An Encounter with a Life
by A. S. Mehta
Dr. Meta was only seconds from a clean getaway.
“Are you Wozniak’s intern?” the floor nurse asked.
Dr. Meta sucked in the chilled hospital air and nodded.
“He’s asking for you.”
“Does it need to be today?”
The nurse handed Dr. Meta a paper and spun around without answering. At the university hospital, an intern ranked below homeless men seeking shelter in the ER waiting room.
Meta surrendered to the inevitable and examined the paper. Wozniak had been moved to hospice. He, too, had surrendered to the inevitable. The intern should have felt sympathy for the man who had weeks, perhaps days, to live. She would have felt pity, were it not for Wozniak being the most challenging human the young physician had met. Not for much longer, she thought, heading for hospice. She was mildly curious as to why a man who had interrogated her during their last encounter would ask for her return.
* * *
The day had gone from sad to surreal. Meta had made rounds at 07:00 with her resident, a second-year Internal Medicine physician from Toledo. They entered Rehab 501 and checked on their TBI, a traumatic brain-injured man in his thirties.
The patient sat on his motorized bed watching a TV cartoon; a contented smile on his face. His shaved hair had started to grow back, covering the sutures. A motor vehicle accident a month earlier had contused his frontal lobe. His wife sat in the corner. Their two-year old boy slept on her chest. Her worried eyes searched the doctors’ faces, hoping for any sign or a hint of improvement.
The resident asked the patient the usual questions, without response. Dr. Meta avoided eye contact with the young wife and took notes.
The next patient was in Rehab 503. He was the same age as the TBI, but opposite in most other ways: a T-3 paraplegic, the victim of a fall from a scaffold. The patient stared glumly at his disobedient legs. The resident performed his neurological exam: no change in sensation or movement. They took more notes and promised to return the next day, without receiving a response.
Outside the room, the resident queried, “Which would you rather be, the TBI or the SCI?”
“What do you mean?” Meta knew exactly what he meant but wasn’t in the mood for medical humor.
“A choice between having a damaged brain but happy because you don’t realize it, or a damaged spine and miserable because you do realize it.”
She submitted to the riddle repeated in some form each day in every hospital. “I’d rather be the spine injury. I couldn’t stand having a loved one suffer like the TBI’s wife. She’s the caretaker of two.”
“Now to cheer you up, we’ll meet our new patient. An admit from ER. His name is Wozniak. A 71-year-old white male with stage four Non-Hodgkins. Failed two rounds of chemo. Doesn’t want a third. I admitted him from the ER with severe anemia. He’s probably close to the end, so we’re just providing palliative care. This man is... different. I need you to finish his History and Physical. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“W-What?” Meta stammered. “I thought you needed to be with me when I do physicals.”
“You’re still under my supervision the whole time. I’ll just be a floor away.”
“Any special reason?”
“No, I’ll be right with you. You don’t even need to do a full physical. Just heart, lung, abdomen. But I do need a full history.” The resident was looking away during this last exchange.
Dr. Meta pulled the chart and entered the room.
* * *
“Mr. Wozniak, my name is Dr. Met—”
“In Poland, you’d be Meeta. I’ll call you that,” he interrupted in his Slavic accent, looking at her name tag.
“Is that where you’re from?”
Wozniak had a lean angular face and thick gray hair with a pointed widow’s peak. It was a sharp face that could have been sculpted with a cleaver. He focused his ice-blue eyes on hers.
“Shouldn’t you have read that information in my chart first, Doctor?” He mocked her.
“You’re right, I should’ve known that. Actually, your history’s half empty. Even though you’ve been admitted many times before.”
“Do you want to know why, Doctor?” he chuckled. “First, they gave me an attending. Then a resident. Now an intern. Next, I’ll get a veterinary assistant. Are you even in college?”
“I’ve finished medical school. This is my first rotation. My resident will be directing your care along with the attending.”
“Directing my care from another building,” Wozniak huffed.
“I’m only doing simple paperwork.”
Wozniak stared at the ceiling before continuing. “I thought you were getting my history. That’s not simple. A man’s story is the most important part of who he is.”
“It’s important. That’s why I need to document your social and family history. For some reason, it’s not in your chart.”
“Because the others gave up. Including that idiot resident. That’s why he sent you in alone. He has no business being a doctor. You on the other hand...” — he stared at her before continuing — “shouldn’t be one.”
Dr. Meta opened her mouth and clicked it shut. “Excuse me?”
“I don’t think your heart’s in it. The other idiot-doctor stared at his watch the whole time he talked to me. You’ve made no notice of the time. I see the novel Narcissus and Goldmund in your stack of papers. The story that asks more questions than it answers. Doctors use questions as a means to end a journey. A creative person sees questions as the reason for a journey. You are reading a story about the battle between the life of the spirit and the life of the flesh. I know which side doctors take.”
Why was she feeling pummeled? Meta took a deep breath. “This is all interesting, but you know very little about me. I need to ask you some questions. Can you tell me about any medical problems in your family: siblings, parents?”
Wozniak tugged at his sparse goatee. “I was born in eastern Poland. I never knew my father. There were no siblings. My mother had a factory job in Gdansk. She couldn’t afford to take care of me in the city. I was eight when she sent me to live on my grandparents’ farm. My mother visited when she could. She loved watching me play in the meadow.”
Wozniak paused and stared out the window before continuing, “I had the kindest mother in the history of motherhood. I remember one afternoon in July. My fondest memory. I played in a meadow. The grass was as silky as rabbit’s hair. My wonderful mother looked on. I cherish that memory. It gave me strength through all the hardships.”
“You were lucky to have had such a gentle childhood.”
Wozniak turned away from the window. “Except it never happened,” he mumbled.
Meta squinted, not understanding. Wosniak sat, staring at her, staring through her. The silence became uncomfortable.
He spoke abruptly. “Soon after I was sent to my grandparents’ farm, my mother stopped visiting. The grandparents were feeble, so I had to do the work of two. Luckily, school was compulsory, so I had that. My mother died three years later in the factory hospital. I don’t know from what. I can’t remember her face. I have pictures, but I don’t recognize the face. I dreamed of a childhood with a kind smiling mother watching me play. I didn’t get to live it.” Wozniak’s voice quivered; he looked down at his hands. The knuckles turned blueish-white under the force of his fingers.
“What was your occupation?” Meta changed the subject to release the awkward pause.
The patient became less sullen. “I was first in my class, so I received a scholarship to a university. I studied art history.”
“Are you an artist?”
“No, just a teacher of their lives and works and a lifelong student. That’s how I can recognize a creative soul.” Wozniak gazed at her face for a long moment.
“Sir, I have many more questions.”
He raised his hands in mock surrender. “I’ll answer all your questions. No distractions. But in the end, promise to hear my confession.”
“I’m not—”
“I’m in the last stages of a losing fight with this disease. I’m running out of chances to speak.”
Meta nodded and continued her questions. She learned how Wozniak had made his way to the States. He hadn’t been able to find work in a university but settled on guest-lecturing at a community college. There were no children, no marriages, and no friends that he cared to mention. What money he saved was spent on trips to visit museums. A small apartment close to the hospital had been his home for many years. Meta realized she passed by the old building daily. Finally, she stood. “It’s been nice speaking with you, sir. I’ll give this information to the doctors.”
“You haven’t heard my confession.” He leaned his thin frame forward. “I’ve led a virtuous life. Except for one crime.”
“I’m not sure I should be hearing—”
“I took what I had no right to. A boy—”
A nurse entered the room with a tray, interrupting their conversation. “I brought your medicine.”
* * *
With relief, Meta made excuses and exited. She met her resident a few minutes later and considered telling him about Wozniak’s partial confession. She did not, deciding that he must have been using a metaphor. Wozniak’s words troubled her for the remainder of the day. Not just his final statement but the entire meeting.
Dr. Meta had been doubting her medical career for weeks. Wozniak had given voice to her doubts. Doctors liked absolutes. They wanted definitive tests to find the absolute clear diagnosis that would lead to the inevitable treatment. She was unconvinced that the world was so easily labeled.
The first patient was “the TBI.” Not a man whose wife had begun the day with a lifetime partner and ended with a lifetime burden. She understood why doctors needed to label, sort, and categorize. They had to protect their psyche. The battle for the life of the spirit against the life of the flesh. She hadn’t been ready to pay such a price.
Meta thought her day was ending when the nurse handed her the note. Wozniak wanted to see her. She entered Wozniak’s room and found it empty. Even the bed was gone.
“Are you the intern my patient was hoping to see?”
She turned to face the hospice nurse. Unlike the floor nurse earlier, this woman had a sympathetic smile adorning a heart-shaped face. She had an undefinable age, anywhere from thirty to fifty.
“Unfortunately, I was able to talk with him only once,” the nurse said.
“What do you mean?”
She hesitated. “I’m sorry, Mr. Wozniak expired thirty minutes ago.”
Meta’s throat clenched. “I got here as fast as I could.”
“It was unexpected. We thought he had at least a few weeks. He said he had asked for you. I told him that most students had left for the day. He wanted me to give you this in case... I guess he suspected what might happen.”
Meta took the note, thanked the nurse, and left. She walked through the chilled corridors until she found some chairs near the main entrance. She plopped down on the bench and stared at Wozniak’s message.
“Meta, are you okay?” It was Chris. He was a fellow intern. Unlike her, Chris was very enthusiastic about his future in the medical profession. He seemed enthusiastic about all things. He was a tall, muscular athlete who made no secret of his wish to be an orthopedist someday. She briefed him on the events with Wozniak.
“Would you mind staying while I look at his note?”
Chris sat next to her and stared at the note as she unfolded it.
Meta,
I finally got to see my attending physician. The news wasn’t good, but expected. I’m not sure if or when we’ll see each other again. I have one last thing to ask. Though I wouldn’t blame you for tossing this note. Would you return The Boy? My address and keypad code are at the bottom. It’s important that I make restitution. You’ll know the rightful owner when you look out my apartment window. The key is above the doorsill. Meta, I wish you my best wishes in your life as you fight the battle between the life of the spirit and the life of the flash.
Victor Wozniak.
“You don’t think there is a real boy locked in his apartment?” Chris had been reading along with her.
“No, Chris. He was a vexing man but a decent one.”
“That’s the old apartment building next to the employee parking lot.”
“You’re not thinking I’ll go? I should give this note to someone.”
“No. This could be like that show where they open up abandoned storage spaces. I’ll go with you. If there’s anything strange, like decaying body smells, we’ll run to the police. We’ll open his door a crack and flee if there’s any sign of danger.“
* * *
Chris accompanied Meta on the hospital shuttle. After exiting at the employee parking lot entrance, they crossed the road to face Wozniak’s antique apartment building: a pair of eight-story towers connected by a lobby. She punched in the keypad code and turned toward the left tower. The seated security guard did not bother to look up.
Taking the lone elevator to the top floor, they stared at a hallway out of The Shining. A stained scarlet carpet was lit by lamps on coffee tables. They paused at the last unit and listened. Nothing. Meta reached up, found the key, and pushed the door open a crack. Chris nodded. She opened the door fully.
Wozniak’s unit was a studio. a Vinyl sofa, a small wooden table, and a twin-size bed were the only furnishings. The place looked sterile, except for dozens of 8x10 black-and-white photos. They were pictures of paintings from the museums he had visited.
“I don’t get it,” Chris said. “Why would you make black and white photos of color paintings?”
“He told me he loved art because it was a collaboration between the artist and each viewer.”
Chris paused. “But why would you make black and white photos of colored paintings?”
Next to the sole window was the one object that was out of place. It was an oil painting of a vivid green meadow in summer. In the center, a boy, perhaps five, lay prone staring into the distance. His chin rested on folded arms. Behind him stood his mother, gazing with admiration at her child, lying prone on the luscious green grass. Neither figure seemed to have any concerns on this sunny day. It was titled The Boy.
“Could it be valuable?” Chris asked.
Meta looked out the window and shook her head.
Chris followed her gaze. Wozniak’s apartment was 50 feet away from the neighboring tower. A similar studio apartment had its curtains open. The lights were on, but the place looked vacant. Several landscape oil paintings had been leaned against the wall in various states of completion. An artist’s easel holding a portrait of a family stood in the middle of the room.
“He must have taken it from there,” Meta said.
“I can’t understand why someone, who only stole once in his life, would steal something from there.” Chris gestured at the neighboring apartment.
“The past that never happened,” she murmured. Meta looked around the studio. “Can you grab that bedsheet? We’ll wrap the painting and leave it outside that apartment.”
“Any note?” Chris asked.
She shook her head. “I don’t know what to say.”
Chris removed the cover from the bed then looked under the mattress. “No million dollars. This trip is now officially a waste.”
They left the studio holding the wrapped painting. Meta took a final look at Wozniak’s room. The remnants of a life she barely knew.
A life of the spirit.
Copyright © 2022 by A. S. Mehta
