Standard Procedure

Standard Procedure [Watty Awards]

"Life" he sneered, "what it is life?" He held up his arms, clear tubes encircled his his limbs, they looked like snakes sucking the life out of him rather than saving the man. He was dying and he knew it. The nurse shuffled uncomfortably where she stood, her eyes focusing anywhere but that hospital bed.

"Sir, this procedure would give you more time, for family and friends." she stuttered.

"I have no friends and as for my family, they don't even know I exist. As for time, I have only need for the length of my story." He coughed, a raspy cough that brought up blood. He wiped his mouth and stared at the back of his hand. The nurse started to move toward him, but stopped as he held up his palm to her. The weary old war general looked at her with eyes that seemed miles away, back to the battle fields, the machine guns, and the death. She saw a sadness in his eyes.

"Sit," he commanded. The presence of the man dispelled all opposition. She obeyed, positioning herself in the worn leather chair near the hospital bed. She was scared, she had the strength to admit that much, as for the rest of the feelings that she was experiencing she could put no name to them.

"The doctor says I have about a month left." he paused and coughed up more blood, "a month to tell my story, and I want to tell it to you."

"Sir, we have counselors that can help with this stuff, I don't know if I can assist you all that much."

He laughed, his veins visible in his neck as if the strain of laughter was too much for his body to handle, it probably was. "No, I don't need help now, I don't need a shrink, I need a stranger, you're new here, young, and soon to be married by the look of that ring." She covered her hand and didn't say anything. "Must be a rich one for the size of that diamond."

"Your story, Mr. Peterson."

He looked at her. He could tell she was scared, but she didn't leave so she wasn't that weak. Neither was he once upon a time, a young soldier, ready to fight under the stars and strips, ready to do what all boys dream of, be a hero. Look at him now, who would have thought that a bullet placed in his chest fifty years ago would kill him now. They couldn't remove it, it was too close to his heart. They had said he would live, they didn't plan on the small metal object migrating near his lung and pressing on it till blood now labored his breathing. The muscle that had held it in place all those years was now gone, leaving the ghostly frail figure that now laid on the thin hospital sheets hacking up crimson liquid with each passing hour.

The nurse watched the old man, his eyes concentrating on a time far back in his life, his glory days. Slowly those steely gray eyes again returned to her face and the helpless old man resumed the strength of his war days once more, a juvenile look of fierce determination on his haggard face. He looked as if he could have risen out of the hospital bed and marched down the hallway at that moment were he not tethered to the bed with clear plastic tubes. She saw the young soldier again standing proudly on the stage receiving his purple heart, shaking hands with the president.

The old man stared at the nurse, she'd calmed down, her hands relaxed in her lap, no longer trying to cover the precious stone her lover had given to her. She was pretty he thought, not in the conventional way though. She had a thin face framed by locks of long blond hair that she was always pushing out of her face. The large glasses she wore distorted her doe-like brown eyes, so much so that he had difficulty distinguishing whether they were looking at him or not. She made him think of his wife, the lovely woman had passed away twenty years ago, the thin young nurse before him looked so much like her, were she not so young they could have been twins.

To him she looked bored, like she didn't want to listen, like she'd rather be somewhere else. He didn't blame her, how could he? He was a wreck of a man, senile and crazy had probably crossed her mind more than once as she beheld his pitiful form lying there helpless with the assistants moving around him, cleaning him, feeding him. No, he was no one to pay attention to, another face on the wall, another date, on another stone, in another cemetery.

The look on her face would change as the story went on, he had decided. She would listen, she would have no choice, he knew things he shouldn't have known. He'd seen things he shouldn't have seen and he'd killed to protect those things, he'd killed for silence. Everyone knew freedom had a price, but no one would ever guess how high that price actually was, how far a government would go, and how low mankind would stoop to secure that freedom, among other things.

Those "other things" was what he remembered, those "other things" were what kept his mouth sealed. They knew he was nearing the end and yes they had declared him insane, he was a poor old fool with Alzheimer's was what they said. The truth, why that was another matter, one the nurse would have to figure out for herself. He knew what went on behind those beautiful granite columns and the white alabaster stone, and that scared them, they made it so no one would believe him, they made him to be an imbecile. He was just as sharp and alert as when he was a young man. He had a hope, not much of one, but one nonetheless, someone would believe him, someone would carry on his fight. He hoped and prayed that he'd chosen the right one, he felt in every fiber of his being that he had chosen correctly. The old general paused for a breath and said in an airy whisper,

"Close the door, I've got a story to tell you."

While her back was turned he reached his hand to the button beside his bed and turned off the mic.