Inheritance (Book 1 of Wakwak Chronicles)

Reflections

Life is a terrible disease – cured only by death.

Hai Gaon, Musar Haskel

Community Hospital

Agatha May, an eighty-five year old widow, sitting on her raised hospital bed, oblivious of her health. Her eyes stare blankly out the window; she wants to go home. The door opens and her doctor comes in.

"So doctor, give it to me straight, how long do I have?" asks Agatha, with a blunt tone.

Dr. Artemis Young tries to find his words carefully as he is caught off guard with her tone.

"Well..." stammering, he walks slowly towards Agatha.

Now at her bedside he pauses in front of her, facing her. He poses as if to smell the air, his face lit up and he wears a light smile, like someone getting a high of smelling the flowers.

Ah, that sweet obnoxious smell how I love the smell of the dying in the morning. "I'd like to do more tests on you."

He is breathing the air again but this time, well not the air, her essence, her life force, draining her of energy, her light energy. She begins to feel weak.

"Just out with it doctor, am I going to die?"

"Well, Miss May," Doctor Young gaily replies, "we, you and I are all headed down that road someday and some sooner. And I'd like you to be here for awhile for... observation."

"I know I am dying doctor, I can feel it already, and I do not want to die here, I want to die at home, where Leigh died... in bed." Agatha pleads, and cries.

Doctor Young moves beside her, he holds her hand and sits on the edge of the bed, comforting her, all the while he continues to draw out her life force.

"I don't think we can do that, we still need to look at what is wrong with you Miss May."

"Mrs. May." She corrects Doctor Young, "Well is there anything wrong with me? Besides, old age," she continues with a defiant tone.

"Everything turned out to be normal, but..."

"Normal, the results says normal, and what am I doing here anyway?"

"We could not figure out why your blood pressure is low and as you have told me you are still feeling weak..."

"Listen sonny, it's pretty normal for an old hag like me to have low pressure or high, it's called dying."

Doctor Young could not find his words and was silent.

"Well now, if you cannot find anything wrong with me, I would like to leave now."

"Alright Mrs. May, I'll make the arrangements." I can't find enough reason to let her stay, all her stats are normal. That would be too obvious or might alert some people. You can't be too careful these days, he thought. Why do I get some nagging sensation that someone saw me that night? Dr. Artemis Young is forced to release her.

Artemis Young, was born in the US his grandparents were from the Philippines, basically a mixed race person. His grandparents immigrated to the US after the Second World War, back then most of the Traditional Chinese were not allowed to marry or inter-marry with that of the other races at least that was what he was told. His grandfather was being ostracized silently by his relatives for marrying his grandmother who was of Malay descent.

After his shift ends, he sits at his office, and ponders on why he became a doctor. He stares at the large framed poster of the Hippocratic Oath.

Is this still all worth it? What have I become? Have I become death? Surely Nana would not approve of this. After all these years I still have not even scratched my goal. There has to be some sort of logical explanation of what I have turned into.