“I don’t want to see her...” my faint voice trails off. I am fortunate not to have found myself in this situation when hospitals were more cautious in admitting patients. No one wants to contract the virus that makes face masks, soap and sanitizers must-haves.
Nurse Vivian looks perplexed. She opens her lips wrapped in a white and blue coloured face mask to speak but closes them almost immediately. She steps out. After a brief mumbling behind the door with my mother, she enters but moves towards another patient. My mother’s footsteps can be heard fading away into the distance; people do say that she drags her feet while walking like a village girl. This is a visiting hour. Anyone but my mother can visit me.
Here, those who share food after being visited are everyone’s favourite. It is no child’s play to be sick and hungry at the same time. I hate the nauseating smell of the hospital and the rude behaviours of the nurses yet being here has changed a lot about me. I don’t have to share a tiny bed with mother. Uncle Imoh, our next door neighbour, also can’t fondle with my body any time I enter his room to watch TV; I don’t like it but he gives me food. I don’t have to hawk anymore before mother agrees to send me food. But I miss my legs; I would rather hawk under the scorching sun than live without legs.