[My Ghosts] Re-published for Myles

The most painful memories of my life are evoked by the mere mentioning of the words “Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital”, and now I’m entering that very place. It’s been almost five years since I’ve been here. Its prodigal son returns.

My ears begin to tingle with familiarity as I step onto the worn out pressure sensor mats in front of the automatic doors. I can see the inner hallway through the fencing reinforced plexiglass of the inner doors. I steel myself.

As I step through the entrance into the hallway, I notice the sea-foam colored tile that lines the hall and the same pastel pattern that borders along its edge. Only now, it’s seems lower. Have I grown that much?

I make my way, almost on auto-pilot, to the elevator. I notice, with a grin, how the arrow that points up still blinks with irregularity.

“Oops, my bad.”: says the orderly as he bumps me with his cart full of urine samples and the like.

“De nada.”: I mumble as I follow him onto the lift.

My finger finds the button for the ninth floor even though the number is scratched and appears now to be just a sloppy “3". I push it until it’s illuminated a pale orange.

It’s just the orderly and me now. We both smile and nod as we attempt a witty reparte’ while we wait. At the “ding” of the bell, I step off as I wish the orderly a good day.

The ninth floor. The Oncology ward. As I walk towards the door, my legs begin to feel like I’ve just run a marathon. They’re tired and heavy. I reach out a clumsy hand towards the cold metal of the doorhandle. My fingertips are surprised to feel a warmth in that seemingly heartless piece of steel.

As I open the door my nostrils flare as they are assaulted with the smell of the antiseptic cleaner used to clean up vomit. I, as Pavlov’s dogs salivated at the sound of a bell, have associated that unctuous odor with vomit and begin to get that bitter taste in the back of my mouth that touches the sides of your tongue right before you puke. My eyes dart around the hallway searching for a trash can. Not finding one, I run back through the doors and out of the Cancer ward, my heart racing.

I sit down in the corner of that hallway and put my head between my knees in a futile attempt to make that feeling of fear and anxiety subside. Throwing up would be a release.

Standing up and ignoring my own lightheadedness I step to the door, draw it open and attack the entrance. I step through it with all the will I can muster. As I look down the hallway, I observe a frayed knot of action. Nurses are walking stiff-legged with urgency from room to room, alcove to alcove.

As I start to move down the hall, I feel more like the hall is moving around me. I look down at my feet moving step ahead of step. It’s like I’m watching someone else’s feet. My breath tightens as I look through the crack of an opening door.

I see a child sitting on a table. I feel my stomach tense as his blue eyes lock with mine. His head is bald and lumpy resembling (though I hate to say it) a potato. Through the crack of the door, I can see the patches of gossamer hair that cling to his head in clumps. I see how on his arm is a board; and in his wrist is a needle, an I.V., a heparin lock.

In his eyes I can see a strength beyond his stature. As they hold me in their grip, I see a determination, a will greater than I can understand, a fire. He lays his head in his mother’s lap, and I can see him no more through that crack in the door.

As the hallway begins again to pass by me, I run, quite literally, into a little girl. She too, has the gaunt figures that remind me of sights I’ve seen only in National Geographic Magazine of starving Ethiopian children. But there is no emptiness in her eyes. I hear her squeal with delight as she races along the pathway and skids around the corner with her I.V. pole in tow. Her pink bathrobe with Barbie monogrammed on the back fluttering along after her.

I run after her. I want to see where she’s going. But when I turn the corner, my smile fades. I remember this place. It’s a cul de sac of a hallway; a giant “u”. It’s the infusion area. This is the place I remember all too well. This is the place I’ve been trying to forget. This hallway is more of a big room with little alcoves along the outside wall that surround a nurse’s post. Each little “room” has a bed, a tv, a chair for the parents, a pole for the medication, and a curtain for privacy.

As I walk through the hallway, I hear screams of pain. I can hear the children cry to their mothers “mommy, make it stop! I’ll be good, I promise!” My nose begins to drip and my eyes start to well and itch. In with the pleadings of the child I hear the alto sobbings of the mother: “I’m so sorry baby, I’m so sorry.” I go to this room, and I peek around the curtain to see the child laying down with another board held on by clear adhesive medical tape to his arm. It’s the boy I saw earlier. Wincing in pain, he once again lays his head in his mother’s lap. She strokes his lumpy head and begins to sing in a deep, melancholy voice:

"Summertime, and the livin’ is easy...” Instantly there is silence; silence, save for that sweet sound seeming to saturate every pore of my soul.

I look at the little boy. The pain has not left his face though his tears have stopped. I see all motion leave his face. My tears flowing, I close the curtain.