Chapter 10
“Death Pellets”
As the first rays of light trickled into the room, Norman noticed the fabric of his sheets glowing. He had spent most of the night trying to sleep, but his aching bones kept him awake. Now that morning had finally come, he had no choice but to push his covers off his face. As he stared at the cold white ceiling diffusing the sunlight, his vision blurred in and out of focus. Deciding not to wait for his vision to figure out what it wanted to do, he pulled himself up from his pillow to greet the day as if he had actually wanted to see it. As he rose, he felt the creeping ache in his back. The nurse had given him some pills the night before to relax him, but they clearly didn’t last. Now that the tension in his body had returned, he pushed the rest of his sheets away and turned to put his feet on the floor. It felt cold on his toes. He reached over to the nightstand beside his bed and grabbed for his bifocals. They weren’t the best pair he’d ever had, but they were sufficient. After donning them, the room became clearer. The walls sharpened, the door developed contour, and he could finally see the card on the nightstand sitting next to the lamp. The card was white with colorful balloons etched in the face. He opened the greeting to get a better look. Inside, his grandchildren had left him a note congratulating him on his one hundredth birthday. He wanted to feel happy about their best wishes, but he set the card down and sighed. After a moment of letting out a trailing breath, some birds chirped from outside the window. He looked through the opening to see a family of blue jays perched on a tree branch. Beyond the tree, he saw a small graveyard resting silently under a shade. He sighed again.
Norman lay down and pulled the sheet up to his chin. Memories of a room he had some time ago that overlooked the park temporary entered his mind. The room smelled like urine, but the sun was brighter there. This room smelled like urine, too, but he could never see the blue sky past the leaf canopy covering the ancient oak tree outside. He hated his view. The squirrels never let him feed them when he had food. No one ever had a picnic under the tree when he was looking. The birds would rarely shut up—always chirping, never taking a rest until the rain or the dark set in. The only person he ever saw outside that window was the old gray-bearded groundskeeper who mowed the lawn in the graveyard. And he never stopped his lawn-mowing to say hello. The man would just cut the grass and then disappear. Norman had lived for a hundred years, and this was his life’s pinnacle.
“Time for your pills, Mister Jenson,” said a voice in the doorway.
Norman glanced at the door to see a middle-aged nurse pushing it open. She held a shiny metal tray in her hands. On the tray, she was carrying a glass of water, a sandwich, a small bottle, and an enema pack. Another four-course meal. The nurse clacked her high heels against the wooden floor as she trekked across the room.
“Get away from me, you tart,” he said, as he stretched his hands to block her advance. He looked ridiculous with his fingers turning crooked like two sets of claws, and he knew it, but he still wanted to make his point. “Haven’t you put enough of your death pellets in me already?”
“Sir, these ‘death pellets’ will make you feel better. Open up.”
The nurse set the tray down and removed a white pill from the bottle. She tried to stick the pill into Norman’s mouth while making a chugging sound, but he kept a tight lock on his closed mouth.
“Come on, Mister Jenson. “We can do this the easy way, and the easy way is the painless way.”
She picked up the enema pack and dangled it before him.
“Or we can do this the hard way,” she continued, “and the hard way is not the fun way.”
Norman folded his arms over his chest and faced the other direction. Not fun for whom? he thought. He was certain this annoyingly sweet little tyrant in stockings had plenty of fun doing things the hard way.
“So would you please open your mouth and make this pleasurable for both of us?”
He stared at her.
“Why do you—?”
The nurse shoved the pill in his mouth. She quickly reached for the glass of water while she propped his jaw open with her other hand between his teeth and poured the water in. As the water splashed around inside, she removed her fingers from his mouth and clamped his lips shut. Then she smiled at him as she waited for him to swallow. Norman wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. He held the water for a few seconds as he stared at her. When the nurse dared to remove her hand, Norman spewed the water and the pill onto her blouse.
“Mister Jenson,” she said, “that was not very nice.”
“Then go mess with someone nicer, missy.”
The nurse turned on her heels and walked out the door. She returned a couple of moments later with a hefty nurse by her side. The big nurse, a giant toad of a woman that the others referred to as Nurse Bullard, did not look amused.
“Stop fighting us, Mister Jenson,” said Nurse Bullard. “You know we can make you do things our way.”
Norman hugged his arms and legs together as Nurse Bullard stomped toward him, shaking the floor as she walked. She frowned as traces of drool leaked from the corners of her lips. Her voice had the cadence of an angry man bent on slaughter. Norman scampered up to his pillow and tried to push himself through the wall to avoid whatever terrors she possessed within her. The nurse reached for the bottle of pills and the enema pack on the tray. Norman decided he was going to make a break for it. He tried to open the window as fast as he could and scream for anyone to come save him, but he was too weak to win the race. He screamed anyway.
Cards in the Cloak Page 17
