Elena
It’s 12 midnight and well past her time for departure, but I am not surprised. The clock on the wall softly clicks. I would love to write the ticking of the clock kept time at her going, but an electric clock relays a meaningless stream of eternal seconds, keeping track of everything and nothing.
So anyway, we can move on from this bed, but not very far, of course. When she came to us she was a very beautiful woman of 58 years. Yes, there were – things – a Foley catheter and later, a rectal tube. These she accepted with dignity, but that is not to say she wasn’t angry. Upon arrival, her eyes were those of a wild mare, buggy and feral, and her focus was dangerous, like she would rear and kick and trample me for putting her in a closed stall.
She had a lover, by the way. The neighbors say they were passionately, completely crazy about each other, and that was envied and talked about. But, like everything crazy, the relationship darkened, and today he seldom visits except to argue with her about bills.
But now the time has come, or so I would think. She is restless; I give her sub-lingual morphine. Before the morphine she lies with her head turned and stares at me with pain and utter contempt, shoving me backwards with her gaze.
By and by my daughter arrives to relieve me. She rides ambulance until midnight. When she sits bedside, things are different. Silently, silently, through thought diffusion, a parade of images passing between them, the two of them repair the torn bits of life, reweaving the heart, stitching up the time, making ready. The presence of God arrives in these situations, without fail.
At 3 PM my daughter calls me, tells me Elena has left us.