I nod my head but keep my eyes on the machine. R2-D2 is sending an image, a movie clip, of me holding Nurse Ratched’s coiled flaxen hair bun, chopping it off with several uneven thrusts. This brings relief as I can’t seem to utter the words, Please stop. Please stop taking him from me.
2:15 pm
They continue to take more of you. The list goes on: litres of blood, your velvety voice, your concept of time – past/present/future/night/day. Sitting at your side, I watch Nurse Ratched and a group of doctors discussing your chart, through the floor to ceiling windows of your “room”. No one makes eye contact. Grasping your hand, I sniff it like an animal searching for a familiar scent. Your skin used to smell like it had just been warmed by the sun, even when you hadn’t been outside for months. I lay my head on your chest, eyes closed, and listen to the whoosh and thump of the ventilator forcing air in and out of your lungs. Your meagre warmth slowly bleeds into my body. I think I hear your voice, distant, telling me a story.
The click of the door opening drags me back. A young man with perfectly pressed pants and a slight flush crossing his face tells me he is a Resident, in training to take care of patients in critical care. He introduces himself as Titus, and I want to laugh because I know in another life you would have giggled “tight-ass”. Titus tells me that he has seen me here every day, Just you, nobody else. He takes your hand in both of his and, looking directly at your sleeping face, says in a low voice, We have to keep fighting, Robert. You are a lucky man. You have a strong woman by your side to carry you.
No one has ever said this about me before. The knot, holding everything inside of me, begins to unravel. Everything is going to seep out of me. I’m afraid I can’t carry you. So grateful for this unexpected humanity.
The image of Titus flickers in my brain. I reach out towards him, put my hand over his. His hand is warm, he is real.
7:35 pm
The Meeting. White room, brown table, blonde-haired doctor and nurse who look like they have gold dust sprinkled in their hair. A piece of paper with the outline of a man and a crudely drawn heart beside him that is almost as tall as him. The doctor is saying, It’s cruel to keep his body struggling and fighting. It’s time for you to make a decision.
Did I miss a crucial part of the plot? Is it a different day, sometime in the future? They say they finally got a good picture of your heart. Give me their best there is nothing to be done faces. Wasn’t it only 12 hours ago that everyone was cheering fight, fight, fight? Six hours ago that Titus championed the battle cry? I turn the picture of you, your heart separated from your body, upside down.
Back at your bedside, the gossamer-haired nurse is asking for permission to take more of you. Your skin, your eyes, and something else I didn’t catch. And this lifelong crusader for organ donation screams NO inside her hollow chest. I can’t bear the thought of your eyes gazing upon somebody else, the way they should be gazing at me. I picture myself catching your eye in someone else’s body, as we pass in the street. And your skin? Not that soft, sun-warmed skin that held all that is you together for 62 years.
I hear myself saying, Yes. My eyes drift back to the picture of the giant heart. I ask, His heart? You’re going to take his heart? She lets out a small laugh, and says, No, no. We can’t use his heart. It’s grown too big from overwork. It’s exhausted. It will go with him.
You seem whole again. For now, I am relieved.