Excerpt from Thea's Novel!

OK, readers, here is the promised excerpt from my novel, Belabored. The setup is, my protagonist, Tanya Ritter, has completed a research paper and debate project, similar to Haverford High School's senior project from days gone by. Suffice it to say, the presentation did not go well. She was grilled mercilessly by the teacher and fellow students about her position on her topic, "selective reduction," a form of abortion which sometimes comes into play when a pregnancy involves more than one baby. Physicians often suggest this "procedure" when fertility treatments result in high risk multiple pregnancies (twins or higher). Selected fetuses are "reduced" in utero by injecting a lethal drug into their hearts, leaving their corpses to rot alongside their more fortunate siblings, who continue developing in the womb.

Tanya, still reeling from her public humiliation, next has to listen to her classmates debate the subject of physician assisted suicide. This chapter is her reaction to their presentation.

“Blessed is the servant who loves his brother as much when he is sick and useless as when he is well and can be of service to him.” – Francis  of Assisi

“Of all the arguments against voluntary euthanasia, the most influential is the 'slippery slope': once we allow doctors to kill patients, we will not be able to limit the killing to those who want to die.” – Peter Singer

            As if I weren’t upset enough after my own debate debacle, the next one gave me nightmares. Literally.

            Carl Zeppo and Zara Patel presented Monday on physician assisted suicide, and let me tell you, Dr. Chase didn’t grill them the way he did Sophia and me. He just let them make their points, everybody asked their stupid questions, and he moved on. But, oh man, did it bring stuff up for me.

            Suddenly I was back in my grandparents’ room – the one at the top of the stairs that I sleep in now. When I got too big to squeeze into their double bed between them, they invited me to set up my sleeping bag and camp out on their rug whenever I wanted. Mom was fine with it as long as I got to sleep on time, and Grandma and Granddad always turned off their TV the minute I crept into their room. I remember thinking that I wouldn’t want to turn off a show in the middle, but if it bothered them, they never showed it.

            While Zara gave her side of the debate, my mind switched gears and I could hear the hum of the oxygen machine and smell the disinfectant. Both my grandparents got pretty sick in their later years, ending up on hospice with visiting nurses, that kind of thing. Both were unconscious at the end, which was really sad, except Mom said they could probably still hear us, so we whispered in their ears about seeing them in heaven, and prayed they had accepted Jesus into their hearts so that would actually be the case. At the time, I bought everything Mom said about such things, but now I’m not so sure.

            The reason the debate reminded me of all this was because a big part of the discussion focused on physician assisted suicide being a “humane” alternative for the sick and elderly. “Death with dignity,” they call it, as opposed to the messiness and inconvenience (not to mention expense) of having to be taken care of. Apparently, a number of states have legalized patients’ rights to choose the time of their own death, and doctors are supposed to help by supplying some sort of lethal injection. So much for the Hippocratic Oath.  According to Zara, who argued the con side, sometimes there’s a big push from family members and society in general for such people to hurry up and die so the rest of us can get on with our lives.

            When she said that, I felt the breakfast burrito I consumed two hours earlier rise up in my throat. I willed myself to keep it down by recalling the last time I saw Grandma alive.

            “Read to me, Tiny Tanya,” she urged. That was her affectionate name for me as long as I could remember, and she’d no doubt disregard my protruding gut and still call me that today. Her cancer-ridden body made it impossible for her to get out of bed. Macular degeneration and cataracts had done their worst, and she could barely see.

            “OK, Grandma,” I replied, settling myself in the chair by her bed. I opened my backpack and pulled out the novel which had been assigned to my fourth grade class. “This is great! I can get my homework done and still hang out with you!” 

            Looking back, I remember the plot bored even me and probably sent Grandma more quickly into her pre-death coma. But if she found the book lackluster, she never let on.

            “Oh, Sweetheart, you are just what the doctor ordered!” she beamed, squeezing my hand. “How did you get to be such a good reader?”

            Evidently, she hadn’t picked up on my mispronunciations and the skipped sentences my teacher was always calling me on. To her, I was Meryl Streep doing Shakespeare.

            Two years later was like a bad rerun. This time it was Granddad who was dying, and Mom was again muddling through with the help of hospice nurses and home health aides. But they were all home sleeping when Mom could’ve used their help that November night at 2 AM.

            I woke to hear Granddad sounding agitated, insisting on going to the bathroom by himself. He wasn’t strong enough to get out of bed on his own, but he what he lacked in physical strength he made up for in sheer will.

            “Shhh, Dad, you’ll wake Tanya,” I heard Mom cajoling as I made my way to the doorway of his room. By that point, she was fumbling to get his 200 pound frame onto the bedside commode. Even at age 12, I realized this wouldn’t end well. I instinctively stepped in to take some of the load. Mom flashed me a smile that warmed the dark room like sunshine, and said she’d never been prouder of me.

            After that, I kind of became her right arm. I mean, I still went to school and everything, but when I came home, I would ask Mom what I could do to help. She showed me how to change his adult diapers when he got too weak for the commode, and together we would roll him from side to side so we could fasten the strips of tape on the sides. I won’t say it was pleasant, and I know it made Granddad feel weird, but in a strange way, I think he felt good that we cared enough to do something like that for him.

            One day when I got home, Mom was in a state trying to get somebody to chill with Granddad so she could do some errands. She looked older that day than I had ever seen her, and I could tell she’d been crying.

            “Don’t worry, Mom,” I reassured her. “I’ll stay with Granddad. Everything’ll be fine.”

            Two lines formed between her eyebrows while she considered this.

            “I don’t know, Tanya. It’s a huge responsibility.”

            I kind of pushed the issue, reminding her how much I had already done for Granddad, and that I’d been staying alone for short periods for quite awhile. I could tell she was still undecided, so I rested my case with, “Besides, Granddad’s not going anywhere, is he?”

            That did it. She smiled indulgently, grabbed her purse, barked a few orders, and flew out the door.

            Granddad was still pretty alert at this point, unlike how he was at the end when the drugs controlled both his pain and his mind.

            “Hey, TT Pot,” he began, using his pet name for me. I didn’t like it, but never had he heart to tell him.

            “How’d you like to hear a story? Just like when you were a little girl. It’s been too long, don’t you think?”

            “Sure, why not?” I answered, not knowing that would be the last time he’d ever tell me one. I knew I couldn’t relax like I used to as a kid, when his bedtime stories would put both him and me to sleep. Still, I lowered the side bar of his hospital bed and cozied up to him as best I could without disturbing the cord from the oxygen tank, which snaked across the floor and ended in two prongs that had an annoying habit of slipping outside his nose.

            “Oh, Tanya, don’t ever make the mistake Washer* did!” he cautioned me, referring to the title character in the story, a wayward raccoon who wandered out too far in the river near his home and ended up going over the falls. “Mother Raccoon couldn’t reach her little Washer because he went just a little too far.”

            A coughing spell interrupted him. I gave him a few sips of water and waited for him to continue.

            “Well, you know what happened next. Sneaky the Wolf captured him and took him by the scruff of the neck back to his den! He planned to serve little Washer to Mother Wolf and the cubs. But Mother Wolf ruled the roost,” he chuckled, “so you know that never happened.

            “In fact, she took a liking to little Washer, and so did the cubs. They became playmates and Mother Wolf decided to adopt Washer and raise him with her other children.

            “There was just one problem, and you know what his name was!” Granddad laughed and waited for me to answer, as I had done every one of the thousand times he’d told me this story.

            “His name was Sneaky!” I cried with the gusto Granddad expected.

            “That’s right, Tanya, his name was Sneaky. Sneaky threatened to eat Washer one day, until Mother Wolf pounced on him and caught his flesh with her massive jaws.”

            Here Granddad assumed an ominous, yet feminine, voice. His speech was weak and somewhat breathless, but he carried off the inflection the way he always had.

            “‘What are you doing with my cub, Sneaky?’ Mother Wolf growled through her sharp teeth.”

            Granddad then took on a sniveling tone for Sneaky. 

            “‘What do you mean your cub?’ Sneaky replied. ‘That’s not one of our cubs! That’s going to be our dinner one of these nights!’

            “‘Oh, no, he’s not, Sneaky!’ said Mother Wolf. ‘I’ve decided to raise him and teach him

to hunt with the others.  He can teach our little wolves things they could never learn otherwise.

It’s been decided!’

            “Well, you know what happened, TT Pot. They argued for a while, but Mother Wolf won

out, as usual.”

            Granddad was beginning to sound hoarse, so I gave him more water.

            “Thanks, T,” he said gratefully. “Now, where was I? Oh, yeah, Mother Wolf brought Washer to the big pack meeting to meet Black Wolf. He was the pack leader, and a fearsome sight to behold. Mother Wolf pleaded with him to let Washer into the pack, but, uh, but, lemme see  – ”

            “It’s OK, Granddad, you need to rest,” I offered, seeing he was fading.

            “No, no, it’s OK, T,” he protested. The spirit was willing, but the flesh was weak, and he started rambling like he used to when he got too tired. I guess the dark room and warmth of the covers made him sleepy, and he always ended up nodding off and mixing bits of his dreams into the story.

            “Well, you see, Mother Wolf went to the White House and the Obamas were all there, too, of course  – ”

            I couldn’t help it, I started to laugh. It was just like old times, but with painkillers added in.

            I let him drift off, silently remembering the details he had left out. Sneaky’s visit to Black Wolf before the pack meeting, where he got the senior wolf to promise that Washer would be dead meat if he showed up. Black Wolf’s surprise defense of Mother Wolf when the rest of the pack descended on her, trying to get to Washer. And how Mother Wolf finally realized if she truly loved her adopted cub, she had to let him return to his own people, where he would be safe.

            e H

Granddad slept for about half an hour, but then I began to detect an odor I knew only too well. I considered my options. There was a good chance Mom would get home soon, so maybe it could wait. But then Granddad started squirming, trying to get comfortable, and I knew only one thing would accomplish that. I wrestled an adult diaper out of the full package and went to work. At first he resisted, saying he could wait till Mom got home, but from the smell of things, I knew sooner would be better than later.

            I patted his arm and tried to sound confident.

            “It’s OK, Granddad. We’ll get this on in no time.”

            With a weak smile, he relented, and 20 messy minutes later, the deed was done. It wasn’t on straight, and shortly after I finished, a yellow trickle made its way down his left leg via the gap where his hip met his thigh. But my pride was undaunted. When Mom walked in the door, she burst into tears, saying I was the best daughter anyone could ever have, and she wished she could do something to reward me.

            She didn’t realize she just had.

            So when Carl made his case for assisted suicide, all I could think of was these were the moments I’d have been deprived of if that had been law of the land when my grandparents were dying. Sure, my life might’ve been easier if I hadn’t gone through all that stuff, but no one can tell me those two old people didn’t have something rich to contribute even from their deathbeds. I count those last days with both of them among the sweetest in my life, and if I could have them back, I’d gladly tuck in next to them in those God-awful hospital beds and be just as content as I was camping out on their rug when I was a kid.  

            I only wish Jess could’ve gotten to meet those two wonderful people.

*The bedtime story Tanya's grandfather tells her is based on the following:

Walsh, George Ethelbert. Twilight Animal Series: Washer the Raccoon. Philadelphia: John C. Winston Co., 1922. Print.