If it is your life (6 page)

Actually Joe was a good man and there is no point me being facetious about this. He walked about ‘cheering’ everybody up. Such people exist. Joe was one of them. Some people who do that are horrible evangelical patronizing fucking egotistical bastards. Not Joe. Joe is or was genuine. Probably he had dropped dead.

Hell’s bells.

The notepad and pencil rested between my left leg and the edge of the bed.

I had lain them to rest. Were one to shift position they might tumble to the floor.

Fraught!

I refer to one’s life. Even here, within the confines of the hospital bed, one experienced the existential nightmare of that which we know as the day-to-day.

Nurse Liddell speaking to her colleague, and quietly, the patient might have heard had he not been snoozing, old Mister Somebody, bereft of consciousness. He could not hear, alas. Nineteen twentieths of the old fellow’s life passed in sleep. His body was drained, his lifeforce spent, in defence against the cancer entity. I saw it as a war; a small and well-drilled army takes on a huge, densely populated country. Sooner or later one or more limbs of the well-drilled army will fail. They cannot continue indefinitely

unequal struggle

Compos mentis, however. I remained so, alert. Why then had I sighed? I had sighed. Why had I sighed and so damnably tired so damnably damnably tired so tired so tired

The notepad and pencil, and close to the edge. When had I laid them to rest?

No major event. Nothing was. The nurses were young women. The men they liked were so much younger than me, much younger, very much younger. One saw them on television. Confident young males, they all were confident and boyish. Boyish! They were all so fucking boyish, it made one grue, at their so-called charms, stylish in their disarray. But still the girls smiled upon them. No doubt

No doubt. I had tacked on the ‘no doubt’ as a form of reassurance. The typically pathetic manoeuvre of the older male, pretending a righteous displeasure at the antics of the young, when it was nothing more than the deepest most god-awful jealousy, and bitterness. I could have killed, and I would have, these fuckers.

Whence the anger?

I was not beyond the pale. The nurses were in their mid-twenties, so that made how many years of a difference? countless and countless were a lot, a lot of years, as they say, a vast pressure of water rushing beneath the bridge.

And propped up on all these pillows; this is what the vast pressure of water had done to me. Swimming against the tide, or with the tide, it made no difference. The exhaustion was one. An unimaginable

the thought itself unimaginable. And as I began reaching for the notepad even my god my arms, even them, as though aching. Arms ached, but I pushed forwards one, my right, oh god, groaning aloud, and in the next bed the man moved his feet.

This man had been asleep and seemed always to be so but now was awake.

Because I had groaned! Yes!

I held my breath, looking to the mound wherein lay my belly beneath the sheets. Better the devil one knows than the unknown evil thing lurking in the dark, enabled to perform its malevolence. I looked for the nurses, their voices no longer audible.

They had gone.

My pillows were stuffed together! They propped me up! They had been plumped! My pillows. Someone had done the plumping chore. While I was not looking. Was that possible!

So there we are. One is reduced

What time now?

But who had plumped up the damn pillows? God damn.

The smell of food.

I was to receive food and the sense of it was to the fore. What might it be? No matter, I would savour it. I always did. My wife derided me for that. My sons didnt. It was a gender issue. And I hailed from a large family. Members of large families savour food. They fight for food. They die, die for food

however

No however, howevers. The food would come to me and the auxiliary staff person would not see me while serving.

A tired woman. I could draw her, her face. She concentrated on the work. I would have communicated with this woman. I would encourage her smile. I would remark in an amusing manner as to the nature of the world, a Stoical perspective assumed, and she would respond to that.

Nor need communication imply a new relationship. Tomorrow she could resume her normal working practices in silence, her blinkers donned, oblivious to one’s maleness; not any maleness, simply that of the patient, one’s humanity.

I would so advise her. Do not nullify our existence. Nor is there a need to worry; and certainly not about me. Who has the energy for such nonsense? let alone hospitalized parties the likes of myself. Even prior to the present situation, and location, I was not the man to overstep the mark, certainly not.

I would prefer being elsewhere. No harm in such a confession.

The list of dietary details. Nought special for me. I ate anything, red butchermeat a delight. Even salad. Ho hum. I studied the leaves and other food. Oh well. But when I lifted my fork I found that I could not eat. I pushed a forkful of cold meat and lettuce to my mouth, into my mouth, but could not nibble.

There was no space in my stomach. Where could I put the food? If I swallowed what would happen? Would the meat and lettuce settle in my throat. Perhaps if I masticated thoroughly the food might squeeze its way down. But my goodness it surely was a nonsense. Was I expected to cope. How could I.

A fellow patient could no longer swallow. The food settled between his cheeks and gums and was a concern for the medical staff should a particle have entered the lungs, pneumonia? something like that. I watched for signs myself. But I was nowhere near that stage.

My stomach should have had space aplenty for food. In recent days I had eaten less than normal. So why should it now be full? I reached for the notepad. Any phenomena, any at all.

Nurse Liddell materialized. I prepared to smile but she did not glance in my direction. She returned to the bed nearest the window, old Mister Somebody – McGuire.

The nurses called me him, but they called Mister McGuire old Mister McGuire.

Old Mister McGuire. How could one but pity the man. He was always asleep. Or unconscious. The staff spoke about old Mister McGuire within earshot of other patients.

Beyond earshot what did they call me? Him. But apart from him. The good-looking older guy!

Has the good-looking older guy been given his bedbath this morning?

Bedbath. A fantasy for many. Joe Smith always referred to bedbaths in his wee chats. But he was wrong: such events take place free of erections. The nurses, in full professionalism, merely brush the insistent manifestation to one side, get thee beside thee, and dight one’s thighs in a formal manner.

Poor Joe. Unless he had gone home. People did go home, and as full human beings, resuming their personhood. Each time a bed became empty I presumed the death of the patient. It was nonsense!

Joe would be missed. But even he failed to engage old Mister McGuire in conversation. Nobody managed that. Not even his middle-aged daughters who appeared most days. They did. That old man was the most regularly visited party in the entire ward. He must have been a great old fellow. Otherwise why would they all come to see him?

Because he was about to drop dead. And he was rich, and they all had an eye on the loot.

Whereas me.

Who the hell came for me! My sons were in England. And people forget. They do. I pretended indifference to my wife, if the subject arose. What did it matter if one’s visitors, one’s visitors

Few, very few; few, fewer and fewest, in completion of the sentence, which is life itself, life itself is the sentence

And I needed to piss to piss. But I couldnt. The need was not serious. The entire piss was psychological. It was one for the doctors’ rounds.

How are you today mister errrrrr?

Oh I had a psychological piss you fucking nincompoop.

Nurse Liddell would smile. I too. Unless I frowned. I had no mirror. I wanted no mirror.

The idea of seeing oneself!

The philosophers were wrong.

If I smiled it was self-consciously done. Otherwise impossible. A horse laugh could have worked.

Another nurse was there now, alongside Nurse Liddell. Who was she? Merciful heavens. I had never seen her before. A thin skull, high cheekbones, lightly the nose, lower lip; hair – and so reminiscent, reminiscent, she was, my god, I knew this woman

and tense right shoulder tense right shoulder, I could see it from here, the line of her neck, the line of her tits; her hand rested on the patient, near to my neck. ’Twas the same, the same.

But the eyes of this nurse! Her eyes could not be drawn. Her eyes were so full of the life the life. In the most remarkable of remarkable ways, so full of life, vigorous and beautiful, moving to the other side of my bed, one wanted to kiss her, just embrace, an embrace, who was this woman

and beyond there the old fellow, Mister – who was it? – somebody, Mister Somebody, dead to the world, shot full of dope, fucking dope

The sigh was allowed. I had sighed. I sighed. Okay. Settling back on the pillow now, where the pencil, and notepad, the pencil and notepad. Close to the edge oh so close. Thank god she was not attending me, it was not a time for strange nurses.

Here lieth I, sometime known as Old I, for whisper it: this indeed is I. In sore need of a breath, perhaps so, if not breathing hardly, hardly

at all, thus might one sleep, have gone in sleep so far, so far, that the pulse, the old pulse, as when the tiredness hits, and the way such tiredness also affects, has affected, effected, so strange, how it happens, occasionally also when my wife is there, sitting by me, as if from nowhere, the plumped pillows.

A fine Full Moon from the third storey through the red reflection from the city lights: this was the view. I gazed at it, lying outstretched on the bed-settee. I was thinking arrogant thoughts of that, Full Moons, and all those awful fucking writers who present nice images in the presupposition of universal fellowship under the western Stars when all of a sudden: BANG, an object hurtling out through the window facing mine across the street.

The windows on this side had been in total blackness; the building was soon to be demolished and formally uninhabited.

BANG. An object hurtled through another window. No lights came on. Nothing could be seen. Nobody was heard. Down below the street was deserted; broken glass glinted. I returned to the bed-settee and when I had rolled the smoke, found I already had one smouldering in the ashtray. I got back up again and closed the curtains. I was writing in pen & ink so not to waken the kids and wife with the banging of this machine I am now using.

The security entrance buzzer sounded. It was somebody who used to be a friend, a firm friend; what they call an ‘intimate’ friend. Obviously I invited her in. Otherwise things would have gone from bad to worse. She was there to give me her troubles. Why else would she come! It was funny, but not amusing; funny peculiar. Her troubles had nothing to do with me. I was no brother-confessor, if that was what she wanted. I was not in that category. The category included ‘objective bystander’. It was annoying she could think such a thing.

If she would only not visit me!

Why did she? I felt like screaming. Maybe she mistook me for a monk. That was her habit, not mine.

I was looking about for money. No damn money. My God. But the kitchen sink. Yes, there by the draining board. Where else. I was going mad. Oh well.

She was smiling. Good. But it was nice to see.

I was not apologizing for a damn thing. That includes the draining board. Why! It was mine. Whose life was it!

Okay one can have less than positive habits. One of mine was emptying my pockets where ere I happened to be. When one empties one’s damn pockets there are sundry other objects, pieces of wool, old tissue with
cracked snotters and God knows what else. Dirty greasy coins. Where had that money been! Look at it! Dirty greasy coins! Do not let it near food, oh keep it away from the food. Especially fresh meat. My God the case for vegetarianism was strong.

But that was was not her. She never said that. Who the hell did say that?

My mother!

Interesting to have mixed Jennifer up with my mother, dear old mum.

But anyway, I would keep my money where I wanted. It was my bloody money. As also my apartment. Or studio. Nowadays it was a studio. Oh I am buying a studio, I am renting a studio. Everybody said it. Pretentious crap, as if everybody was an artist. I have a loft studio. A studio up in the loft. I need it for the light. That was these middle-class television programmes shot in New York City and featuring all these beautiful young people. A load of shit. In the old days a loft was the attic. Nowadays it was a penthouse suite. Old Mike Gilroy referred to it as a bedsit. We shared a first name. I was young Mike and he was old Mike. He was from Wales and worked in the storeroom. I worked in the office. He called me snooty but he was only kidding.

A bedsit was a bed-sitting-room. A room with a bed to sit in, a room you sit in that also has a bed. That was the studio, one single room where you had a bed and a sink and a chair, all crammed in together with a single wardrobe, a ward for your robes. If ever we wear robes we store them in this ward.

Ward!

One of these days it was the lock-up wing for me, I knew it, nothing more certain. How else to cope? How else!

The world was going crazy. Did dictionaries even exist any longer? That was old Mike’s position. A typical old-timer. The world has gone to the dogs. Dogs. Was I a dog? I felt like a damn dog, especially with her around. No sex for ten years. What was that about, that was me, slight exaggerations here and there, thank God otherwise I would be out the window, I would have jumped out the window.

She was waiting for me by the outside door. She knew my habits. Mike, she said.

What?

We dont have to go out.

Yes we do, unless you dont want to.