All Gone

THE DOCTOR

The nurse. She bathes and dries me. Shaves me and dresses me in my very best. My suit. My white shirt and even has my shoes shined. But she doesn’t know how to make a tie right. That’s okay. “Just tie it a little tighter at the knot,” I say. She does. “Not so tight,” I say, “or they’ll get you for choking me to death and not for letting me expire in a more proper medical way.” She laughs. They like me here. Doctor Sweet Guy I’ve been nicknamed. That’s okay. Undignified expression maybe, but something I’ve gotten to like. I’d maybe like anything today because it’s my third day out of intensive care and a Sunday. And on Sundays everybody has visitors and no matter how many times I’ve said nobody has to visit me if they got anything else they want to do that day, I’m glad I’m in a room where I can have all I want. My son. My daughter, who’s bringing my wife. My sister who lives two blocks away even, though with her who knows? “Two blocks can be the last mile for me,” she said over the phone yesterday. My former longtime patients who some of them I’d really be happy to see.

They sit me up in a chair. No bed today. “Thank you very much,” I say. “You look very nice,” the nurse says. “Thank you very much again and you do too.” “You’ve never seen me in my best clothes,” she says, “but maybe one day.” “Oh yeah,” I say, “maybe one day you and me we’ll go dancing at a doctors’ convention, okay?” “Okay,” she says. She combs my hair. “You got the part wrong I’m afraid.” “Sorry,” she says and she combs the part on the other side. I’m not supposed to do any of these things by myself just yet. Eating, yes, and answering the phone, but the doctors say nothing else and I’ll agree with that. Today it’s just cosmetic. I might just look good and as if I did everything myself, but inside I’m still not so hot. She even combs down my mustache. My professional mustache I grew to look older because in those days nobody wanted to go to young doctors, and which fifty years I’ve never shaved off once. She holds up the mirror to me and says “Nice.” I look. I look okay. Like somebody my age who’s been in a hospital for two weeks after a fairly serious heart attack, but okay. “Thank you,” I say. “Have a nice day,” she says, “and if you need anything, just ring.” “Thank you very much. You’ve been very competent and kind.” She leaves. I wait.

No one comes. Hours pass. The lady with my lunch and who later takes the tray away, but nobody else. I had to get a private room? They made me get one. “Dad,” Alba said, “between you and your medical insurance you can well afford it, and you deserve the best.” But I like the idea of talking to other patients and listening to their visitors’ conversations and jokes. Laughing and people with feet walking around. People with behinds sitting up and down. “Oh, they’ll just bother you,” Alba said, “asking you a lot of free doctor and health questions till you never get any rest,” even though I wouldn’t mind and with all the doctors coming in to see their patients, it would in fact help me to keep in touch. Finally: “It doesn’t look right,” Alba said, “a doctor should have his own room.” But she has too big a mouth. Ordering me. Ordering her mother, who’s staying with her till I get out of here and isn’t well herself. First Merry got a stroke and when I’m taking care of her at home a year after she comes out of the hospital, I get one too. But hers was much worse and left one side of her partially paralyzed and her mind a little slow and forgetful when it was always so quick and retentive before, so she’ll never recover as much as I hope to. And my sister, though with all her illnesses, she has a good excuse. And my longtime patients, though most of them have no cars and live too far away. And of course my son. What’s he doing that’s so important where he can’t visit me today and for the last week or at least call to explain why? But don’t get so excited. The doctors here won’t even let me read my medical journals for fear I’ll get too excited reading them. And there’s still plenty of time for visitors to come. Just sit here and sit tight. That same nurse from before stops in the corridor and says “How’s it going, doctor?”

“Fine, thank you. I’m feeling just fine.”

“Good.”

An hour later my phone rings.

“Dad,” Alba says, “we won’t be able to come see you today. I’m sorry.”

“That’s too bad. Anything wrong?”

“We were all set to leave with Mom when our neighbor gave Louis four of the best Garden seats for the Harlem Globetrotters game. We didn’t want to go, but the boys put up such a holler that we had to give in.”

“If you’ll be in New York, why don’t you drop your mother off here and go to your game and later come back across the bridge again to pick her up?”

“It’d be too much for everyone. All that traveling and traffic on Sunday and bridges four times, and the boys would be exhausted.”

“Then leave Louis and the boys at the Garden and you drive here with your mother and later pick them up.”

“But I’ve never seen the Globetrotters. For thirty years I’ve wanted to see them do their antics and tricky things with the ball and all and I know this will be my only chance.”

“Actually, I don’t know why I’m making a fuss. I’ve already told all of you that if you have better things to do, do them instead of coming here. Though I did want to see your mother.”

“I know. And both Mom and Louis and I want to see you. We’ll come another day. Next weekend. But next weekend you’ll be leaving there. So we’ll see you when we pick you up and drive you and Mom home.”

“Good enough. Let me speak to her please.”

“I don’t think she’s in the best of moods to talk to you right now. That’s another reason we didn’t want to bring her in. She seems very depressed. I don’t know what from. We’ve given her everything here, treated her royally. Maybe it’s not seeing you. Or the boys could be making too much noise, but she’ll be fine soon. We’re having a friend stay with her while we’re in the city. Which is also why we can’t get to the hospital. Our friend can only stay so long.”

“I understand. But there’s nothing wrong or changed with your mother’s physical health, is there?”

“No no, I’m not holding anything back. She’s the same, don’t worry — just depressed. You know how she sometimes gets. I just don’t want her to upset you, that’s why I don’t want to put her on.”

“Just let her say hello.”

“No, Dad, really. She might cry or break down.”

“Okay. Give her my love.”

“He gives you his love, Mom.”

“Give him my love back,” I hear Merry say.

“She says to give you her—”

“I heard, Alba. Thanks.”

“Then all right. We’ll see you next week. Though I’ll call lots before then and Mom will speak to you and maybe the boys. And you’re feeling much better?”

“Now that I’m out of intensive care, much.”

“Great. Bye, Dad.”

Maybe my son will come. But he really is a busy man. I shouldn’t be unfair and forget that. Much busier than I ever was and with a lot more pressures. He’s a doctor too. He’s been phoning in every day on my case my doctor here says, and the doctor says Rom really knows his stuff. When I get discharged Rom’s going to make me close my office. Only open three half-days as it is, but he’s probably right. I’ll just go to the hospital twice a week as I’ve been doing and continue my medical work there. Seeing how the people are in the geriatric wards. Taking their pulse. Mostly cheering them up and telling them they’re going to live long lives. All that new research and drugs and equipment is just too much for me to learn about now. Rom is a specialist though. Much different than me in every way. High liver. Three wives and working on a fourth. Kids from each one also, though we only see the two from the first. Money he makes tons of, but he needs it with his court settlements and office and apartment and vacations and homes here and there and cars and now a boat. He complains about me. His actual words are that I’ve money up my ass and I’ll die with it stuck up there while he never will. He should know better. About my money and that I don’t like to curse or hear the words. I have a little money put away for Merry and me and that’s all. Just enough in case I’m forced to retire not only from the office but the little I make at the hospital too. In the beginning it was mostly chickens and things and a few dollars I took in. Meat, cheeses, fight passes and cases of beer. But I don’t operate. I don’t live big. I’m a general man. I examine people, fix little things and try to prevent worse things from happening, make out prescriptions or recommend my patients to higher men. Our big luxury was the car for my house calls and hospital work and a week’s vacation in a small Connecticut beach resort twice a year. We lived sort of frugally and always will. What does he mean money up my ass? Lost a little in stocks. Sending him through schools and helping him start his practice took a big bite. And Alba all the way with her degrees and paying off her first husband and every summer her children’s summer camps. So I don’t have a lot. Some doctors don’t. Rom says I lie to him on that. I tell him I’m not. He laughs, says “Listen, I understand. No doctors likes to say how much he’s really worth. Somebody wanting a tax informer’s cut might get wind of it and then you’ve lost most of what you’ve stored up.” But he does well. Good for him. And also does teaching work. And maybe he’ll come. Or his first ex-wife. Or his oldest child who’s now old enough. Or my sister. Or my sisters-in-law and their husbands. Or my brother in New Mexico who hasn’t called or sent a card. Or someone. An ex-receptionist of mine or patient I haven’t seen in years. Who knows? Word gets around.

“Nurse,” I say. It’s night. I must have dozed off. My dinner tray is on the table next to my bed. They must have thought I wanted to sleep. “Nurse,” I say when she passes my door again.

“Yes?”

“Could you undress me and give me my bedpan and then get me into bed?”

“Certainly, Doctor. Have a nice Sunday?”

“To be honest, I was a little disappointed.”

“What happened? Nobody come and visit you?”

“No, my family’s all right. Just little things. But I’ll be okay. Thank you very much.”