Fever

Beep….Beep….Beep….

This was what my life sounded like orchestrated through a machine; the pulsating of my heart converted mechanically and unemotionally through wires and displayed on a monitor as a green moving graph.

Beep….Beep….Beep…

A steady repetition.  A pixilated illustration of blood pumping in a circuit throughout my body.  It was strange to see this for myself, as if I were so close to death that every heartbeat needed to be tracked and recorded and emphasized with a little artificial sound.  Maybe I couldn’t see it completely – they had turned the monitor away from my bedside – but I knew it was there.

Beep….Beep….Beep….

I had known I was sick, but this really put it in perspective.  I would like to see someone call me a hypochondriac now. 

Beep….Beep…. ….Beep….

Was it my imagination?...Did my heart skip?  Was there a missing beep, or was I going crazy?

Beep…. ….Beep…. …. ….Beep….

I could almost feel it giving out.  The thing keeping alive and in this world was losing its strength.  Could it be the end already?

Beep.... …. ….Beep….

I wasn’t scared really, just curious.  What would the afterlife be like?  I looked at it as a kind of science experiment. 

Beep…. …. …. ….Beeeeeeeee

I pictured the graph flattening out.  There would be a single neon green line shooting across the screen.  Suddenly I was afraid.  This really was the end.  It was so strange, even though it felt as though my heart was going to pump out of my chest, the monitor showed no activity.  I laid my head back and prepared myself.

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

How long could one person go without a working heart?  Maybe it would take a couple minutes….I began to sweat and my mouth felt dry…

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

The constant high pitched tone of the machine was enough to drive anyone from sanity, but it didn’t bother me because it was the last thing I would ever hear….So why was I still hearing it?  Why was I hearing anything?  Nurses sprinted into the room, crash cart careening around the corner, through the door, and shot across the floor towards me. 

And suddenly it hit me: I didn’t want to die!  I was so young!  I had so much more to do!  This couldn’t be the end!  I was only in my fifties; how could I have no more time left?  I didn’t smoke or drink heavily and I ate mostly healthy foods and got plenty of exercise….How could this happen to me?  I knew any moment I would lose my vision.  My heart had been stopped now for several minutes.  Any second now….Any second….eeeeeeeeee….Any time….eeeeeeeee….Any moment….

I heard another beeping sound and then someone said “clear” and there was a loud thump somewhere nearby.  Then it happened again, and again.  I couldn’t feel anything.  Was I not supposed to feel it?  Could they not revive me?  Was I too far gone already?

Beep….Beep….Beep….

I felt life rush back into me.  My heart started to beat frantically again and I was suddenly aware of everything around me.

The nurses were wheeling the crash cart away and wiping sweat from their foreheads.  I moved my fingers and then my arms and then wiggled my toes.  I heard the beeping and pictured the neon green line forming back into the many repeating mountains and hills of the mechanical representation of my enduring life.  I had looked over the edge and come back.  I had seen the end and been pulled away.

Two nurses walked beside a cart as they returned it to its closet down the hall.

“That’s enough action for me today,” said one nurse.

“Tell me about it.  If he tries to die on us again after having been here so long I may have a panic attack,” said the second. “You’ll be using that cart on me.”

“Don’t leave me alone during one of those scares!  I couldn’t handle it.”

“Speaking of….Did you see the new guy in bed seven?”

“Right next to Mr. Phillips?  Oh yes, I saw him.”

“I thought he was going to start convulsing!”

“Didn’t he check himself in last night?”

“Yep.”

“What for?”

“A fever…”

“Are you serious?  A fever?”

“I am.  We couldn’t turn him down, though, could we?  He looked so frightened, it was kind of adorable.”

“I guess sometimes you just gotta humor those hypochondriacs.”