The doctor had a serious look on his face. “This is not good,” she thought to herself. She lay in the hospital bed, uncertain.
She held his hand tighter. He had his eyes closed and she knew he was praying silently.
The doctor faced both of them, then seemed to change his mind and faced only the man. “I’m sorry,” the doctor said in a monotone. “The cancer has spread. The prognosis is not good. She only has three weeks to live.”
The floor rushed up to meet his head. The doctor called for nurses to help the man to the sofa, where he lay passed out for a few minutes.
She lay still in bed. Her eyes were closed, but she was not asleep. Her thoughts were a jumbled mess… although quite ironically not of her impending death, simply a mess of things she needed to do before she died.
Not even fun things like sky diving or bungee jumping (as if she could, in her condition) but simple tasks like teaching him how to do laundry, giving away all her worldly posessions, finding someone to adopt her dog (he was allergic), etc.
Of course, the most pressing thought in her mind at the moment was teaching him how to properly lather the hamsters with beer…
He woke up, startled out of blackness by a loud sound. “What was that?” he said, trying to gather his bearings.
“You farted,” she said, and smiled at him.
Boy, was she going to miss him.
originally written & posted April 2, 2003
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