Within These Walls

by J. L. Berg

  I’d barely left the hospital since.

  I had a small apartment across town where I would sleep between shifts and make mediocre meals, but this place was where I lived the majority of my waking hours. I usually worked overtime and took extra shifts when people needed days off just so I could stay within the walls of this hospital.

  This was the only type of home I had anymore.

  I hadn’t really lived a day of my life since arriving here three years ago with blood dripping down my face as I’d screamed out Megan’s name over and over, trying to will her back into consciousness. It hadn’t worked in the ER, and it hadn’t worked in the horrible days that followed either. I’d been walking these empty halls without her ever since, following her ghost around corners and down halls while I tried in vain to just exist.

  I couldn’t live when everything I’d lived for was dead.

  Stopping by the vending machine, I pulled out the loose change in my pocket until I found the exact amount for my birthday-dinner treat. Dropping the coins in the slot, I pressed the correct combination of buttons and waited for the candy bar to push forward before plummeting to the bottom. It dropped with a hard thunk, and I quickly bent down to retrieve it.

  Less than three minutes later, I’d demolished the candy bar, and the wrapper was long gone in a trash can. I made my way back to the nurses’ station from the vending machine to check back in. I’d just rounded the corner when I came face-to-face with Margaret.

  “Hey, Jude. You’re just the person I was looking for. Would you mind following me? I wanted to talk with you for a minute,” she said.

  I gave a curt nod and followed behind her, watching her dark brown bob in all directions, as she briskly walked down the long hall. In a sea of scrubs, she was the oddball dressed in a cheap blue wool suit. It looked itchy, and judging from the red scratch marks along her collar, I was guessing she would agree.

  Cheap wool could make people break out into a rash faster than taking a hike through a forest of poison ivy. When I was around nine, our nanny, Lottie, had been instructed to take me shopping for a new wool blazer for Christmas Eve. It was something my mom had always loved doing, but I remembered that year as being particularly stressful, so she’d sent Lottie instead. Halfway through Mass, my father had pulled me out of the service because I couldn’t stop scratching. It turned out that Lottie had bought the blazer from a cheap knockoff store, and she’d pocketed the rest of my parents’ cash. Needless to say, that was the last Christmas she’d spent with us. It had been quite the adventure for the ten year old boy I had once been. When I retold the story to my friends, there were cops and robbers involved.

  As Margaret and I made our way farther down the hall, she continued to fuss with her collar, but I refrained from making any comments. I’d left behind the life of expensive tailored suits and board meetings.

  Jude, the nurses’ assistant, wouldn’t know shit about any of that. He was quiet, he didn’t have friends, and he never answered any questions about his past. It had taken awhile, but my coworkers had learned to respect these boundaries. After the first year of turning down every after-hours hangout opportunity, flirty date request, and party invite, they’d quickly figured out that I was a loner with a fortress of thick, impenetrable walls built around me.

  I wasn’t about to go screw it up by making some snide comment to my HR representative about digging her fingers into her neck. If I were to do that, I might as well give her advice on her 401(k) and offer to look at her stock portfolio.

  Margaret unlocked the door to her office and flicked on the fluorescent lights above us.

  “Have a seat, won’t you?” she asked, gesturing to the seats in front of her desk.

  I settled into one of the cushioned wingback chairs and leaned forward, bracing myself for whatever might lie ahead.

  She shuffled some papers around her desk and clicked on her keyboard before finally turning her gaze to me. “You’re probably wondering what you are doing here.”

  I nodded.

  “Well, you see, there’s been some adjustments and—”

  My pulse quickened, and I cut her off, “What do you mean, adjustments? Am I being laid off?”

  I couldn’t lose this job. This was the last place I had seen her, where I’d held her hand. If I weren’t here, I wouldn’t be able to feel her with me, and I didn’t know how to function without her.

  “Calm down, Jude. No one is getting laid off. You’re just switching departments.”

  “What? To where?”

  I’d been working in the emergency room since my first day as a CNA. It was exactly the type of place I needed to be. The ER was fast-paced and kept my mind occupied. It was also where they’d wheeled us in, battered and bruised from colliding head-on into a Jersey barrier after Megan had fallen asleep at the wheel. I’d been treated and discharged quickly, only sustaining a broken arm and a few bumps and bruises. Megan, though, had taken the majority of the impact, so her injuries had been far worse.

  “You’re being transferred to cardiology.”

  I inwardly groaned. All I could picture was old people with aging hearts and their bypass surgeries. My bedpan duties just went through the roof.

  “Why? Is there a particular reason?” I wanted to know what I’d done to deserve this hell.

  “We just think it would be good for you to do something different,” she answered with an encouraging smile.

  She’d done this on purpose.

  “I don’t want to be fixed, Margaret. I’m not your charity case,” I said through clenched teeth.

  There had been a handful of others like her, but Margaret was persistent. She’d been the one to get me this job, knowing I was a broken, grieving man wandering these halls. She’d probably assumed the job would open me up and give me opportunities to heal and move on. She was wrong. Healing required the desire to do so. I didn’t want to heal, and I certainly didn’t want to move on. I hadn’t left my old life behind and taken a job where my fiancée died to soothe my soul. No, I came here each and every day to mourn the life I’d selfishly taken, and I would remain here to do exactly that—no matter what department Margaret stuck me in.

  “I’m sorry, Jude,” she whispered. “You weren’t the only one transferred. Please don’t feel singled out.”

  “When do I start?” I questioned, trying to calm the anger I felt rolling off me.

  “Tonight. You can head over there now if you’d like,” she answered with a polite smile.

  As she returned to her piles of paperwork, I rose from the chair and made my way out, but I was stopped when Margaret’s small voice cut through the silence.

  “Oh, Jude?” she said. “Happy birthday.”

  Every step I took toward the third floor felt more like a mile, creating an expanding distance from the cocoon I’d managed to build over the last three years. Like was probably too strong of a word, but I’d grown complacent in my simplicity. I’d adjusted to my new life and the way it was, and this sudden wrench that had been thrown into the mix was making my mind go haywire.

  Megan had never visited cardiology. Glimpses of Megan’s parents pleading with me as they’d mentioned her heart flashed before my eyes, but I pushed back the painful memory. After the ER, she’d spent a few short days in the ICU following several unsuccessful surgeries to repair the damage to her brain, but like a speeding bullet to the heart, the wounds had been irreversible and fatal. Just like everything else.

  As I approached the nurses’ station, my slight hesitation dissipated at the sight of Dr. Marcus Hale. Dr. Marcus, as he liked to be called, was a cardiologist I’d known since my janitorial days. He wasn’t like most of the other doctors. He was laid-back without the slightest hint of snobbery. He always arrived for his shifts in sandy board shorts, and his hair would still be wet from surfing. He’d been trying for years now to get me on a board.

  The first time I’d met him was late at night when I was called up to clean a restroom. A patient he had been treati
ng had gotten ill. When I’d arrived, I had immediately gotten to work, cleaning up something that should not be described, while they had been busy talking in the room. I’d finished up around the same time as Dr. Marcus, and we’d exited the room together.

  He’d let out an exasperated sigh and turned to me. “You want to get a cup of coffee? I’m beat.”

  I’d thought he was joking. I had been a damn janitor, and he was a cardiologist, who probably made more sneezing than I had in an entire year.

  He hadn’t been kidding though. Together, we’d walked to the cafeteria and talked over coffee and crappy pastries. It had become a tradition of ours ever since then.

  “Hey, Dr. Marcus,” I greeted, pulling his attention away from the computer screen.

  “Hey, Jude. What brings you over to these parts?”

  “My new digs. I was relocated,” I answered.

  His eyebrow rose in curiosity. “Really? Well, that’s the best news I’ve had all night. Good to have you on board.”

  I looked around and immediately noticed an old man shuffling down the hall. I inwardly groaned. Then, I felt a hard pat on my back.

  “Maybe you’ll like it here better.”

  His encouragement wasn’t helping the situation.

  I gave him a dubious look.

  His rich laughter filled the air. “Okay, maybe not, but you never know. This could be exactly where you are meant to be.”

  After meeting the night-shift head nurse, who reminded me a bit of Nurse Ratched, I made my first round on my new floor. I assisted nurses, changed sheets, answered call buttons from patients, and completed all the other duties I’d performed a million times. The job wasn’t different just because I had been placed somewhere else. Things were just a bit slower. The nurses moved at a leisurely pace here. The rushed lifestyle of the ER was gone and had been replaced with something much more low-key.

  This kind of blows.

  The slow pace did offer me a chance to meet some interesting characters throughout the evening. That was one thing that differed from the ER. There hadn’t been much of an opportunity for social interaction with ER patients when they were all temporary. They would either be shipped out or moved to somewhere else in the hospital. In the cardiology department, however, the patients usually stayed for a while.

  The guy in room 305 was recovering from a triple bypass, and as soon as I entered his room, I knew he had a story or two to tell. Books filled the small space. Leather-bound novels, art books, and books about nearly anything else I could imagine were piled high on almost every hard surface.

  “They’re beautiful, aren’t they? Like a naked woman covered in silk, you just want to reach out and touch it, devour it and own it,” the man said with a rich deep voice that hinted at his Latin heritage.

  Um…okay…

  I wasn’t exactly sure how to react to that, so I did my usual noncommittal head nod and carried on. I checked his vitals while trying not to make direct eye contact that could encourage him to talk more.

  He smirked slightly at my obvious avoidance, and his chest rose in silent laughter. “I’m Nash,” he said.

  “Jude,” I replied quickly.

  His eyes assessed me, taking note of my sandy-blond hair that was in desperate need of a haircut and the tattoos that scrolled across my arms and biceps under the sleeves of my shirt. I was used to this routine. I’d been stared at and brazenly gawked over ever since I started inking my skin. I’d ditched the perfect upper-class appearance I’d been sporting since birth for something a bit rougher.

  I was no longer the man I had been before. When Megan had died, I’d left my family and the life I was supposed to have. When I looked in the mirror, I didn’t want to see the old Jude, so I’d changed everything about myself. I’d bought a home gym, and when I wasn’t at the hospital, I would lift weights, run in the early morning, and work on making sure I never saw what I once had been when I arrived here so long ago.

  “You’re not much of a talker, are you?” Nash said, cutting through all the garbage clogging my brain.

  “Not really,” I answered honestly.

  “That’s all right. I talk enough for two people.”

  And he did. Within twenty minutes, I knew more about Nash than I did my own mother. A retired hippie, Nash had spent his early years living in communes up and down the West Coast.

  As he said, “I was loving life and breathing it all in.”

  I translated that to mean, he’d slept with a lot of women, and he’d done about every drug imaginable, but I thought he was a man of poetic words.

  Later in life, he’d settled down and married—several times. He had a few children, who had eventually had children of their own. He was a writer, and apparently, he was a very successful one. I’d made a mental note to look him up when I got home. His love for filet mignon and chocolate cake had caught up to him, and now, he was paying the price with an extended stint in the hospital.

  “But every part of our life is a journey, isn’t it?” he said.

  I made my way to the door without a response before entering the hallway.

  My life was anything but a journey. It was a dead-end.

  As I passed by room 307, I noticed the door was slightly ajar. It was a room I hadn’t visited yet. I quietly peeked my head just inside and saw a young woman sitting up in bed. Flowing down her back, her long hair was loose and straight, like silky sun-kissed straw. Pale and thin, she looked fragile and angelic. Her gaze was focused up toward the TV positioned across the room in the corner, and she laughed silently, covering her mouth.

  That was when I noticed she had chocolate pudding on her finger.

  In her other hand, she held a pudding cup. She was scooping out the chocolate with her finger and sucking on it like a child might suckle a favorite pacifier. I couldn’t help the smile that spread across my face at the sight of her using her finger instead of a spoon. It was kind of gross but a little endearing. She slowly continued this process, taking small scoops of the dessert, until the cup was completely empty. She then proceeded to lick the edges clean.

  I didn’t know why I was so fascinated by this event. Maybe it was the simplicity of it or the sheer goofiness of witnessing something so innocent.

  When was the last time I enjoyed something so simple? Have I ever?

  Growing up, my life had been all about privilege and clout. I’d enjoyed it, but I didn’t know if I had ever taken the time to appreciate something so easy and insignificant.

  Have I allowed myself the opportunity?

  Before she had a chance to notice the creeper standing in her doorway, I disappeared back into the hallway. The slight smile was still spread across my lips as I set my sights for the hospital cafeteria. I suddenly had a special late-night delivery to make.

  NO CHECKLIST WAS required this morning. It took all of a second for my tiny eardrums to recognize the whisper-soft sound of oxygen being pumped into me. As my eyes fluttered opened and focused, I reached up and felt the plastic tubing around my nose. I instantly frowned. My nose was already dry and flaky from the stupid tubes.

  Gross.

  I hated sleeping like this. It was uncomfortable, unpleasant, and put me in a bad mood, but since my breathing had been a little less than ideal yesterday, I’d been put on oxygen overnight.

  The bright side was I at least had machines and monitors on days like these.

  Things could be much worse, and when I found myself trending toward the bitter side of the spectrum, I always tried to remind myself of that little fact. I could have been born half a century ago and never made it out of the hospital. In my twenty-two years, I’d done my fair share of complaining. I’d cried myself to sleep more times than I could count. I’d argued with my poor mother. I’d begged and pleaded with her when she brought me back to the hospital for yet another procedure.

  But through it all, the rational, realistic part of me knew one very important thing—I was so incredibly lucky to be alive.

  I had b
een fortunate enough to be born in a century with modern technology and in a country with experienced doctors who could treat my condition and help me move from one birthday to the next. Without them, I knew I wouldn’t have made it this far. My life would always be an uphill battle, and even though no one knew what the future held for me, I knew I was blessed for the short life I’d had so far. Longevity wasn’t a guarantee for me. It was a reality I had come to terms with long ago, far younger than any person should, but it was my reality and mine alone.

  Being the repeat offender that I was in this medical establishment, I didn’t bother with calling in a nurse to help me. I simply shut off the oxygen myself. Pulling the tubes away, I took a deep breath and wiped my nose, hating the way my skin felt after a long night of the cannulas blowing air on it.

  I did a small stretch and quickly glanced across the small room. My mother’s latest book was once again lying on the chair, forgotten along with her sweater. An empty cup was sitting on a nearby table. I searched around for my journal. I’d been writing late into the night.

  That was when I noticed it. A single cup of chocolate pudding—with a spoon—was sitting on the tray next to my bed.

  I looked around as if the hospital walls would somehow divulge an answer. They didn’t, and I scratched my head in confusion.

  How did that get here?

  It matched the same snack-sized pudding cup I’d eaten the night before.

  I did eat that last night, didn’t I?

  My mind wandered back to the evening before.

  Lying in bed with my fuzzy slippers on, I’d watched a rerun of New Girl to keep me entertained. Dr. Marcus had made good on his promise of getting me an extra dessert. Not only had two helpings of carrot cake been delivered, but there had also been a little pudding cup as well. I’d saved that little morsel for last.