Destined

Day Twenty-Six through Twenty-Eight

"911 what's your emergency?" 

I hate that line 'whats your emergency'. It makes me sound like some kind of psyche patient that's gone a little off the deep end and is now crying for police assistance when none is needed. And I know that's it's supposed to be polite and everything, but when I'm crouched over the toilet, too weak to stand and too in pain to move even an inch, then had to crawl across my floor slowly and painfully to reach my cell phone, I don't want my operator to do 'polite' and make me feel crazy. Quite honestly, when I feel this bad what I want is to damn life and damn my pact with Godric and damn anyone and anything I can think of, take razor blade to my wrist, and wallow in self-pity. 

I knew the cancer would spread-and had been spreading-to the rest of my body. I knew that it would invade my other organ systems and taint them the same way it had done to my blood. What I never counted on was how quickly it would be. I never counted on the level of pain that I'd experience. And I certainly never counted on the fact that when my doctor had said at most six months to live if your lucky, hadn't actually been a joke. From the moment I'd woken up in tears, the pain in my stomach pulsating and radiating through every facet of my being, I'd known that I was dying. 

You never realize that there's a difference between knowing you're dying and knowing you're dying until the Grim Reaper is staring you in the face, scythe in hand, and inky cloak billowing in nonexistent wind. However, the nausea had overridden the pain in my stomach and driven me from bed where I'd promptly collapsed onto the floor, too weak to stand. Carefully, I'd pulled myself to my feet and stumbled to the bathroom on shaking limbs before landing heavily on a heap in front of the toilet where I'd puked again and again and again, each and every time depositing crimson liquid into the water. I was shivering and sweating while my muscles felt achy and foreign. I couldn't feel anything but tingling in my extremities and the pain in my body had become so potent that tears spilled down my cheeks. That was when I'd realized that I needed my cell phone; I'd risen to my feet only to fall again and proceeded to collapse to the ground with a grunt of pain. This had led to me painfully using my nail to propel me in a crawl across the floor to reach my cell phone, which thankfully had 911 on speed dial since I don't think I would have been able to dial the numbers with my shaking fingers, which brings me to this. 

Instead of going with the atypical, strangled out of my throat answer of 'I'm dying' as 'my emergency', I go ahead and say what's technically wrong with me. "I've been throwing up blood for the last forty-five minutes, have a stabbing pain in my stomach that radiates up through my body. My whole body is shaking, my fingers are numb, and I can't stand on me feet. I have shivers and cold sweats. Oh...I also was diagnosed a few weeks ago with terminal leukemia." 

Anubis comes over and nuzzles his head up against my arm, lying beside me comfortingly while Mufasa perches on the couch and meows at me mournfully like 'I'm going to miss you when you're dead'. Thanks for the assessment, Mufasa; I love you too. The operator pauses, obviously unsure of what to say in response to that. It's a wonder anyone gets to the hospital in time. I don't know if she's shocked about my mile long list of symptoms or that I listed them the way I did, but, regardless, you'd think a 911 operator would be a little more snappy with the feedback. I'm not going to die any slower just because an ambulance arrives, but someone else might. 

Finally, she seems to remember her one time night course training and says, "Ok ma'am, keep calm, an ambulance will be on the way...where is you location?" 

I rattle off my address before slumping against the floor to wait for the ambulance. I'm actually pretty impressed with how quickly they get there, but I'm considerably less impressed when they knock on the front door. I call out that I can't move, and moments later they're in the house and moving quickly to crouch over me. Satisfied, I suppose, that I've been found by the proper authorities, I ignore their shouts for me to stay with them and blissfully lapse into unconsciousness.