The Big Red Button

The care staff carefully turned her onto her right hand side. Slowly and with great care, they hoisted her upwards, propping her upright against the giant stack of pillows that dwarfed her already shrunken size, making her look like a small mouse peeping out from a white fleecy cocoon.

The smaller of the two, the one with the pretty smile and West of Ireland accent, put the big red button into the palm of her hand, and closing over her fist smiled and said, “Now if anything happens Mary, just press that button.” 

“Cad é sin?”

The young girl laughed. “Press the bell if you need anything Mary!”

She sighed, rolled her eyes to heaven and laughed, “Sure wasn’t I looking after myself long before you were born girleen.” And with that, the two carers dimmed the lights and walked out of the room, quietly closing the big grey, solid wood door behind them.

All alone.

“I’m always on my own,” she cried in a hoarse and broken voice. A once commanding now dried out and dispirited voice, uttered through cracked, split lips. “No-one ever talks to me,” she whispered, “I’m always on my own.”

Her eyes.

Those large, grey eyes, once so positive and jovial, now filled with endless sadness and disappointment.

“I love you.”

“Ok.”

A look of love once mirrored had been met with a blank and apathetic gaze.

She turned the big red button over and back, over and back. A big red button in a big black plastic circle. Over and back, over and back. “I wonder what that’s for now?”, she sighed.

Then she put it down on the blue ribbed bedspread. A blanket they called it. “Sure God love them,” she sighed, “they haven’t a clue.”

She looked at the window. It was dark now. No curtains but still she couldn’t see out. As dim as the light was, it was reflecting back on the glass, preventing her from seeing the trees outside swaying in the warm June night breeze.

All alone.

“Sit down there and talk to me.”

“I can’t, I have to do this.”

“Sit down there and rest yourself. Suigh síos agus lig do scíth. You know what that means don’t you?”

Mrs. Morrissey. 

“Trasna na dtonnta, dul siar, dul siar, … “

Mary Caoimh.

Miss O’Keeffe.

All alone.

She felt tired. 

Táim an-tuirseach.

Eyes heavy.

Her father stood at the end of the bed. Sleeves rolled up, he looked at her in silence.

There was a silent recognition. They both knew. Nothing needed to be said.

“I love you.”

“Ok.”

She had been gasping for breath. 

The nurses had put a long tube down her throat. It had hurt.

Oh the pain.

And she couldn’t breathe.

She was suffocating.

Air.

Tired.

Tuirseach.

The light was fading. It was getting dark. Dark with light around the edges.

There was pain but it was muffled pain. Confused pain. She couldn’t quite make it out.

“I’ve loved you since you were a little small thing, jumping around with your curls bouncing up and down.”

She wasn’t there. She was never there. Not any more. All alone. Not like before.

“Hail Mary”

Child of Mary.

Legion of Mary.

Mother of God.

I miss my mother.

All alone.

She was crying. She didn’t know why.

She cried out. But no-one came.

Was she afraid or was she confused or was it the pain?

She didn’t know.

She felt a jolt like a bolt of lightening rushing through her and then everything jammed.

Like a machine cranking to a halt.

Silence.

“Oh Sacred Heart of Jesus I place all my trust in Thee.”

The ceiling was covered in dark shadows.

The darkness moved closer.

The light around its edges got wider, spreading outwards.

All alone.

“Alone all alone by the wave-washed strand.”

Water.

River.

“My own lovely Lee.”

“I want to go home.”

The night nurse walked quietly into the room. She looked at Mary’s distorted face and then down at the call bell by her hand.

“Why didn’t she press the bell?”, she sighed before turning to page the doctor on call.

Once again … all alone.