Sophia

Chapter 5: The Results

Hearing a strange noise at the door, I glance quickly to it and then back again when I don't immediately see anyone standing there. However, a few minutes later, I hear it again as I watch the evening news. It's a scraping noise, like when you drag a heavy box across the floor, but this time it is closer than it was before. Now it sounds like it is next to the bed or just below it.

At first, I dismiss it, until I hear it once more. Surely, my mind is playing tricks on me because when I cautiously look down, I don't see a single thing. Although, I do wonder what is keeping my mother.

She was supposed to go down to the cafeteria and bring her food back up so she could eat her dinner with me. Instead, it has been at least 15 minutes since she left, and my food is getting cold. I begin to think that I should go ahead and eat it. Perhaps, the doctor has cornered her and now they are talking about the test results or something like that. Who knows?

Hearing my stomach growl, I laugh just before I am forced to look up when the door slams shut violently. This time what I find there is disturbing to say the least. As I swallow hard and begin to panic, I see an extremely tall, shadowy figure lurking just in front of the door. It seems to move of its own volition slowly, towards me with every beat of my heart.

Hoping that my mother will walk in any second now, I close my eyes and then get ready to scream. I can already tell that it is next to me when I feel an eerie presence mere inches from my skin. Right before I alert the whole 2nd floor of the hospital, I hear my mother's voice.

As I open my eyes, I suddenly feel relieved to see that she is the one next to me, not an ominous shadowy figure from the dark. "It's alright Sophia. Why do you look so scared right now? You are as white as a ghost." She says softly with concern in her voice.

Leaning towards me to hug me with open arms, I accept only to realize when I look past her that the shadowy figure is still in the room. I watch it move amongst the darkness to the corner where it stays the whole time, she is hugging me. Feeling suddenly dry, I whisper, "Mom, can you please hand me the water? I'm so thirsty."

The moment she hands the white Styrofoam cup to me, the door opens again and in walks another doctor with short black hair. This time he is younger. I would say in his late 20's because he has no wrinkles, and he looks like a college student.

"Hi. I am Dr. Martin. Sophia, how are you feeling?" He asks while a fake smile spreads across his too perfect face.

When he opens his mouth again, his pearly white teeth almost blind me at first until I notice something else even more interesting about him. Glancing up to his eyes at first, I can't figure out what is wrong with his left one. It looks a little off, as if it belongs more to a doll than a human being.

Humoring me, he comments, "Oh, I see that you have noticed my eye. When I was younger, I had cancer. The doctor's saved my life by removing it." As he says it, he plucks it right out of his eye socket and begins to walk towards me with it in his hand. "This one just happens to be made of a hard plastic acrylic. Would you like to see it?" He asks with a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

"Why would anyone want to see that?" I think to myself before my stomach begins to revolt against me.

Hurriedly, I state, "No, no thank you." While holding up my hand to stop him from coming closer with it.

Backing off with a disappointed look on his face, he shrugs and then places it back in the socket before turning to walk to the sink. After washing his hands, he returns to my bedside and then asks flatly, "Do you know why you are here?"

I nod and wait for him to continue, but he seems to hesitate while reading over the paperwork he has just pulled out of his Dr.'s Jacket. When he does look back up, he has a sadness to him that tells me there is something really wrong. Opening his mouth, he relays what I already knew, "Sophia, you have a rare brain cancer called Atypical Teratoid Rhabdoid Tumor. ATRT if you don't wish to say it all again. It is a bit odd, because you are the oldest child, we have ever heard of having it. At first, we didn't know exactly what it was. However, the lab work came back, and we can safely say that is what this is."

The whole time he is speaking to me, I feel like I'm in a strange dream. It's as if I don't understand or didn't hear him right. He turns to my mother and says quietly, while lowering his eyes to the ground, "Mrs. Arnold. I am so sorry. We believe that your daughter only has a few months to live if that. Every day you have with her is a gift." After he says it, he holds out his arms in case my mother needs a hug.

She chooses to ignore it. Instead, she sniffles before stating, "I figured as much." Then she glances at me with a brave smile on her face before leaning over and kissing my forehead.

She kisses it softly, then she can no longer hold back the tears that were threatening to escape this whole time. Hearing her softly sobbing, I look up to see my mother's eyes filled with such a sadness that I have never seen before, as the tears cascade down her cheeks. When she wraps her arms around me, I melt into her body and ignore the fact that the doctor quietly walks out of the room and shuts the door behind him.

That is until I hearthat scrapping noise again and look up to see the shadowy figure directlybehind my mother.