There’s a lump growing out of the side of my neck. It’s a golf ball shaped lump, not dimpled like a golf ball, but hard and rigid. It looks odd.“Are they going to use a scissors to cut my neck open?” I ask Mammy, the very thought coming through my quivering voice. “Of course, they’re not,” she replies dismissively.I don’t believe her. I’ve nicked my knees, elbows and many other body parts on branches, barbed wire and gravel but the incident was always over before I even realised it had happened. But tomorrow I’ll be lying there, as they pull my skin to make an incision with a scissors.
“Finish your dinner. It’ll be a long time before you eat again,” Daddy says but I’m no longer hungry. It’s funny to see him squatted on the plastic chair at my table digging into the dinner I’ve left behind. He never liked seeing food go to waste. Afterwards he gives me a gift. It’s a watch. It’s not my birthday. Why has he given me a watch? He wants to spoil me. Why? Is my time up? I don’t want to die. “Daddy…will I get out before the cèile in Latton?” I query.“Ah you’ll be home long before that”, he chuckles. “Sure, it's not until May.” A wave of relief washes through me.
My parents leave the room to talk with the doctors. I walk over to the window to watch the world below. We’re high up on the fifth floor of Our Lady’s Hospital.The carpark below is full and the traffic on the road never eases. Beyond the road is a graveyard. A black hearse pulls into the gate followed by the mourners on foot. They are heading towards the freshly dug grave, a mound of earth sitting to the side. I touch the golf ball. They can cut me open tomorrow.
Nurse Michelle comes to the door. “Are you coming to the play area Colette my love?” Nurse Michelle is my favourite. She always uses phrases like love and sweetheart. She leads the way. Stella is there. She’s older than me but she lets me hang around with her. Stella says she isn’t allowed to eat sweets or chocolate or even have fizzy drinks. An existence I cannot possibly imagine. One day she took a small black kit from her bedside locker and pricked a hole in her finger, squeezing the blood out. She tells me it’s to measure her insulin levels. I don’t know what that is. It looks sore though.
There’s another nurse with the same name as me! I never met another Colette, and it sounds odd to call MY name when I need her. She lets me sit with her at the nurse’s station at night when I can’t sleep. She gives me jobs to do. I don’t know how she’d get the work done if I wasn’t there. Other nurses come and go. They ask lots of questions. Even questions about my toilet habits. “Did you do a number 1 or a number 2 today?” I don’t know the difference. We don’t speak in ones and twos at home, so I make it up and change it every day. She writes it down on the clip board and hangs it on the end of the bed. I look at the squiggly lines and figures. They make no sense.
The next morning I’m not allowed breakfast and I’m wheeled off to theatre. I don’t know why they’ve put me in a wheelchair, there’s nothing wrong with my legs, it’s the golf ball that’s the problem. I haven’t been to theatre before and I don’t know the doctors, but they know me. The nurse puts a mask over my nose and mouth and asks me to count back from ten. I get to seven and then I hear my name being called. I can hardly open my eyes. She hovers over me and says they’re taking me back to the ward as I battle the tiredness. Later I wake in a darkened room and I catch a glimpse of my parents but I’m too weak to talk. Later still, I wake, and beg Mammy for water. I hear her ask someone, but she comes back to me with pity in her eyes telling me I can’t have any. I’m so thirsty.
When I regain my strength, I’m allowed back to my ward but there are new children there. Stella is still there. I have a white bandage on my neck. Mammy says I’ll have a small scar. “So, they did cut me open with a scissors?” I ask knowingly and she says they probably used a surgical knife. She doesn’t mind telling me now. The day we leave the hospital we do lots of hugs of goodbye and head for the lifts. Stella is walking back to the ward. We look at each other as we head our different ways. I won’t see her again. We drive out of the hospital, past the graveyard. I look at my new watch; my time is not up yet.
