The Visit: A Short Story

 Note: This is fiction based on a recent hospital visit. If you know me then you don't have to worry about my trauma.

Jane had lost her voice again.  It was becoming a habit that she could do without.
"Your family must love it," people said whenever it happened, which she thought was a bit rude. It was true that she could talk the hind legs off a donkey but her family liked that. Without her voice, they had to fill in the gaps, which they didn't enjoy.  She thought of them as her quiet periods; like Picasso had his blue or rose periods it turned her chatter into an art form. 

"If I lost my voice as often as you do then I'd lose it when I have to go and see the mother-in-law," her colleague said. 
"Then you'd have to sit and listen without defending yourself," she told him, pointing out that there was never a good time to lose your voice.  Although this was true, some times were worse than others and this was one of them.

Her mother had fallen and broken her hip.  Ringing for an ambulance was an interesting experience.  She had wondered when you would be able to contact 999 by text.  That was a week ago and Jane had been visiting every day. 
"Go!" her mother would say after about 5 minutes of sign language, "I can't understand you, anyway."
Stubbornly, she stayed, watching the staff and listening to her mother snore.

Hospitals are very different places at the weekend. This was the second day Jane had managed to get a parking space straight away.  The coffee shop in the atrium was closed and people were kicking vending machines that had swallowed their money.  Patients congregated around the doorway, unsupervised in their gowns, pushing drip stands and sharing cigarettes. Corridors that were normally bustling were deserted, as clinics closed for the bank holiday and no doctors stood on floor 1 1/2 twisting their stethoscopes while they chatted.  The smell of the antibacterial hand gel had gone stale and was mixing with the spilt coffee that had been on the floor since Friday night.

Jane pressed the buzzer to her mum's ward, named after a local village that she had never been to and prepared to wait. There was an immediate crackling sound from the intercom, giving her the signal to try the door.  It opened.  Most other days the staff greeted her with a nod but today she felt as though she were completely invisible.  Outside her mum's room there was a yellow 'cleaning in progress' sign and a nurse had just woken her mum to stick a thermometer in her ear, a clip on her finger and a blood pressure cuff around her arm.  She hung back at the door.  There was no point in attempting conversation and she didn't want to have the conversation about where her voice had gone.

Another nurse popped his head in the room in front of her.
"Can I just ask about Brian Matthews?"
"Maybe later," she replied distracted by Jane's mother's abnormally low blood pressure.
"Oh, it's just..." he began.
The nurse looked up, caught Jane's eye and swallowed a yawn. 
"Are you here to visit?"
Jane nodded.
She turned her attention back to the other nurse and said, "If you just wait a moment then I can answer your questions when we go."
Jane waved at her mother and mouthed a 'hello.'

The obs seemed to take forever but as soon as they were done the nurse swept out of the room, taking Jane by the arm as she went. Jane opened her mouth to protest but no sound came out and before she knew it she was standing in a dark side room with the two nurses. She noticed how quiet the room seemed until the female nurse took a huge breath that sucked all the oxygen from the room.
"I'm really sorry to tell you that Brian.."
She paused and looked at the other nurse her eyes searching his for the right words.
"Brian died." He decided to be blunt.
"It was all very peaceful and we were just about to call you.  Actually, did someone call you? I didn't think there was time but.."
Jane looked shocked but still she couldn't make a sound. 
"Oh, you've gone very pale.  Sit down.  We'll leave you for a moment.  I expect you will want some time to say your goodbyes."
Both nurses backed out of the door and shut her in the room.  She looked at the bed. Although he was covered with a sheet Jane could tell that Brian had been a big man.
"How did I get myself into this situation?" she wondered. "And how do I get out of it?"
Brian lay silently, being of no help, whatsoever.

She checked her handbag for paper and pens. "Maybe I could write a note, explaining everything," she thought.  All she had was a napkin and a lipstick and that would only make matters worse. It wasn't as if she had the voice to explain the mistake to the nurses, so she sat for a full quarter of an hour in a small room with the curtains closed and a dead body. She left the room, dabbing her eyes, head down and left the ward.
"Who was that?" said a nurse at the desk.
"I'm not sure," said the other, "She's been in to see Brian Matthews."
"Oh shit," said the first, "I forgot. I need to ring the relatives. If only I hadn't done that back to back shift I might remember these things."

Jane looked in the bathroom mirror, scrubbed the make up off her face and pulled her hair up into a high pony tail before returning to the ward.
"Where have you been?" her mother asked, "And what has happened to your face?"
Jane started a complicated game of charades.

Film. Play. Book. Tragedy. Death. Comedy.