by G. Wulfing
I cannot deny that it is truly wearying. There are times when I could weep for sheer frustration.
But it is my – our – life, now. It will always be thus. And, as Tara the psychologist has said, the difference between one’s circumstances being acceptable or intolerable is what one believes they are.
Progress was slow. The physiotherapist had given me various exercises to help rehabilitate my muscles, many of which I did on the floor while Toro-a-Ba trotted on a treadmill beside me so that he could exercise also. There were days when it felt as though my body was reluctant to live after all; it had suffered so much trauma and interference that it responded sluggishly to what was asked of it. The physiotherapist and the nurses assured me that this was entirely to be expected: the fact that I could walk without assistance did not mean that I was healed.
The day after a session in which I had attempted some new exercises designed to strengthen my back, I felt stiff. I longed to roll onto my belly and relax, relieving my back muscles of my body weight, but I had not been able to lie on my front for three and a half months. The temporary tubes and stitches were all removed; but my abdomen still felt tender and did not like to be stretched or to have more than a little pressure placed on it. The nurses had instructed me to gently stroke and massage my abdomen frequently to encourage the muscles, nerves and skin to regrow and to prevent it becoming hypersensitive to touch; but I could not bear to lie on my front. Not yet. Oh, it was all so tiresome! When would my body be my own again, to do with as I pleased?!
Never, of course.
Lying in bed, I arched my back as much as my abdomen could tolerate, and managed to inch my hands under my lower back, trying to ease it a little. Toro-a-Ba watched me. He and I were alone in the room – ‘our bedroom’.
“Is your back hurting you, Daniel?” he asked, after a moment.
“It’s sore from exercising,” I said tersely.
“If you sit up, I could massage it for you,” Toro-a-Ba offered.
I blinked at the thought of him massaging me, hesitated, then said, “No, it’s fine.”
Toro-a-Ba cocked his head slightly, quizzically. “But if you are sore, it is not fine. Shall I call a nurse to massage it?”
“No, it’s fine!” I snapped.
There was a couple of seconds of silence in the room.
Then I released a deep sigh, closed my eyes, set my teeth and swallowed. “Sorry, Toro-a-Ba.”
“I understand, Daniel,” Toro-a-Ba murmured; but I wondered if he did.
–––––––
By this time a variety of medical specialists – human and thurga – had visited us on various occasions to observe Toro-a-Ba and me. They would examine us physically, paying particular attention to the hose, or watch us as we moved around the clinic together, and would talk with Surgeons Suva-a and Fong for hours in Suva-a’s office. It was embarrassing to be examined and observed by strangers, but I had already spent so long being prodded and examined and studied that it was starting to feel commonplace. We were not horses being trotted out and appraised; we were a medical marvel, a scientific leap, something that would yield masses of data that could then be used in many different cases. Of course they wanted to study us. And of course Toro-a-Ba had known from the start that this is exactly what would happen.
In fact, I was the only person involved who had not known from the start.
I still had not been in contact with anyone from my workplace, the laboratories. My co-workers and employer there had been informed by the surgeons that I was recovering but would not be returning to work; but that was all. After more than three months, the surgery was still being kept quiet to all without the clinic, with the exception of the assortment of specialists and medical types who had visited us.
The highest officials from the Thurga Medical Society had visited us, and shortly afterwards Surgeon Suva-a told us, with some excitement, that she and Surgeon Fong were to be awarded the Society’s highest accolade for their pioneering work. On the same day, two letters from the Society arrived: one for me and the other for Toro-a-Ba.
In elegant, unflowery English prose, my letter praised me for my self-sacrifice. The letter explained that the Society understood and acknowledged that the surgery had been performed without my knowledge or consent, and that it would perforce alter my life drastically and irrevocably; and that my acceptance of this, and my refusal to request a reversal of the surgery, were evidence of extraordinary courage and grace on my part. The letter also thanked me for my unprecedented contribution to medicine and science, which was no less valuable or impressive for having been unforeseen and unintended.
I do not know how much the members of the Society knew of Toro-a-Ba’s offering me the choice of undoing the surgery, but the letter was gracious, sensitively worded, and dignified. It was written to Daniel Avari the person, not Daniel Avari the medical experiment.
The letter closed by wishing me all joy, peace and strength, and unfailing courage for the rest of my days.
I confess that there was a large lump in my throat and tears in my eyes after reading it. Finally, I had, on paper, acknowledgement of what I had suffered. Finally, I was being spoken to as a person; not a patient, not a medical experiment, but a person who had suffered much, and who had chosen to survive rather than die.
Surgeon Suva-a explained to me and Toro-a-Ba that she and Fong had written a report on what they had done, complete with photographs that they had taken of me and Toro-a-Ba, and it would be published in the Thurga Medical Society’s journal. Eventually, of course, the human media would discover the story and it was then that Toro-a-Ba’s and my privacy – and Fong’s, and Suva-a’s, and the clinic’s – might no longer be so assured. We were all, of course, under the protection of the government, but all of us were now minor celebrities, of a sort.
“Some organisations may want to interview you,” Surgeon Fong informed us. “Of course, it’s up to you both whether or not you answer any of those requests.”
She also told us that she and Suva-a, with a few others, were working on compiling a long, exhaustive report in the form of a book, with diagrams, charts, readings and photographs. After all, the data and knowledge that the clinic had collected needed to be disseminated if it was to be of use to others.
“Are you interested in being interviewed?” I asked Toro-a-Ba later.
He paused before answering, as usual.
“If I thought that any good might come of it, I would be.
“However, I think, Daniel, that you are not ready to be interviewed. I think that sometime in the future, when we are more accustomed to this life, we may be ready to be interviewed.”
I nodded slowly.
Then I sighed. The idea of becoming even mildly famous was something that I had tried to avoid thinking about. It was unavoidable, really; what the surgeons had done was unique, and they deserved attention and praise for their cleverness and skill; and, naturally, as the realisation of their work, Toro-a-Ba and I would receive attention. I dreaded the thought of renown because if my independence, and, to a large degree, my right to my own body, were gone, then at least I might have been allowed to keep some privacy. I also dreaded it because I hated the thought of becoming a curiosity, a freak, ‘that guy who had a thurga surgically attached to him’ …
I sighed again, and rubbed my eyes wearily.
“What is bothering you, Daniel?” Toro-a-Ba asked softly.
“Nothing,” I mumbled. “I agree with what you said. … I’m going to have a sleep now.” I rolled onto my side, facing away from him of course. At least I could lie on my left side now, if I was careful in how I got there. It was such a small thing to be happy about and grateful for; lying however I wished should have been a birthright, surely, but no, not for me, not now …
“Sleep well, Daniel,” Toro-a-Ba murmured.
–––––––
Following the visit of the members of the Thurga Medical Society, Toro-a-Ba and I were allowed to use Internet-c
apable devices again. The Society would release the news of our case in its own time, so there was now no longer any need for secrecy. My smartphone, which had been left in my locker at the laboratories, was returned to me, along with the rest of my effects: my pocketknife, wallet, keys, scarf, socks and shoes. I gazed at them dismally. I was relieved to see them, but also I felt strangely detached from them: they belonged to the old me, the Daniel who had been independent and had lived in a flat and worked as a laboratory technician, not the new, battered, weakened Daniel who was permanently attached to a member of another species.
The nurses had thoughtfully charged our smartphones before returning them to me and Toro-a-Ba. We thanked the nurses, and Toro-a-Ba turned his smartphone on.
I went to turn mine on, then hesitated, gazing at its blank black screen. Beside me, I heard a dozen soft pings as messages arrived that had been floating in cyberspace for three and a half months, awaiting delivery to the smartphone of Vi-i-a Toro-a Ni-Ev.
My gaze remained fixed on my phone in my hand. In a bittersweet way, I was relishing the object’s familiarity, but dreading actually using it. It reminded me so much of my old life. Did I dare read my e-mails? How many of them would be from people who had not known where I was, and had remained ignorant for days or weeks, wondering why I did not reply to their messages? What calls or text messages had I missed? Did I dare do all those old familiar things – look at my diary and see what appointments I had missed, what tasks I had failed to do, what notes to myself no longer applied …
I set the phone aside, on the bedside cabinet, fighting back tears. My old life was in that phone. And my old life was gone.
I knew that eventually I would have to turn it on, and face the aftermath of my disappearance from the world for three and a half months – more than a quarter of a year. But not yet. Not yet. It was enough of a shock just to see my old things again; I was not yet ready to use them as I had done before.
After a moment, I sensed that Toro-a-Ba had gone still and was gazing at me, reading my face. “Daniel,” he murmured.
I gulped. “Who are your messages from?” I asked gruffly.
“Mostly from friends who did not know of my surgery until they received no reply from me and contacted my family to ask after me,” he replied quietly.
I nodded. That made sense.
“Each of them then sent me another message saying that they had learned that I was undergoing difficult surgery, wishing me well, and asking me to contact them when I am recovered enough to do so,” he added.
I nodded again. Nothing like that would be on my phone, I was fairly certain. My co-workers all knew about my surgery.
“Are you going to contact them?” I asked, somewhat hoarsely, for the sake of distracting myself from my own thoughts.
“Yes, but I will send them text messages rather than calling them, and I will ask them to not call me until I say it is fine to do so.”
“Why’s that?”
Toro-a-Ba hesitated, and this time it was genuine hesitation, not his usual pause for thought. “I do not wish to disturb you.”
“You don’t have to worry about that,” I said hollowly.
Toro-a-Ba hesitated again. He knew I was lying; he knew I was unhappy; and I think he also realised that there would be no messages from friends or family on my phone; but he also knew, I suspect, that I would not admit anything to him.
“As you wish, Daniel,” he murmured.
–––––––
We were now able to do many things by ourselves, including showering. The clinic had a shower built in a corner of the bathroom, and while I was still wheelchair-bound the nurses had given me showers, lifting me onto the seat that was built into the shower, and washing whatever parts of me I could not reach. The first time, my body had given a kind of shudder at the feeling of warm water pelting onto my skin; it was such a familiar sensation, but after almost three months of not feeling it, it was a shock.
Showering by myself, without assistance, felt different, somehow.
The first time I did so, I stood still in the spray for a long moment, glad to be showering again but also, somehow, sad. I, Daniel Avari, had showered so many times over the course of my life, but this body, this changed body, had never showered itself before.
Something I had read once, long ago, who knew where or why, suddenly swam back into my head.
No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.
I washed myself carefully, taking my time as I had to with everything nowadays. I would get used to this. I would get faster at it. Eventually, it would become mundane, perhaps almost as practised and commonplace as showering without Toro-a-Ba.
Thurga-a rarely use soap, since, not wearing clothes, they need the oils in their fur to remain to keep the fur water-resistant and healthy. Toro-a-Ba splashed around in the puddles on the blue and white tiled floor near my feet, shaking himself frequently and grooming his fur with his claws. While I conditioned my hair, he jumped carefully onto the shower’s inbuilt seat, and asked me to turn the spray onto him, as he had asked the nurses when they were washing us. He soaked himself in the spray, turning this way and that, seeming to enjoy it, then shook himself, sending water flying in all directions through the bathroom. I almost laughed.
I was slowly becoming used to being naked in front of Toro-a-Ba. Being naked with him still felt different to being naked with the nurses, however; the nurses were assisting me – us – in a professional capacity; they saw naked people and dealt with bodily fluids all the time, whereas Toro-a-Ba, even though he had been training to be a nurse himself, somehow did not feel to me like a nurse; perhaps purely because he was not actively nursing me.
Toro-a-Ba had finished washing himself, and was idly playing with puddles and combing his fur with his claws as he waited for me to finish likewise. Somehow, washing myself seemed to be taking ages. Just lifting my arms above my head to do simple things like adjust the spray or shampoo my hair was done at half speed. Showering used to be such a straightforward thing … And my abdomen was starting to ache a little with the effort …
“Shall I wash your feet for you?” Toro-a-Ba offered.
“Er ––” I was a little surprised by the suggestion. “No, thank you, Toro-a-Ba. I can manage.” I needed to learn how to do it myself. – To re-learn. There was so much that I had to re-learn … The thought of still, after all these weeks of being an invalid, needing someone to wash parts of my body for me stung me, and I added ungraciously, in a terse mutter, “You’re my life-support system, not my nursemaid.”
“As you wish, Daniel,” Toro-a-Ba murmured, and I felt guilty.
That feeling, too, stung me still further. Why should I feel guilty for wanting to be independent? That was all I had ever had, and now it was gone! Why should I be made to feel bad for wanting to keep all the independence I could – for not wanting to be a burden to Toro-a-Ba more than I already was?! I crushed the washcloth in my hand.
“I don’t need you to take care of me!” I snapped, trying to explain my feelings but aware that I was probably only going to make it worse.
“Certainly,” Toro-a-Ba agreed mildly. “Please forgive me, Daniel: I did not intend any offence.”
I sighed, closing my eyes for a moment. The water continued to pelt onto my skin.
I wanted to tell him that it was fine; that his apology was accepted; but it wasn’t fine. It would never be fine. Having Toro-a-Ba always there, needing him always to take care of me because my own body could not … it wasn’t fine. It would never be fine.
But I had to live with it anyway, and I had to find a way of not taking my frustrations out on the very person who was trying to help me by allowing me to live.
In the end I sat down on the seat and carefully reached down to wash my feet and lower legs. My belly ached, and was extra tender for two days afterwards.
It would have been easier to ask Toro-a-Ba to do it.
–––
––––
On her second visit with us, the physiotherapist had suggested something simple and brilliant: I should wear a backpack to carry Toro-a-Ba.
Immediately everyone had seen the benefits of this idea. It would be a faster, less risky way of carrying Toro-a-Ba if speed or convenience were a priority. At the time, however, I had not been physically fit enough to wear a backpack, nor to perform the kneeling, crouching and bending required for Toro-a-Ba to climb into it from the floor. The physiotherapist showed me exercises to strengthen myself for these things, and, a few weeks later, when she deemed me fit enough, she brought to the clinic three different backpacks that she had borrowed for us to try. Each of them had a zipper with double sliders that ran from one side right across the top of the backpack to the other, so that the backpack could be opened wide for Toro-a-Ba to enter.
It worked beautifully. As the physiotherapist, Surgeon Fong, and the two on-duty nurses watched, I carefully put on a fully unzipped backpack, and sat down on my bed, planting my feet firmly on the floor for balance. We had decided that to start thus seated would be easiest, at least until Toro-a-Ba and I became practised at this and my physical strength returned.
Standing on the bed, at my right, Toro-a-Ba turned toward me and regarded the backpack for a moment, and I could see him trying to figure out the best way to enter it. Then, to my slight surprise, he walked around behind me, crossing to my left side. The hose now encircled us, running from my right side, behind our backs, to his left. Toro-a-Ba climbed carefully into the backpack from its left side. I leaned forward slightly to balance the weight, gripping the edge of the bed with my hands, and trying not to clench my abdominal muscles as hard as instinct was dictating. This was the first time I had borne his weight, and he seemed heavier than he looked. Peering over my left shoulder, I saw him gathering the slack hose up after himself, arranging it on his left. His little furry hands even managed to coil it, after a fashion, thanks to its flexibility. As the length of hose that was hanging loose outside the backpack shortened, Toro-a-Ba lifted it up to the top of the backpack and inside. Now, only a short length of hose remained outside the backpack, running from my right side directly into the right side of the backpack. Toro-a-Ba then reached a small furry arm outside of the backpack and pulled on a zipper slider to close it, and repeated the movement on the other side, so that he and the hose were safely partially enclosed in the backpack, and he had enough room to stick his head and shoulders out of the backpack as he wished.
