Milly
sits patiently on the blue chair I’ve set for her in the cohort area of the ED,
watching everyone come and go.
‘Busy,
isn’t it?’ I say.
‘So many
people dying,’ she says, smiling sadly, like a middle-aged nun finding love in
her heart for all the evil in the world. ‘How many people are dying, d’you
think?’
‘I don’t
know. Maybe some, but then I suppose you have to think there are lots being
born, so life goes on and we’re all right.’
‘What do
they do? Burn them?’
‘Sometimes.
It depends what the person wants. Some people opt for natural burials. You know
– with a tree. So the graveyard ends up a wood.’
She’s
still smiling at me.
‘Which
is nice,’ I add.
I look
around to see if the psych nurse has arrived yet, but I can’ t make her out in
the chaos of the department.
It’s
difficult having a conversation with Milly. She whispers, and I have to lean
in. When I do understand what it is she’s saying, I struggle to come up with
anything more than blandishments, vague reassurances. My own sense of reality
feels increasingly tenuous.
‘What’s
that word?’ she says.
‘What
word?’
‘Helly
something. Is it? Hell?’
‘Hell?
Do you mean as opposed to heaven?’
‘Where
you go up. You spin up.’
She
illustrates by turning her hand vaguely in the air, and then placing it neatly
in her lap again.
‘That’s
a nice way of thinking about it,’ I say. ‘Like the seed of a tree, spinning upwards.’
Trees again.
She
smiles at me, unchanged
‘What is that word? I’m sure… hell…is it?
Hell?’
‘I don’t
know. Is it a person? Helen, maybe?’
She
shakes her head.
A team
comes out of resus pushing a bed with a patient wired-up to monitors and
drips, heading for ITU.
She
sighs, watches them pass, and then looks straight at me.
‘Helicopters,’
she says.
4 comments:
I know what Milly means,but only if gravity works in reverse.
It's all so confusing!
(I'm confused about gravity?. I'm worse than I thought...) :/
Of course, helicopters, because.... well, why not ?~!
Indeed! :)
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