Kleinzeit

Nothing Out of the Way

Walking like the winter sunlight but without a cane, Kleinzeit visited the other end of the ward. No drugs for five days now, and he felt simplified, economical, stripped-down and running on the cheapest possible fuel., His vision seemed plain and dull, lacking in colour. Everything looked smaller, sharper, shabbier. Astonishing how much paint was flaking off how many things. The chairs looked more secondhand than usual. The daylight in the ward seemed as if dispensed on a National Health prescription, slowly and with a numbered ticket, to the beds patiently queued up for it. The distant horn sounded as in the Beethoven overture, then a mild flash, A to B. Oh yes, said Kleinzeit. Everything is in good order now. We have laboured diligently and’ we are back where we started from.

Like Orpheus, said Hospital.

Yes indeed, said Kleinzeit. Orpheus on the National Health. A thrilling story, I’m surprised the B.B.C. haven’t serialized it. Maybe Napalm Industries will film it. With Maximus Jock and Immensa Pudenda.

Your sarcasm is inappropriate, said Hospital.

So is everything else, said Kleinzeit, nodding hello as he passed one by one his sometime comrades. Nobody new gone. He sat down in the second-hand chair by Redbeard’s second-hand bed. Redbeard looked like an abandoned car.

‘Well,’ said Kleinzeit.

‘That’s it,’ said Redbeard. ‘Well. You are and I’m not. The well can’t talk to the sick.’

‘But I’m not well,’ said Kleinzeit. ‘I feel the same as when I came to hospital.’

‘That’s more than most of us can say,’ said Redbeard. You’re one of the lucky ones.’

‘I suppose I am.’

‘And you’ll be leaving.’

‘I suppose I shall be.’

‘There you are,’ said Redbeard. ‘Make the most of it.’

‘I suppose I must,’ said Kleinzeit. He walked slowly back to his bed, got there as Dr Pink arrived on his round with Fleshky, Potluck, and Krishna. All of them looked at him fondly, as an engine-driver might look at an engine that was being retired from service.

Pink examined him in a good-humoured way, clapped him on the shoulder when he had done. ‘Well, old chap,’ he said, ‘that’s it. We shan’t keep you much longer. You can go home at the end of the week.’

Should I tell him, Kleinzeit wondered. ‘That pain from A to B’, he said. ‘It’s back.’

‘Oh yes,’ said Dr Pink. ‘That’s to be expected, it’s nothing out of the way really. You’ll get that from time to time, but I shouldn’t worry about it. That’s just hypotenuse, you know, complaining a bit as we all do now and again.’

Well, that’s that, thought Kleinzeit. I’m not going to ask any more questions, I don’t want to know any more than I know now. ‘Thank you for everything,’ he said.

‘All the best,’ said Dr Pink. ‘Come in and let me have a look at you in six months’ time.’

‘Thank you,’ said Kleinzeit to Drs Fleshky, Potluck and Krishna. They all smiled broadly, seemed with their faces to say Thank you, like friendly waiters. But Kleinzeit felt as if he were the one who might be tipped.