Young Writers Society

V.

More time passed. I’m not sure how long. The days and nights ran together, and I started just sleeping whenever I could. Sometimes Dad or Mom would sleep in Sharon’s room, and we also hired an in-home caregiver to work some nights, but most of the time I wanted to be the one to sleep in the chair beside the hospital bed. It was stressful and exhausting to sleep in that chair, but when I let someone else do it and went to my own room, it was almost worse. I would lie awake all night, straining my ears for someone to call me and tell me she had stopped breathing. I didn’t trust them to notice when she stopped breathing. What if they missed it and didn’t call me? I didn’t want to miss it.

But why not? Maybe it would be better if I wasn’t there. Maybe it wouldn’t matter at all. I both hated being around her and wanted to constantly be with her at the same time. Part of me just wanted it all to end, but another part was terrified, never wanting to let her go. Her condition was worse than ever now. At times, she would waken halfway and throw out a jumble of incoherent words—angry, afraid, or simply miserable, but rarely happy. The hospice workers’ advice to make her happy seemed more ridiculous than ever.

Just when it seemed that things couldn’t get much worse, after the doctor told us she could die any time, and we were counting the days until it happened…an even more horrible development occurred. Sharon couldn’t go to the bathroom. Of course, it had been several days since she had been able to actually get up and use the toilet…She couldn’t even use a bedpan anymore because it hurt her too much. We were using briefs and mattress pads so she could just go in bed. But one day, she just couldn’t. During the day, she kept waking up and saying she needed to go, and we would tell her that she could go right where she was, but she couldn’t. At first, it seemed like she was confused and didn’t understand that she couldn’t get up anymore, but after another night passed and the next day came, it became apparent that she honestly couldn’t urinate.

We called the doctor, and they tried to put a catheter in, but for some reason it wouldn’t go, and after a long while of miserable trying, they gave up. Various theories were thrown around—a tumor, kidney stones…and then the doctor said to keep him updated, and he left. It all seemed stupid and frivolous to me in light of Sharon’s suffering. Wasn’t there something else they could do? Why hadn’t they done it?

That evening, our upbeat, talkative in-home caregiver knocked on the door. I had forgotten we had scheduled a caregiver for that night. When I saw her, a sudden, intense dislike washed over me, and I sent her away. It wasn’t her fault. For some reason, I desperately wanted to look after Sharon myself that night, and I didn’t want anyone else barging in on us.

I ate a late dinner of leftovers with my parents, and then we tried to get Sharon to eat something. She was far from peaceful, moving her arms and legs restlessly, trying to scoot up in bed, sobbing and moaning with pain, and refusing even a bite of the bagel and the yogurt we offered her.

“Why won’t you ever leave me alone?” she choked, “Everyone just leave me alone! Ugh…I d-don’t want it. Potty. H-help me…potty-potty-potty…”

I sent my parents to bed. Then I went to her bedside and held her hand. Her eyes opened halfway, then she closed them again, tossed her head, and groaned. “Why won’t you help me? You don’t love me.”

“I love you, Sharon. You know I do,” I replied, pain shooting through my heart at these words. She didn’t know what she was saying. “Are you in pain? Do you need your oxycodone…y-your medicine?” I suggested feebly, not really sure if the painkillers were helping at all anymore.

“No more medicine no more medicine no more medicine…” Sharon muttered. Trailing off, she fell silent, except for her rattling breathing. It seemed she had fallen asleep. Then, suddenly, her eyes snapped open. “Potty!” she cried, “I-I need to go…”

“It’s okay, Sharon; you can go right where you are,” I recited soothingly, stroking her shoulder—but cautiously because I didn’t want to hurt her, “You can go right there…It’s all right.”

“Help me get to the bathroom,” Sharon pleaded, as though she hadn’t heard me, “Potty…”

I was shaking. “It’s okay; you can go right where you are,” I repeated, “Please try. It’s all right.”

“Okay…” Sharon sighed, “Okay…okay…I’ll try…” For a few long, excruciating moments, she strained and arched her back. Then she fell back down again, groaning, “Potty-potty…I need to go…potty-potty-potty…”

“I’m going to give you your medicine,” I said desperately. I didn’t know what to do. Leaving her bedside, I hurried to the dresser in the corner of the room and got one of the slim, prepared syringes of liquid oxycodone. We couldn’t give her pills anymore because she couldn’t swallow them. Returning to her bedside, I said, “Honey, I have your pain medicine. It will help, okay? Please open your mouth.”

“No…no more medicine,” Sharon protested miserably. She clamped her lips shut.

After a long process, I finally managed to get her to open her mouth so I could squirt the medicine under her tongue. She made a face at its awful bitterness. Returning to the dresser, I prepared her sleeping medicine—a little, round pill that needed to be dissolved in water and drawn into the syringe. After another fight, I persuaded her to take it too. Even though she was still begging to go potty, I got her to drink a little water, because her mouth was horribly dry. At last, she began to calm down. Her restless shifting stilled, and her shallow breathing became more regular.

Collapsing into the chair, I held her hand and pressed my forehead against the cold, hospital bed railing, sobbing. Tears fell freely from my eye. Though I tried to keep silent so she wouldn’t wake again, audible sobs and shuddering gasps kept breaking free. I couldn’t control myself. Nothing could be worse than this. Nothing. It was so stupid. So grotesque and senseless—just like everything else that had happened since she had been diagnosed. It was worse and stupider than my slip-up that had caused me to fall down the waterfall. Worse and stupider than my niece committing suicide just because she couldn’t bear the thought of me in hell. All Sharon wanted was to pee. Couldn’t she have just that? Was that little comfort too much to ask?

As these thoughts passed through my mind, my abject horror turned to anger. That’s right, is even this too much for You? I demanded in my mind, throwing myself back against the recliner and staring at the dark ceiling, Even if You weren’t strong enough to stop the planes from crashing into the World Trade Center, can’t You at least make her pass a kidney stone or whatever needs to happen here? Or is this Your idea of a joke? Are You laughing at her? Laughing at me trying so hard to help her? Why won’t You stop this? What’s Your twisted plan behind all this? I hate You!

Suddenly, I stopped, realizing that I was acting as if god existed, or cared. I wanted to find someone to blame, but there was no one to blame. Nature had caused this to happen to Sharon. Simple, biological scientific laws. Impersonal laws couldn’t be an object of anger.

Numbed by rational thought, I continued to stare at the featureless ceiling. A dim streetlight shone in through the thin curtains, casting a gradient of light across the ceiling that was met by the stronger light of the shaded lamp across the room. As I grew more focused, I suddenly became aware that I could no longer hear Sharon’s breathing.

This realization sent a shock through my entire body, and I sat up abruptly, staring at her. She couldn’t be gone. No…not yet. I wasn’t ready. I held my breath. No…no, her chest was moving. Or, it moved. Once…twice…The pauses between her breaths were too long, and they were growing shallower each time. She was dying.

Then, suddenly, she drew a deep, gasping breath as though her lungs had suddenly panicked and forced her to give them more air. But again, her breathing grew shallower, and the pauses between each breath became impossibly, painfully long. I found I was holding my breath at every pause, as though testing for myself whether a person could live that long without air.

Then, again, came the gasping breath, and the pattern repeated itself. Somehow, every pause was just as frightening as the last. Would she even make it until morning?

An hour seemed to pass, but when I looked at the clock, it had only been thirty minutes. Sharon woke up again, tried and begged to go potty until she had exhausted herself, and then fell asleep again. After another stretch of time, she woke once more, and again all she could think about was how much she needed to go. Again, I tried to soothe her, and I lied to her that she could go, and again she exhausted herself and slept with intermittent breaths.

I wasn’t trying to sleep, but without noticing I slipped into dreams. Confusing images presented themselves to my mind. The waterfall, the ocean. Sharp stones pressed against my injured back. It hurt. I wanted to move, but there was someone above me, stopping me. No, he wasn’t stopping me. He was bending over me, weeping. Oh yes…Him. I had almost forgotten about Him. Rachel was here. Bright and smiling, nervous and awkward, with that intense look in her eyes. I hated that look. This shouldn’t matter so much to her.

“Jesus is pursuing you…” she said, “I know He’ll save you…you’ll be surprised.”

“Then just—let it happen!” I responded, an edge of frustration coming into my calm voice. What I really meant was “leave me alone”.

But why was Rachel here? She was—

I suddenly jolted awake, scrambling to sit up. After a few seconds, I remembered where I was and looked over at Sharon. Another breath. I cursed myself for falling asleep. I couldn’t sleep while she was like this. But then, how long might she be like this? It could be for days.

For a while, I stared at the lamp. It was a rather typical, shaded lamp that cast a dim light, but there was a green, painted design of an old-fashioned, English village on it. Sharon took another deep, shuddering gasp, and I turned back to her. My little nap hadn’t refreshed me at all. Sleep tugged at my eyelids.

Then Sharon’s eyes drifted open, and I snapped alert. Maybe she could have more oxycodone. How long had it been? It was three o’clock. I stood up and took her hand, certain she would start pleading for the bathroom at any moment, and dreading it. “Honey, I’m here. I’m going to give you your medicine, all right?” I told her in a low voice.

Sharon’s gaze rested unseeingly on me for a moment. Then she looked toward the foot of the bed. “Oh…you’re here,” she murmured. Something was different about her this time. She wasn’t moaning or fidgeting or striving. In fact, she seemed peaceful.

“Yes, I’m here, dear,” I repeated, stroking her shoulder, “Do you need your medicine? I’ll—”

Sharon looked up at me again. “Oh, Gavril…” she said, as though just noticing me, “I didn’t know Rachel was coming to visit. I didn’t think she’d make it, it’s such a long drive.”

A chill went through me, and for an instant I experienced terror at the thought of Rachel’s ghost standing at the foot of Sharon’s bed. Her image was still fresh in my mind from my dream. I looked where Sharon was looking, but I saw nothing.

Then logic took over again, and I calmed myself. A hallucination, I thought. That wasn’t too far out of the range of things that could happen. In fact, it was very likely that Sharon would hallucinate Rachel. I had heard stories before of dying people who saw dead family members and close friends, but I had never believed in them. Of course, I believed that those people thought they had seen dead friends, but not that those friends were actually present.

Even so, watching Sharon’s serene gaze trace an arc around the bed as though Rachel had come to stand across from me…was unnerving. I didn’t want her to continue in this surreal madness. “Sharon, Rachel is dead,” I reminded her gently but firmly, “She can’t be here. What you’re seeing is a hallucination.” She would want me to talk straight to her and not try to make her feel better by pretending to see what she saw. She was like that.

“But then…” Sharon looked at me again, then turned attentively back to the other side of the bed as though she had been spoken to. “No, Gavril, I don’t think this is a hallucination.”

I shivered again, but anger rose in me at the injustice of it all. Sharon had always had a sound and clear mind, but now she was delirious—reduced to talking to a hallucination as if it was our niece back from the dead. I hated seeing her like this. And yet the clarity with which she spoke astounded me. She hadn’t seemed this self-aware in days. It even seemed like her pain was gone.

Maybe she was experiencing a kind of waking dream. If she was still asleep, she might not be feeling any pain. I opened my mouth to say something and wake her up, but then I hesitated. If she woke up, she would be in agony. I didn’t want that for her.

Still, I wouldn’t encourage it or pretend I could see Rachel too. I stood silently beside Sharon, holding her hand.

“She says she’s sorry,” Sharon said abruptly.

Before I even knew what was going on, tears were stinging my eye. I hurriedly blinked them away, shaking my head. Stupid. Rachel wasn’t sorry. She wasn’t anything. I couldn’t pretend she was…

“But she’s happy,” Sharon added.

“Why?” I muttered.

“Because we’re going to know Jesus soon.”

“Yeah, that’s what she would say,” I returned with a dry laugh, “But Sharon—”

“It’s all she ever hoped for.”

“Sharon, stop this!” I burst out, trembling, “You’re having a dream, or—or-or, you’re seeing things! Rachel is not here! She can’t keep trying to force us to believe her stupid fairy tale—y-you’re more reasonable than this! You can’t believe! If you were to, h-how could I—Even if Rachel were to come back from the dead, we wouldn’t believe! You know that!”

Sharon had turned her head and was watching me with tears in her eyes. “But Gavril, I think I do,” she whispered, “I never thought I would, but He’s here.”

“She!—sh—What ‘he’? There is no ‘he’ here!”

Sharon tried to raise her hands but then let them fall jerkily back to her sides. Her eyes drifted closed, and her brows pressed together in that weak, pained expression that had become so familiar over the past month. “I’m tired,” she murmured.

“Y-yes, of course you are,” I said warmly, relieved that I could approach her on a businesslike level again, “Are you in pain? Do you need your medicine?”

“I am, but…it’s fine,” she replied in a shaky, barely audible voice, “He understands.” She drew in a long, shuddering breath and then fell silent again. Another, shallow breath. A pause.

For a moment, I stood rooted to the spot, an inexplicable sensation coming over me. Then, abruptly, I said, “No, I’ll get your medicine. You need it.” She had been refusing it lately, anyway. It was so bitter. Hurriedly, I strode over to the dresser. There was one more syringe of oxycodone prepared. I would have to prepare more after this. I picked it up and returned to her side. “Sharon, I know you don’t like the medicine, but please take it. It will help,” I said. Her mouth was hanging weakly open. Ever since her condition had become this serious, she had slept with her mouth open, and her tongue always became terribly dry. Maybe I would use a swab to moisten her mouth after this.

Maybe I didn’t need to wake her up to give her this medicine. I held the syringe closer to her mouth, preparing to squirt it under her tongue all at once.

But then I hesitated, a jolt going through me as I realized something. She didn’t seem to be breathing anymore. Quickly I drew back, watching her chest intently. I held my breath. Another breath would come. It always did.

Only, this time, it didn’t. When I could no longer stand it, I released my held breath, gasping for air. Was she really not breathing anymore? Could she really have just died? Just like that? “No…” I whimpered, dropping the syringe and leaning over her, “No, no, no…Sharon!” I shook her shoulder—gently at first, but then roughly, no longer caring if it hurt, as long as she was alive. But she wasn’t. She wouldn’t move. I held her wrist to check her pulse. Nothing. No, I must have missed it. I didn’t know what I was doing. I pressed two fingers just below her jaw.

Nothing.

“No!” I shouted, stepping back. My knees gave way, and I fell to the floor, shaking all over.

“No…”

VI.

There was an obscene amount of business to be done after Sharon’s death. Hospice had to be called. I had to wake up my parents and tell them what had happened. They hadn’t heard any of my shouting that night: they slept with their hearing aids out and were basically deaf that way. Then everything was a rush of activity as people bustled about, washing and preparing the body, writing the death certificate, phoning up friends and family to spread the awful news. A funeral had to be planned, decisions made, a gravestone and coffin purchased…But I couldn’t do any of that so soon. I couldn’t bear it. I had to get away from all this confusion.

When I finally did get away, it was almost noon. I hadn’t finished everything I had to do, but I needed to escape it all for a while, so I just slipped out. Restlessly, I paced into the gardens. It was early autumn, and the weather was cold. The sky was heavy with shifting, gray rainclouds. A misty drizzle blew into my face. Everything was as fresh as spring, and the breeze carried that distinctly sweet scent of damp fallen leaves that my wife and I had always loved. “My wife”. Sharon. That Sharon and I had always loved. I didn’t know what to feel anymore. Everything seemed so abstract all of a sudden. Sharon was simply gone.

Coming to an aesthetic, little shelter we had built in the orchard, I went inside to get out of the rain and sat down on the bench. For a long time, I sat there, staring thoughtlessly at the tangled weeds and flowers that had once been our garden. Then a strong, indefinable emotion rose up in me, and a frustrated scream broke from my damaged lungs. I pounded my foot on the wood floor of the shelter, sending pain shooting up through my leg. What was this? Why was it like this?

Nothing made sense. Everything I had ever believed in seemed to be caving out from under me, and I screamed again—and coughed. Rachel. Rachel. She’s here. He’s here. What was that all about? Why had Sharon of all people—

“It was nothing!” I shouted at the overgrown, purple-flowered hydrangea across from me, “Sharon is nothing now! No one in this whole damned universe—no God, no Jesus, no Rachel! We’re alone, okay? You have no creator! That’s it, that’s all! I don’t care!” Realizing I was crying again, I angrily dashed away my tears. This didn’t deserve tears. It didn’t matter.

I was losing control. I hated being out of control. I had to rein in my emotions. Relax, I told myself, There’s nothing unusual going on here. This is all part of the normal grieving process. In time, it will pass. Forcing myself to calm down, I took off my glasses—which were now tear- and rain-stained—and set them on the bench beside me. Then I pressed my face into my hand and wept quietly. A little healthy release of emotion now would keep me from blowing up around my folks when they were sure to try talking to me about god again. Grieve. Grieve, I told myself, Even elephants grieve.

Maybe what bothered me the most was the way Sharon had become so irrational in the end. She had never struck me as the kind of person to have a deathbed conversion, and I felt almost betrayed. After everything He did to you, would you believe in Him now? I thought. No, this was all too horrible for any goodness to exist in it. No benevolent plan could involve that much senseless suffering. In a world like this, it would be worse for there to be a god than for there not to be one. At least in a world of cold, hard science, there was no one to blame. No purpose.

For some reason, this thought that there was no one and no purpose made me weep all the harder. Simple, human psychology, I told myself, We’re social animals, and we tend to see intentionality even in things that aren’t intentional. It was helpful to our evolution.

I laughed suddenly. I was overthinking this. It was all very simple. Grieving. I didn’t need to defend it as if I was trying to explain the concept to Rachel. She wasn’t here. Neither was God.

Neither was God.

“God…” I muttered to myself, “God, God, God, Jesus…” I felt like I was going insane. Yet all of my reasoning and rationality seemed to fall empty inside me. Though I clung with all my might to my control, something else inside of me was stretching the other direction, reaching and grasping for something more. Some meaning. But I didn’t need meaning. I wasn’t about to make up some meaning in a world where none existed, just to fill this hollowness in my soul—

What soul? I didn’t have a soul. I had control, and that was all I needed. I didn’t need any God. I felt that if I believed in God, I would have to relinquish control. No, I had made my decision. Everything about this world was too terrible for there to be a God. I didn’t love God. I hated God. I was suffering too much.

He understands.

“No!” I shouted aloud, this time into the air, “No, You don’t! This is all Your fault! You don’t understand what this is like!”

I understand.

“You want to talk?” I spat, “How about this, then? Why do You force us to suffer? Why do You make such horrible, pointless things happen? Is this shit fun to You?”

You forget who I Am.

“I suppose You want me to say ‘Jesus’? You’re not Jesus! You’re not anything! Jesus was just a man—just an ordinary man who suffered and died and was gone just like everyone else! Jesus never claimed to be God! Jesus—Jesus…Jesus…” I began to tremble as my own lips formed the Name. I didn’t know what was happening to me. It was as though something beautiful was forcing its way into the void in my soul—filling it—and even as I fought with it, I welcomed it, as a man in the desert welcomes a cup of cold water.

“Jesus,” I repeated, but this time I sounded like a little child asking for his mother. I remembered the Man who had wept over me when I thought I was dying, who had been there in the room as Sharon died, comforting her—who was here now trying to embrace me while I fought so hard to push Him away! Why was I doing this? All at once, I no longer wanted control. I didn’t care about control. All I wanted was to let in this impossible, incomprehensible Love that surrounded me on all sides. Nothing else mattered anymore.

“Well?” I said, letting my arms fall helplessly by my sides, “Here I am.”

Just as I ceased striving, I was filled with that Love. I had never known anything like it before. Yet how had I ever lived without it? Now I understood. I understood why this had meant so much to Rachel—why she had never stopped trying to make me see it.

“My God!” I cried, leaping to my feet, “My Lord Jesus Christ!” I let out a laugh, but this time it wasn’t a laugh of scorn, but of joy—maybe even humor! Yes, this was funny, of all things! It was funny that I had never seen this before—that I had fought with it and run from it all my life—and yet what was there to run from? Why did I ever cling to control when all I ever really wanted was Christ? Why had I never understood this?

And why, why was everything so beautiful? I had loved the beauty of nature all my life, but it had never, never seemed so beautiful as it did now. The purple hydrangeas seemed to be glowing and buzzing with life and worship—and so were the autumn plum trees, and the nettles, and the creepin’ jenny, and the mountains on the horizon! So were the swirling, gray clouds, and the tiny, sweet droplets of rain in the wind, and the dirt turning to mud around the shelter. I didn’t know how to contain this much joy and wonder. Abundant life! Everything around me sang with meaning, all rushing together in a tide towards Heaven and redemption. In joy and in sorrow, in everything I beheld and everything I had ever lived for…

It all found its purpose in Christ.