Draftee

Sorry guys! I was about to write this entry when I got called away. I did not think the title was actually public yet. Here is the entry..

She was wearing the uniform of an army she never wanted to join. Blue and white cotton that tied around the back of her neck and hung loosely down her body. The hospital johnny marked her as the newest draftee in the never ending war on disease, and she was the latest casualty.

She was weak now, weaker even than yesterday when she had been admitted to the hospital – and frightened. It had all seemed so minor at first: the fatigue could have been from overwork at her new job, the muscle weakness from exhaustion after a sleepless night, the difficulty focusing her eyes just a byproduct of…what? She had run out of excuses then, and seen her doctor, and he had her admitted immediately.

The tests had been the worst part of it all. The technicians were all nice and cheerful when they had greeted her, but became a bit withdrawn and more ‘professionally detached’ as each test progressed. It seemed like as the test started she was the same as the technicians, one of the general population, but as the tests neared completion and the strange results became apparent, they  realized she was now somehow different, no longer one of them; she had been marked by her illness as the newest draftee in mankind’s oldest war. They could see something was wrong, but wouldn’t tell her what it was.

The nerve conduction test was the worst of all. Needles inserted into various muscles and electric current passed from one to the other like some kind of bizarre torture test. The technician conducting that test had started out as friendly and chatty, but soon would not meet her eyes, or even smile at her.  No one would say anything specific, everything was kept vague. She understood that – only the doctor could make a diagnosis from the results. Only the doctor could explain her fate, but the waiting was hell. The tension built up by the minute until she seemed ready to burst with sorrow or panic or sheer dread – some combination of every fearful emotion she had ever experienced.

It was the young one they had picked to tell her, the one just finished with his training. He came in with a serious look, and she lost control and started to cry before he even said a word. Amazingly, he wasn’t surprised. He pulled out  a few tissues from the box on her bedside table and patted her cheeks dry. He placed a warm hand on her shoulder and looked right at her. His eyes were dark blue and very kind. Somehow just the pressure of his hand on her shoulder was a comfort, the first real human touch she had felt since she had been admitted.

"It’s bad isn’t it?"

He sat on the edge of her bed to bring his eyes down to her level, then looked deep into her. He seemed somehow satisfied with what he saw. "Its not good news," he said, "your life is going to change."

She cried again and he wiped away more tears. She was afraid to ask but she knew she had to. "What is it?"