A dull clattering.

December 30th, 7:28 am, 2013

“And then I wanted to see you before I left,” I exclaimed, staring at the red bundled mess on Nurse Johnson’s head, “but I ran out of time.” I wondered if she dyed her hair, or if she thought to at all, when it looked so carelessly disheveled. She was quiet, slowly picking up the fallen bottles on the floor. I couldn’t remember when I put them down. My hand stopped reaching for the nurse’s papery clothes, the silence shrouding the room, dusting over the windowsill, settling on the crumpled sheets.

When she finally spoke, she murmured in a faint voice,“You should rest now.” I picked at my cast again, looking down. Her gaze rested behind me, unfaltering, and when she left, I wanted to trade all the stars in the world for her to linger a moment more.

•••

December 29th, 11:50 pm, 2013

I was jolted awake by a dull clattering on the floor. It must’ve been the lady in the next room, I thought, the one with the heavy glasses and the book with the golden spine. I could see her sometimes, through the corridors, peering inside my room, but she never talked to me. She was always reading out of the book, and there were hardly any pictures. I don’t know what could interest her so much.

“Hello.” A wispy voice settled in the air. I glanced towards the foot of my bed, and a figure loomed in the dark. “Are you another nurse? I’ll go back to sleep now, don’t be mad.”

I heard a faint chuckle, and hesitantly asked again, “Are you here to take more tests?”, propping myself up to sit against the wall. The sheets rustle loudly when no one speaks, I’ve noticed that now. “No child, I, I suppose I’m a ghost now, aren’t I?”, he said, in a strange manner, one I had never heard before. I wanted to sound clever, so I answered, “I know ghosts. I used to hear stories about a Christmas ghost. They were very long.” I tried to think of why I had remembered that, when I couldn’t remember much else, and reached over to turn on my lamp. I had never seen a ghost before, and it seemed very impressive to.

“Child, how old are you?” I said I was eight, but next year I’ll be nine. I think. “Next year should come very soon, I think.” I smiled. He had a very soft voice, as if he was drifting away. “You remind me of my daughter.” And then, when I looked at him, he had such a forelorn and lonely gaze, that it reminded me of someone I used to know. She was a blurry figure in my mind now, and was strange to have all these thoughts, when the doctors said I wouldn’t be able to think of much after what happened with the car.

I asked him what his daughter was like, because no one had talked for some time, and it seemed nice to. He said she was very frail and beautiful, and that he although he knew her not long, he desperately wanted to visit her.

“I would visit you, if you wanted.”, I remarked, and he smiled ever so slightly.“Where is your mother dear now?” I looked at his face in the dim light, and decided that ghosts were very nice. “The get-well people said she was in the car where I got hurt and lost my thoughts. I asked when she would come back, but they keep saying the same thing.” Mr. Ghost’s smile faltered a moment, and he replied, “The get-well people?” I nodded, my hair falling in my eyes. I used my lumpy cast to brush it away. “When they come, they always say to me, ‘get well soon’, and that I would go home with them once I was.” I didn’t say that I didn’t want to go with them, because I’ve never told anyone that, and I didn’t say that I was waiting for my mother to come take me home, because I was afraid he would give me the same answer and tell me she couldn’t, not for a while. I don’t like that answer.

“Mr. Ghost, how did you pass?” He remarked that that was a good way of putting it, as passing a place, leaving it to go away. He also said his name, but I could not understand very well, so I called him Mr. D. He then asked about the Christmas ghost story, which I said I could not find in my thoughts, and explained what I could regarding the doctors.

“You have a broken mind. All the great ones do. I could tell you the story, if you’d like. I wrote it, you know.” I was astonished. How could a ghost write a story? I asked him eagerly, and when he replied, the hours ticked away so swiftly that I hardly noticed it passing at all. “Ah, but, my dear, I was not always a ghost. You see, I went away because of a train...

•••

December 30th, 12:23 pm, 2013

“...and it rendered me so very ill that I could not carry on much longer. It was an unlikely matter, befalling some one like that, and such long years have passed since then that I may have a broken mind as well.” When I finished, the child laughed with such ferocity, I had never met any who was more blest in a laugh.

I wished I could bottle it up and take it with me, a very human thing to do, to have something physical to ground me. The little creature then remarked, “You have a funny way of talking, Mr. D.” I could not help the overwhelming feeling of happiness at her peculiar humour, and expressed my desire at telling my Christmas Carol to her, at which she agreed with a vast, substantial smile.

Often she would stop me, enquiring what the more heard words meant, many of which was “apparition”, “Fezziwig”, and “Bah Humbug”. The last she took a particular interest in, repeating it in her light voice, and it was then that I decided it might not be so burdensome if I were to stay. But if I did, would I tell her the truth about what would befall her? Amongst all the others, would this girl who resembled my dear Dora accept what I say, or argue the opposite?

My wandering thoughts were interrupted by her question. “You’ve talked a long time, do you want some water?” I merely nodded. I watched as she untangled herself of the wires surrounding her, machines echoing solemnly. I watched as her fragile body reached out for an outline in the shadows, her little hand shaking in the dark.

I opened the window when she looked back, the moon brimming in the sky, her with a handful of glass bottles clinking against each other. I wondered if she could see me clearer now, with her bright eyes, still murmuring under her breath, breathing ever so softly. I stood then, and held out my hand.

“Do you want to come with me?”

She remained motionless.

“To wait for your mother?”

Droplets wet the bottles. I had never seen a girl cry so silently before.

She whispered faintly, “I want to stay.” I closed my eyes. So many others had begged for their lives when it neared its end, their voices a wail inside my head.

“Then you shall stay.” I could not bear to answer her the same.

I turned to leave then, the curtains billowing in front of me, trying to escape from their bondage. Then I felt her hand in mine.

“Would you come back, if I wanted to?” She spoke with an airy lightness, her words soaked in tears.

“I will, if you promise to stay.” I grasped her hand tighter, and lifted her up, the bottles falling to the floor with a dull clattering.

•••

December 30, 7:29 am, 2013

I picked up the bottles, one by one, while her body lay on a cold and unforgiving slab. It seemed futile to do anything, but nevertheless I persisted in my task, gathering them up in my hands, so much bigger than hers that I wondered how she managed to hold so many. I wanted to say something to break this frozen silence, being so used to her quiet little voice chattering away. When I finally opened my mouth, all I could say was, “You should rest now.” Such a meaningless thing to say.

Laying my hand on the door, I pushed it open and nearly stumbled into Mrs. Prim.

“Nurse Johnson, can I-”

Her gaze stopped behind me, on the empty bed, the mess of equipment left behind.

“You should be in your room, Mrs. Prim.” I croaked out, trying to steer her back. She shook her head rapidly, tearing splattering on her glasses, her face contorting.

“No, no, it’s not possible..” I set down the bottles by the door and took the book from her hands, for fear she might fall.

“Mrs. Prim, I’ve told you this before.” I sounded shaky, a failed attempt at trying to console her, “She’s gone.”

“I, I can’t even remember that m, my own daughter is gone, it’s my fault, and I ca, can’t even reme-”

•••

December 30th, 7:36 am, 2013

As the two collapsed into each other, a nurse with a sense of belonging with the child, and a mother who unknowingly killed her, they cried. They shed tears for what they lost, for what they had, and for what they will never have again, sitting on the cold tiled floor, and as they gasped for air through their muffled sobs, a single book fell with a dull clattering . It was a small book, with wrinkled pages and a golden spine, titled A Christmas Carol.

Time faded away so quickly then, it was hard to tell the beginning from the end.