Kingdom of the Sick 5

KINGDOM OF THE SICK 5

Nights in a hospital ward are never silent or dark. Voices, muffled or otherwise, drift in from the corridors or other patients' rooms. Emergencies arise, and one can hear as others are whisked away to be tended to elsewhere. Nurses and doctors scurry about, sometimes coming into my room, allowing as they enter harsh light to shoot across me and against the walls. I didn't sleep well the entire month I was in St. Vincent's.

For two weeks I shared a room with a man who was gravely ill with liver cancer. He was a jazz musician, and during our one extended conversation he mistook me for the headwaiter at one of the clubs where his band played. When I told him that I didn't recognize him, he appeared disheartened. Hoping to placate him, I went along with his delusion; he seemed satisfied by my fabrication, though we rarely spoke again.

Still, he talked constantly—on the phone, I initially thought, until one night I grasped that he was actually speaking to himself. I could understand only a few of the words, but they came out in a steady murmur, and I began to wonder if he was reciting poetry or, perhaps, praying. Though eerie, I found it weirdly compelling, even calming under these peculiar circumstances. It rarely bothered me.

As time passed he grew sicker, and his doctors had to visit him more frequently and at all hours. Often he was wheeled away for some medical procedure or another, but when he returned to our room, he never appeared better. Despite his failing health, his conversations with himself continued.

Two nights before he was moved from our room, I understood for the first time something he said. He was a bit more agitated than usual—even if his words had been no more lucid—and suddenly in the midst of his babbling, I caught a distinct sentence. "She was a beautiful woman," he slowly whispered, in a heartfelt way, "but I don't blame him for beating the shit out of her." After that he again grew incoherent.

The next night I heard him once more, speaking in a soft, odd voice: "I want you to take off all of your clothes and lean over the sink. Then I want to beat you with a whip and pour hot oil and pepper all over your body. After that I want to stare at every inch of you, particularly your asshole."

With these words he stopped. I was astonished to say the least. The ward had never seemed stranger.

The following morning he was taken to the intensive-care unit, and I never saw him again. o