The Bell

Blanketed by fog, the morning sun looks like a full moon as I head to my appointment with dr taggert. This is only my second time seeing her since the nurses went on strike nearly six weeks ago. They signed a new contract over the weekend but they’re not back at work yet. When the bus pulls up in front of the hospital, I see that the tents and port-a-potties for the picketers are all gone.

The metal detector is in operation for the first time in a while, and I put my bag in the tray and set off the alarms when I hobble through on my crutches. A polite young man wands me over and for the first time it starts to beep. He asks if I have anything in my pocket and I tell him just pens and he waves me on without checking to see if they are in fact pens and not a knife or gun. 

I check in with a man I’ve never seen before, then head up the green elevator. The lights are on in the office but I’m very early. I only have to wait a few minutes before taggert bursts out and hollers for me to come in.

She asks where my wheelchair is, as I knew she would, but she seems satisfied when I tell her I’ve been using crutches all the time, which I have. “The wheelchair is just so much harder,” I say. 

She says she understands. “I told you about my brother, right? He had MS as a kid and we wheeled him around everywhere.” She’s not wearing her mask, and I can’t stop staring at her mouth, which I’ve only glimpsed before. There’s nothing wrong with it, in fact she looks younger and prettier without the mask, plus for the first time her hair is down. Freed of its ponytail, it’s golden and longer than I imagined. I would not recognize her if I saw her on the street. 

The only other person in the office is Bridget, the new receptionist. Taggert says the nurses will be back tomorrow. I ask if she’s relieved. “Oh god yes, this has been a nightmare. But I saw what some of them will be making and I think maybe I should’ve just become a nurse. Now maybe you can tell me, does the chair look right to you? I can’t get the leg rest to go back any further but maybe it was always that way?”

I slip off my postop shoe and sock and she peels off the bandage. “Well, this still looks good,” she says. “Really good. Wait, what about your knee? Is that still… oh, that’s healed up too. Wow. Okay, let me just get this callous off.” She plucks it off with a knife and says everything is healed up underneath. She slaps a bandage on and says, “Oh wait, it’s all wrinkled up, that’s not…do I need to cut it? No, I can just fold it over like…you know, the nurses really are better at this. Anyways, that’s it! You’re all healed up! You don’t need us anymore!”

“Really?” I ask.  I had figured on there being at least another visit or two. It’s strange to suddenly be separated from people I’ve spent so much time with over the last year. I wanted to hear how they weathered the strike, if they enjoyed the time off or were just tense the whole time. And of course the one I miss the most is KC, her awkward flirting, her terrible singing… I feel sad knowing I may never see her or any of them again. But mostly her. 

Or I may be back in two weeks. Regardless, I should draw them a thank you card with my info so they can keep in touch, though I’m pretty sure they won’t. 

“So now what?” I ask. 

“Now you can start breaking in your shoe, though if you’ve had it a while you might want to get a new one,” I tell her I’ve never worn it and she says I should still get a new one. “Besides, Medicaid covers a free one every year,” she says. “Oh wait, you don’t have Medicaid.”

“Yeah but soon no one else will either!” I cry.

“That fucking guy,” she mutters. “I can’t even bring myself to say his name. But give them a call. They should be  adjusting your inserts quarterly anyways.”

“Quarterly?” I groan. She nods and gives me that bug-eyed stare I’ve grown so accustomed to, though its intensity is oddly diluted without her mask. 

“A wound like this takes ten to twelve months to fully heal up, and even then it’s only ever going to be 80% of what it was before,” she says for possibly the thirtieth time. “You are always going to have to be hyper-vigilant. The moment you se any signs of rubbing or soreness, you rip those shoes right off and get them adjusted. And if the sores open up, you call us immediately.” I tell her I will, though I feel tense and tired just thinking about it. This isn’t over. This will never be over. This is my life.

Taggert holds my coat up so I can worm my arms into the sleeves. “I feel like your butler,” she laughs, and escorts me to the door. She surprises me by giving me a big hug. 

“This is so anticlimactic,” I say. And it’s true; there are no emotional outpourings, no fitting denouements to any of the character arcs. Apparently this story ends with just me and Taggert hugging awkwardly in the vestibule. From a narrative perspective, it’s pretty weak. But perhaps there’s something fitting about that, even if it feels unsatisfying. 

Sitting on the counter is the bell you get to ring when you finish your treatment. For the first time, I notice that there are actually three bells; the one I rang last time, and also a town crier type hand bell and a squat cowbell. 

“Don’t I get to ring the bell?” I ask.

“Oh my god, of course!” Taggert laughs. “I forgot! It’s been so long since anyone’s rung it!”

I grab the little cowbell and shake it maniacally. It clonks dully, a harsh, ugly sound. I should’ve taken the town crier bell, but it’s too late. You can’t undo these kinds of mistakes. Taggert nevertheless waves her arms in the air and cheers. Bridget grimaces and shakes her head. I ring and ring and ring that fucking bell.

Outside, the sun has burned away the fog, and the world and all its denizens are cast in a harsh, cold light. It feels strange to be going to work after my appointment instead of the other way around. As I wait for the bus, a spotlight seems to shine on the litter at my feet one object at a time. Soggy brown wads of paper towels. A sheet of newspaper. A family of cigarette butts. A wrapper for a king-sized Snickers bar. A guy in a bright yellow vest is lethargically sweeping it all up. 

A man with purple hair walks past, wearing a black jean jacket with the words Where Roses Bloom So Does Hope stitched in Gothic lettering on the back. I move so the guy with the broom can sweep up the Snickers wrapper, and then the bus comes and I climb on and we head down Glisan, taking the Burnside bridge across the river, which is still shrouded in mist, despite the sunshine, into downtown, past the empty storefronts and boarded-up buildings, past addicts frozen in place and cops strapping on their riot gear, past people with baby carriages and mobility devices, couples holding hands or walking their dogs or getting coffee, past all these stories unfolding all the time around us, until finally I pull the cord to ring the bell for my stop.

The Alternative

     It’s Valentine’s Day and the museum is closed due to inclement weather. Everyone in security had to come in anyways, though there’s no need for all of us to be here, so I hobbled on my crutches through the snow and am now sitting here getting paid to drink cold coffee from a paper cup.

      My bosses are laughing and carrying on about a new product one of them saw advertised. It is a metal and plastic ball that attaches to the muzzle of a gun. When you pull the trigger, the bullet is slowed down by the ball, so that by the time it hits the target it will have been rendered non-lethal. It’s called the Alternative. I admit it sounds pretty questionable but these guys are howling  like it is the funniest thing they’ve ever seen.

      They talk about an incident ten years ago, there was a guy acting rowdy down on the waterfront and when the cops came they shot him with an orange shotgun, which is only supposed to be loaded with non-lethal ammunition, only someone had loaded it with real bullets. “Lotta people lost their jobs over that one,” one of them says. The other nods, no longer laughing.

      Today is the one year anniversary of my first day of hyperbaric treatment. This exact time I was being pulled from the hyperbaric chamber, dazed by the strangeness of it all. 

     I think about whether to send a text to nurse Hannah wishing her a happy Valentine’s Day. I would send her flowers but I don’t know her address, don’t even know her last name.

      I was supposed to get my shot of retina medicine today but the office is closed. The nurses strike has hit a wall. Last week the hospital made them an offer but 83% of the nurses rejected it. There have been no talks since. The hospital says the nurses will lose their insurance at the end of the month. I would like to hunt down every one of those millionaire administrators, gun them down in cold blood. I don’t love the idea of murder but we are being left with no good alternatives. 

      Nurse Hannah isn’t affected by the strike since she isn’t an RN. I send her a text and she texts back immediately. Friendly but noncommittal. I send another text and she doesn’t respond. I sip my cold coffee. Snow is still falling but the streets are black. it’s already starting to melt. 

Rosa Parks

All day at work my knee is killing me, and sure enough when I get home and take my pants off it there is a giant blister that hadn’t been there the day before. It looks like I can no longer put off the wheelchair. All weekend I alternate between it and the crutches. Sunday I don’t leave the apartment, and I call in sick on Monday. In the middle of the afternoon the phone rings with a familiar number, and when I answer it there an equally familiar voice on the other end.

“Hello this is Luna from wound care, is Seann there?”

She says Dr. Taggert has her mornings free to see and asks if I want to come in for an appointment. “She won’t be casting you,” she says. I say yes, of course, that sounds great, when? She says how about tomorrow. 

There is frost on the grass when I wheel down to the bus stop, but luckily the sidewalks are dry. This is the first time I’ve used the wheelchair outside the apartment and my arms start hurting instantly. The hill down to the bus stop is very steep, and I use my good leg as a brake, which also hurts by the time I get down there. If I’m this worn out before I even get onto the bus, how am I going to get through the day? 

The driver puts down the ramp and I drag myself aboard with some difficulty. He says there’s no charge; it’s Rosa Parks Day. The morning is so foggy I can’t see the river when we cross it. I get off at Burnside and catch my second bus. I’ve made this trip so many times with my scooter or wearing the cast that it’s become second nature, but the wheelchair changed everything. I feel self-conscious taking up so much room, feel like an obstacle. Luckily the bus isn’t crowded so I’m not actually in anyone’s way. I just feel like I am. It’s difficult not to feel self conscious, though I know there’s no need to.

Tents have been erected on the corners surrounding the hospital to give shelter to the strikers. A truck has set up a table with coffee and donuts, and a row of portable toilets lines the street. I don’t see anyone I recognize so I just slowly make my way down another extremely steep hill to the hospital entrance.

They’re open but most of the lights are out and there’s hardly anyone inside. I roll up to the counter, feeling very small, and tell the woman who knows me, “I’m back!” 

“Any COVID symptoms?” she asks.

“I missed you too,” I say as I wheel past the Starbucks, whose non-union workers are hard at work pouring blackberry sage refreshers for the scabs. 

The lights in the office are out but I hear someone fiddling with the door handle. “I don’t know how to open this thing!” Dr Taggert laughs. “I’ve never done it before! Oh, hello!” she says, finally having figured out the latch. She’s the only one in the office, aside from a gorgeous Black woman behind the counter I’ve never seen before. I almost wish her a happy Rosa Parks Day, but fortunately I stop myself. 

Taggert introduces us. “She’s the new Luna. Or will be, once this strike is over.” It’s been a month with minimal headway being made but she sounds certain that it will end soon. I’m less optimistic.

She has me sit in room one. I tell her about the knee wound. She looks at it and seems a little concerned, but after poking at it a bit decides it’s not as bad as it looks. I take off my shoe and she peels off the makeshift dressing I slapped over my foot wound.

“Oh wow, this looks great,” she says, and shows me the dry bandage. “Look! Nada!” She gets a knife and starts carefully cutting at the scab. “I’m not seeing anything under this but skin. The wound is gone.” 

While she continues to cut and clean the area, I ask how she’s doing and she says not too bad. “We’re kind of sheltered from the madness in here,” she says. “Just running the chambers.”

“Making sure not to blow up any children, I hope.” 

“Oh God, isn’t that horrible,” she says. 

Last Friday a hyperbaric chamber in Michigan exploded with a five-year-old boy inside, burning him to death and injuring his mother. “You know what started it?” she asks. “A toy. They let him have a toy in there. Can you imagine? You see how careful we are here. Of course the place wasn’t accredited, one of these boutique places. And you know what he was being treated for? Autism!” 

She goes on to says that, insanity about using oxygen to treat autism aside, places like that don’t even use enough pressure to be effective on anything other than altitude sickness. I tell her the tragic story of Landmark’s Legendary Affaire, which she has somehow never heard. “That’s why we remove all our patients’ horseshoes,” she says.

She’s cheerful and chatty, and after my surprising good news, I am too. But as she re-bandages the wound area, she lectures me again about how I have to accept the fact that I am never going to be able to go back to living the way I used to, in other words, being able to walk. Part of me refuses to accept this can possibly be true; surely there must be some sort of shoe or surgery that will allow me to use the foot for more than just balancing? I don’t want to run marathons; I just want to be able to stroll around. I wish I could talk to Dr. Thompson about it; she’s always much less dire and reactionary. Taggert says she just got back from Hawaii. Maybe I can find out what days she works and make an appointment with her.

When Taggert asks if I want to come back next week, I tell her I’d rather wait another week. I feel resentful at her for squashing what little hope I can summon. She says to call Luna when I’m ready to schedule, and to just keep doing what I’m doing, then says that when she went to Costco the other day there was a line of people all the way back to the snack aisle. “Everyone’s cart was totally filled with toilet paper! It’s like the pandemic all over again! Did you know that our toilet paper comes from Canada? And everyone’s freaking out because of the stupid tariffs. So what could I do but fill my cart with toilet paper.” 

I ask why she doesn’t just steal it from work like everyone else does. “Nobody will notice,” I say. “They’re all on strike!”

As I wait for the elevator, the fire alarms go off and all the doors slam shut. A female robot says that there is a Code Red in the cancer center, which is a whole other building, so when the elevator arrives I just take it down to the ground floor and head for the lobby like usual. The lights are on now and there are a lot more people here; you would never know that thousands of supposedly essential frontline workers are fighting to be fairly compensated.

It takes me a long time to struggle up the hill to the bus stop. At the top I say hi to the nurses crowded under one of the tents with their picket signs. They are bundled up and crowded around a gas flame and they look like they are freezing their asses off. Cars honk in support as they pass, the blaring horns playing an appropriately irritating requiem for America.