I Really Hate This Place

This story is by Terra L.Walker and was part of our 2024 Spring Writing Contest. You can find all the writing contest stories here.

You sit in the driver’s seat and glower out the windshield at the large cement edifice before you. You can’t believe you are here again, in this…place. You close your eyes and hang your head, waiting for your resolve to kick in. Do you really HAVE to go inside? Would anyone blame you if you turned the car on, headed south on 35 W, and didn’t stop until you hit the Mexican border?

Nah.

Dammit…

Yes.

You MUST do this, no matter how much it hurts.

After a deep cleansing breath, you open the car door and creep towards the hulking structure, which looks more like an industrial complex than a hospital. The revolving door shoves you inside with a gust of wind, and you catch yourself stumbling over the edge of the salt-worn mat meant to protect the entryway floor. You glance down as a few curse words tumble out of your mouth. The security guard reading a copy of USA Today at the desk looks up and chuckles. You shoot him an eye that says, “If I wasn’t in such a piss-poor mood, I might laugh too, but right now, I’m liable to punch you in the face, buddy.”  His smile evaporates. He takes a sip of coffee from his Stanely tumbler and goes back to reading his paper, ignoring you.

You walk down the long, dim corridor following the blue arrows on the cream and grey tiled floor, pointing you towards the main elevators. Not like you need directions; you could probably give tours of this place like an Original London Tour Bus Guide: “Over here, you’ll see the Surgical Waiting Room. Established in 1985, it’s the largest waiting area in the hospital. It features chairs and couches guaranteed to give you semi-permanent lower back pain and a large screen HDTV that only tunes in PBS, C-SPAN, and Telemundo. To your right, you’ll find dozens of infuriating puzzles missing two or more pieces and a plethora of Time, Field & Stream, and Newsweek magazines that are at least 4 years out of date. Now, if you direct your attention across the atrium…”  The faint sound of your cell phone ringing shakes you back to reality. On the other end, Dad asks for his usual – lime Jell-O and Sprite.

The cafeteria isn’t busy at this time of day. You grab a bottle of Sprite from the cooler near the entrance, then scan the huge refrigerator section, looking for the familiar plastic containers holding brightly colored squares of jiggling gelatin. You find a green one with bits of fruit cocktail floating in it. This should do. You take your purchases to the open register, and then you see him; you don’t know his name or his exact story, but you’ve seen him here often enough to make an educated guess. His baby face says he’s in his early 20s. Serving younger patients has become more commonplace at the Minneapolis Veteran’s Hospital, and considering the extent of his injuries, it’s a good bet he’ll be hobbling these halls for years to come. You watch him and the cashier with ‘SARAH’ on her nametag have a…conversation. The damage done to his body tells you he was likely the victim of an improvised explosive device or IED. The halted and nearly incomprehensible speech, jerking arm motions, and drunken-like stumble are hallmarks of the invisible wounds concussive force exerts on a young man’s brain. You pause to wonder what that brain could have done if it had gone to college instead of war. Did he have a girlfriend? Was he a fan of HBO’s Game of Thrones? Does he need his mother to dress him and wipe his 20-something-year-old ass? He struggles to speak the cashier’s name, “Sssss-aa-rrrrr-ah,” – she smiles sweetly at him and waits as he wrestles a few dollars from his fanny pack. That woman has the patience of a saint.   You feel a lump start to form at the base of your throat. Damn. I REALLY hate being in this place. You shake your head like an Etch-A-Sketch to erase the thoughts in your mind and start fresh. Now’s not the time for these thoughts. You need to keep moving. Stop wasting time!  You give Mother Teresa and Baby-Face the best smile you can muster and exit the cafeteria.

You continue to wind your way through the labyrinth of hospital halls. Once you reach the heart of the building, you punch a button for the elevators that service patients, staff, and visitors. A door opens, and a moaning, one-legged man in a hospital bed is wheeled out of the elevator and down the hall. You wonder for a second if he’s headed to the Recovery unit or if he will end up instead in the Palliative Care unit. Your heart skips a beat.   As you ride the elevator, take a quick second to pray the PCU doesn’t end up as your destination today. The devil on your shoulder stabs your frontal lobe with his red-hot pitchfork and whispers, “Mexico is waiting; it’s not too late!”  Shut up, asshole. You couldn’t live with yourself. Or could you?

You exit the elevator on the third floor and turn left, following another corridor skirting the top of the waiting area, enclosed in glass. You stop in front of one of the Medical-Surgical units and look across the atrium at the office windows along the northern side of the hospital. You gaze down upon the people in the waiting area like a shepherd watching over their flock. The woman in the red sweater; has the doctor come out to say, “The surgery went well, you should be able to see him soon”? The gentleman wearing combat fatigues; had they already told him his buddy didn’t make it? You step away from the window. You ARE wasting time.   A door behind you opens, and two nurses in colorful scrubs exit the unit. They see you and immediately lower their voices. A smile creeps across your face.  You know why nurses whisper; it’s because they are talking about you! You snicker a little at the irony. Your phone chirps – this time it’s mom wondering what’s taking so long. You text her back and then turn it off. You aren’t supposed to have cell phones in the oncology unit.

You push through the thick, heavy double doors and head straight to the desk at the center of the unit. You swear the same ancient LPN who must have graduated nursing school sometime in the late Cretaceous period is still on duty. Her gray hair (or what’s left of it) is tucked up under one of those awful Nurse Ratchet-like paper hats, the wrinkles on her face so deep you’d swear spelunking in them was possible. She barely lifts her head to acknowledge your presence and orders you to “sign in.”  You grab the coffee mug stained sheet attached to the clipboard and scribble your name. The desk is littered with patient charts and illegible medication orders. Nurse T-Rex grabs the clipboard, glances at it, and asks who you’re here to see. You answer, and she flips her finger to point you down the hall. This is your last chance to turn back.

You pad down towards the patient room and creak the door open. The first thing you notice is the familiar smell; a strange combination of medical-grade disinfectant, latex gloves, and that special spray they use when a patient vomits. Guess it’s a little bit comforting to know some things don’t change. You can hear your mom and Dr. Brown discussing treatment plans and anti-nausea medication on the other side of the curtain. Oh, that must be why it smells like that air freshener. You step a little further into the room. A sign reads, ‘Foam In/Foam Out,’ triggering your memory about the importance of clean hands, especially in situations like this. You extend your hands up to the metal can of foaming hand sanitizer mounted on the wall and rub an egg-sized dollop of it into them – the alcohol stings.

A moment passes.

Oh God, why do you have to be here?

You work to hold back the tears that are surfacing in your eyes. Not now. You wish you weren’t here, in this place. Maybe if you were somewhere else like Mexico, things would be different, better even, but not in this…place. You take a deep breath. You force a smile to invade your lips as you reach your arm out to pull the privacy curtain aside. The light from the window is blinding and forces you to turn your head – just as a tear slips down your cheek. You sweep it away. Now is not the time, you say to yourself, be strong for Dad.

You made it.

But- you still really hate this place.