"Kuneka, we had to perform emergency surgery, I went to check on him and he was coughing up blood like crazy. Turns out it was a large clot we had to remove. We had to move him to another room," Khadijah said as she shoved some fruit snacks in her mouth, "I didn't even notice you were in there."
My colleagues gave me a crazy look when I told them what had happened. If heard 'Why would you fall asleep in here?' one more time, I would've lost it.
It was an accidental catalyst of exhaustion and anticipation; so I just took a seat, I didn't have intentions on falling asleep, but I did.
I put my thumb to my chin and pushed up on my lips,"Well, if he was coughing then that means he's awake. Where is he?"
"Room 234, he's upstairs now, you've got some ways to go, K." Khadijah briefly scanned a clipboard before returning to spraying and cleaning syringes before they were sent off.
I thought to myself; hospital's have so much consistency. That's a good thing, I would think. All you heard about was needles, medicine, doctor such-and-such, nurse whatchamacallit, IV's. It was all the norm, maybe that's why the patients would always be so questionable about our treatments. I would be too, if it's all they talked about.
By now, I was already in the elevator to the 2nd floor. One of the nurses from the maternity ward stood next to me, he looked at me and I witnessed it from the corner of my eye. His eyes resting on me made me somewhat uncomfortable; and I was relieved when I left him alone when we stopped on the 2nd floor. But it wasn't just him; all the other doctors and nurses just stared at me as I made my way down the hall. Some even mumbling something to the person next to them. Did Khadijah keep something from me again?
Reaching 234, I found an escape from all the attention as soon as I entered the room.
Eric was awake, reading some book I'm pretty sure he found lying the table next to him. I knew for a fact he didn't bring any kind of reading material with him. 'The Color of Water', it was titled. He then looked up, eyes which were now golden brown from the sun invading the room. "It's the hero of the hour," he said, eyes falling back on the book.
"What do you mean?" Maybe I could find the answer to all the looks I was receiving not even 2 minutes ago.
"You woke me up from an AIDS ridden coma, whatchu mean what I mean?" He said, dog-earing the page of his book then setting it on the table beside him. It actually cracked me up a bit, the book must've caught his attention for him to be worried about saving his space.
I understood that I woke him up from a coma, a coma from newly found AIDS at that. But it was something I've never done before, so is that why people were shocked? The people staring at me; was it a good thing?
"I know, I been a bitch to you ever since I done got in here. But damn, I'm more than grateful. Ima be healthy again." Eric rambled on, smirk on his face. I knew his words were genuine, it was the first time he was ever ...decent towards me, and his facial expression sealed the deal.
I thought about sitting down, but I stayed standing, I was still tired and I didn't want last night happening all over again. "Well, we don't stop here, Mr. Wright, you're still sick, westill have a long way to go, but your progress is impeccably advanced. So maybe you won't spend much more longer in here."
"What's with all these big words?" He chuckled then added, "And you can call me Eric, or Eazy, or E. Fuck it, whatever you want."
"I'm a doctor, meaning I have to keep my vocabulary formally tight," I giggled.
"Don't do that shit with me, niggas don't know whatchu sayin'." He laughed, flashing his pearly whites.
- - -
"That's great, man," I said to Ren on the other line. He had just updated me on E's status, and he pulled through the coma.
I rested my elbows on the cement balcony rail, looking down on Nicole who painted her nails by our large pool. The sun was just about to set, painting a strawberry orange color upon the city. It had been a good day; I finished 2 tracks including the California Love remix with Tupac, and Nicole finally came back home after we had a real bad falling out almost 3 months ago.
"Yeah but, Yella and I gon' be up there tonight probably. Cube said he'll be there too, roll through if you can, Dre." His words left a satisfying feeling with me. Everything seemed as if it was falling into place.
"I'll be through there, catch you on the flip side homie." I ended the conversation and hung the phone up, resting it on the railing of the balcony. But no sooner than I placed it down, it began to ring.
Picking it up, I pressed the talk button, "This Dre." I heard music blaring from the other end of the phone, then it almost immediately ceased. "Wassup Dre, it's Suge." I took the phone from my ear for a brief second, sighing heavily in irritation. Suge was my homie, he was the mastermind behind my latest work, I owed him my life. But he had been bugging lately, I didn't know what it was. He was so uppity about shit, cryptic and whatnot.
"How you livin', man?" I began to absent mindedly pace. Before I knew it I was already back in the house.
"Good, good. I sent that track to Pac, he dig it. He said we gotta start filmin' the video asap." Suge said with enthusiasm in his voice.
"That's dope man, sound good to me. Whenever he ready, I'm down." I found myself plopping onto my white sofa in the spacious living area.
"Whatchu finna get into right now?" He asked.
"Shit, nothin'. Finma go see the homies at the hospital. My mans E, he gettin' better." I smirked at the thought of my homie back out on the streets.
"Ion'know why you fuck with them, Dre. They turned they backs against you for that white ass Jerry." Suge retorted. This is all he'd ever talk about; how NWA treated me wrong. Eazy dissed me, this that and other.
"Let that childish shit go, man. That's the past, and we prefer to keep it that way." I roughly explained with a stern tone.
"Wassup with you Dre? You done changed within the span of a month, man, I'm not feelin' it man." Suge announced.
I huffed in vexation, "Just hit my line when we gettin' ready to film the video."
I threw the phone on the couch diagnal from me, shaking my head and getting up from the sofa. I informed Nicole where I was going and left without hesitation. I couldn't help but to think that I was missing something, and Suge was trying to touch upon it. Did Eazy did more than what I had known of? What happened in the past, was that only the tip of the iceberg?
