Free The Sweet by and By by Todd Johnson Page A

star means to check dietary notes before allowing them to eat anything other than prescribed meals. Mama said she had once seen a new aide sit watching reruns of game shows while a newly di- agnosed diabetic man helped himself to a bag of bite-size Snickers bars that somebody had brought in. The teddy bear, if I remember cor- rectly, means that the patient isn’t ambulatory, often she can’t get out of bed. And I definitely remember the rainbow because it showed up in at least one or two new places every time I came here. It is the code for a patient who has signs of senility or outright dementia. Mama said most of her coworkers didn’t look forward to dealing with “the rain- bows,” but she didn’t mind. She said it was harder on her nerves some days, but she wanted to think that she could help make up for some of the psychological health they might be lacking by making sure they were physically comfortable in any way she could and that the estab- lishment allowed. More than a few times, I suspect she offered help in the form of things the establishment did not allow if she felt strongly enough about what kind of help was needed.
    I was three-quarters of the way down B Hall when I heard Mama’s voice. “Mathilda, are you out there? I need some help please.”
    I laughed. I knew enough stories to know that Mama didn’t care for Mathilda. She called her “Mean-tilda.” “Mean ’til da end of time” were her words.
    “Sorry to disappoint you,” I answered her. “I thought you’d be ready to go.” I had started speaking while in the hall and turned into the doorway only to stop dead still. Mama was standing by a bed with an elderly white woman lying in it, or rather, sprawled awkwardly on top of it. The covers were pulled back and the woman’s pajamas and underwear had been pulled down to her ankles. She was com- pletely naked, gray f lesh hanging on knives of bone that were her ribs and hips. Mama was wiping her with what had been a white cloth, now covered in near-liquid brown shit, as were the rubber gloves Mama wore. The stench hit me like a towering wall falling apart, I felt immediately nauseous. Instinctively, I turned away and saw that the sheets piled at the bottom of the bed were also stained all over with dark splotches of diarrhea.
    Mama spotted me and did not say hello. “Honey, pull that cur- tain. Mrs. Clayton had an emergency.” I was frozen in disgust. “Go on now. Pull it and wait for me in the hall,” Mama instructed, sensitive but undeterred. I felt myself gag as I pulled the curtain around the woman’s bed. Walking to the door, I heard Mama’s la- bored moan. No more than a few seconds elapsed, and she grunted again. Instead of racing into the hallway, or even back to the car in the parking lot, I couldn’t move, thinking something might be wrong. “Mama?” I meekly asked and took steps back toward the bed. I pulled the curtain back only slightly and saw Mama bending over the prostrate woman, using her full weight to try to raise the woman up far enough to pull off the soiled bottom sheet and replace what looked like a square thick pad underneath it. Mama, sweating glass beads on her forehead, succeeded in rolling the patient onto her side, at which time the woman’s eyes landed on me. At f irst it occurred to me that she had died until I saw her face, leaking more humiliation than I thought possible for a person to feel, outside of being beaten or raped. I was sure she would speak. I prayed she would not speak.
    I shouldn’t be here, watching her, I thought. No one should watch this. I wanted to be invisible, but there was also a curious part of me that wanted to hear what she would say. Would she yell at me, rightly so, for intruding on her privacy? Would she cry out in pain, because even though my mother was strong and doing the best she could, it could not have been comfortable to be wielded and maneuvered like a side of beef ? Maybe the woman would curtly tell me to help,