Finding Muna: A Palestinian Novel

Chapter Forty-Eight

Mahmud's death took a toll on Lamees and every passing day seemed to be worse for her to manage than the previous ones. She spent all of her days wallowing in self-loath, cursing her fate and reminiscing the precious memories she had with her loved ones – those of them who had passed away, and one of them who avoided her like a plague disease.

April's behavior towards her worsened her condition, it would have been better if she had her friend with her at the hospital, even if it was just for a few seconds. Lamees knew she was on her last days and would soon join her beloveds in the other realm. But she didn't want to pass away in low spirits, she wanted to enjoy her last days with or without her friend.

The next day, it was almost like she was on an adrenaline dose, she got out of bed for the first time in several days, she made the bed and cleaned her ward, waited for her morning drugs and food impatiently, and once she was done, she asked to be taken out to an amusement park.

Her caretakers were amazed, they had never seen a psychiatric patient who was deteriorating at her rate get better suddenly, but they complied with her wish nevertheless, they took her to the amusement park and stayed by her side wherever she went, they had fun moments at the part, but they didn't stop monitoring her stability.

It went on like that for the next few days, she would get up early in the morning, energized and pumped up, eat and take her drugs, and then request to visit somewhere with either of her caretakers.

It wasn't until the fifth day when one of her caretakers entered her room that she spotted Lamees asleep, she narrowed her brows in confusion but thought nothing of it, she was probably just taking a sleep after all the stress she'd put her body through for the past five days. The nurse glanced at her watch and decided to come back later, Lamees still had two hours grace to take the drug so the nurse decided to allow her to rest.

But when she came back an hour and a half later and saw her in the same spot, seemingly lying the same way she left her, the nurse got very worried. She hurried to Lamees's side and took out some tools to check her vitals. The machine couldn't read anything and so the nurse tried again and again fearfully, although she could see it from Lamees's pale face that she had passed. She didn't want to believe her eyes and called her co-worker to help check up on Lamees. Only after she heard it from her co-worker's mouth did she believe Lamees was truly gone.

The situation was a shocker to her, someone who was very energetic the past few days had now been reduced to a pale, decomposing body. She didn't know when a lone tear slid out of her eye, she was quick to wipe it and left the ward to make arrangements to place Lamees's body in the morgue. She wasn't sure how to report the new occurrence to April, she had happily reported Lamees's improvements to her only a couple of days ago and it made her happy that April was ecstatic about it.

Her death might negatively affect April, and she was unsure of how to tell her the news.

The nurse quickly went ahead with the processes and only half an hour later, they moved the body to the morgue.

The nurse's mood was totally ruined throughout the day, she remembered the previous night when she was discussing with Lamees who was pestering her about going to the arcade a few blocks away from the hospital. They both made plans on the next location to visit and the morning she should have taken her to the arcade, Lamees decided to die.

She decided not to let April know to the news yet until she herself was stable enough to relay the news to another person. She couldn't count the number of times she went to the morgue to see her patient, although she had always been afraid of seeing lifeless bodies, especially at the morgue, she didn't know how and why she kept going back to see her. Perhaps it was in hopes that Lamees might open her eyes and tell her she was just pulling her legs.