The tiled walls around me are shining as the morning sunray entered through the glass panes. The janitor is at work, supervising the cleaning, mopping and dusting. The typical hospital smell of disinfectant is in the air. Two nurses changed the bed sheets on me. Their focused work indicated that some VIP patient is coming.
I came to know that this is the most expensive single room in the hospital,and with the most comfortable bed (that’s me).Only rich can afford this. It made me rather puffed up with delight that only the rich give me company.
I have been lucky that all patients who were with me got cured and went home. Patients who came here gave rest to their nerves for two to three days, got themselves checked and went away.
But today who is coming?
From the conversation of the nurses, I could know, a famous cine star had developed some health problem.
I have resigned to fate. I have to be with patients. After all I am a hospital bed. There have been very young patients and old ones too. Which made it clean that man continues in pain through out life. I have heard he is the best creation of God.
The VIP arrived at 9am on a wheel chair, accompanied by nurses, doctors and his wife. He was transferred to my back with concern. I felt his weight. He is a well-built man.
I got sad, looking at the gloomy face of his wife.
At 10 am, the cine star was taken to be city scanned. I could gather, many other tests were done on him.
At one o’clock he was brought back to me. Wires were all over his body. They were connected to the monitor which did continuous measurements of his parameters such as heart rate and rhythm, respiratory rate, blood pressure and many other things. I heard something new. Critically ill.
By evening, he had developed cough. I felt the pain of his coughing. I prayed for his recovery.
7pm, the doctors came.They put an oxygen mask on his mouth and I saw tears dropping from the eyes of the wife. Hopelessness visible on each face there.
9 pm, the doctors visited again. Their eyes were glued to the monitor. The patient just took one, two three hiccups and collapsed. The wailing of the wife wrenched all hearts there. When he collapsed on my back, I could obviously feel the heavy and lifeless weight on my back.
Oh, God, why do you punish man like this, I wondered.
This incident has been my first in many years. Oh, God, I beg you. Never do this again on my bed. It’s very painful to watch. When the family came to take the body to their home, the hospital staffs couldn’t hold their tears.
Tonight I get the awkward feeling that, we inanimate objects, are in some ways, better off than man. This pain of sickness and the torture of death is just unbearable.
