Closure

“Status”, Edward asks the paramedic who wheels in a badly wounded guy in to the emergency room at 3:30 am in the morning.

"Highly Unstable. Blood pressure is rapidly falling. Excessive bleeding", replied the paramedic as he ran into the ER.

Dr. Edward Moor was busy reading a report of a patient whose heart surgery he is to perform in 3 hours. He takes a sip from his coffee cup only to realize it’s empty. He throws the cup in the trash while rushing out the room to go meet his patient. As he closes the door, his phone rings. He hurries back into the room and just manages to answer the call. After a few words are exchanged, he slumps into his chair as tears run down his cheeks.

“What happened?” Edward asked as he checks the man’s pulse.

“Multiple gun shot wounds to the lung and stomach”, the paramedic replied as he and his partner shift the man on to the hospital bed.

Edward sees the police cars as he drives up to his house. He gets down and rushes to his house. Detective Wellings and Glover indicate to follow and escort him through the door he has been entering for the last 10 years, but this time it was different. He learnt to grow indifferent to the terrible things he saw in the emergency room of the Boston Medical Center everyday for the last 17 years but nothing prepared him for what he saw today. He stares in shock and falls on his knees and cries.

“His blood pressure is rapidly falling. He is going into cardiac arrest. We need to perform an emergency surgery. Wheel him into the OR”, Edward told the nurses as they start wheeling him down the corridor towards the OR.

The images of his wife and two boys lying in the pool of blood with their necks slit open troubles Edward even today. Extensive therapy helped him cope with his loss but nothing could replace the agony and suffering. Investigation of the murders met several road blocks and was eventually given up due to lack of any substantial evidence. Police said that the victims were killed during a burglary and there were no more leads of the culprit except a ring that couldn’t be traced. The case was closed.

The guy was in a very serious condition and had lost a lot of blood. He would have lost his life for sure had it not been for Edward, a very skilled doctor. After 3 hours of surgery, the guy was stable and out of danger.

“A couple months of rest and a lot of Physiotherapy, the guy can go on to live a long life”, thought Edward as he finished stitching his wounds.

Edward walked out of the OR pleased he was able to save a life today.

Edward had always been a very dedicated doctor. After the tragic loss of his family, he buried himself in work with a passion that bordered on obsession. He started spending almost 18 hours in the hospital’s emergency room where he believed he could do more, he could save more people. He hardly went to his empty house and if he did go it was only to shower and sleep. He became a recluse and refused to go out with friends or meet his family. He was obsessed with finding the man who killed his wife n sons. His emotions of revenge overwhelmed him and he wanted closure.

He sees detectives Wellings and Glover standing outside the OR waiting for him. They indicate to follow and escort him to a more secluded place in the hospital corridor and for a second he gets transported back in time. He walks up to them, shakes their hand and prepares himself for the bad news.

“Hello Detectives. What brings you here?”, he says to them with a heavy voice.

“Hello Doc. We have some good news for you. We found the person who murdered your family 2 years back”, said detective Glover with a heavy British accent.

Edwards shifts uncomfortably in his place and struggles to get the words out. He has been waiting a really long time to know the identity of the person who destroyed his life. He wanted to kill him and wished he would die as brutally as his family did. But none of these thoughts mattered anymore.

He just wanted closure. Peace for his family and more importantly himself.

“Well.. Who is he?”, Edward asks in a voice that did nothing to hide the shiver he felt.

Detective Wellings turns and points to the guy being rolled out of the OR, Edward just came from.

“That’s him. The man you just saved. ”

To-Do List

Things to do:

1. Get married.
2. Buy flowers for wife everyday.
3. Take son to baseball games.
4. Take daughter to ballet class.
5. Watch them grow up.
6. Attend their weddings.
7. Play with my grandchildren.
8. Not to die before doing 1 through 7.
9. Go to Chemo everyday.
10. Pray.

Anything for You

He peers out the window while finishing the letter to his wife and son, “Please forgive me. I only did it because I love you”. His tears, smudge the word” love”.

He folds the paper and puts it on the table beside the blood soaked knife.

He sits, waiting to be found.

Sights

He sees children playing, couples smooching, families enjoying their picnic, street performances, joggers running, a mother cheering her kid with an ice cream, an old couple holding hands, teenage girl crying, a kid falling and laughing, a guy writing, another taking pictures.

Atleast he wished he could.

He walks away with his service dog.

Now

He thinks of his wife and sons. His parents. Their world trip. His house on the beach. His Ferrari. His million dollar contract. All it would take is this one thing. Now.

He looks up, closes his eyes, prays to a god he never thought of until now.

With all his strength, he kicks.

The Usual

Introduction: Over readings of many many blogs, I came across a new style of writing called 55 Fiction. So decided to try my hand at limiting my stories to 55 words. This is my first attempt. More to come.


-The Usual-

“The usual”, says the girl and hands him a yellow dandelion.

He smiles and pays the girl. It starts to drizzle. He turns to look at the light in his apartment and smiles at the thought of his wife.

He starts walking on the path he has been taking for the last 55 years.

The Lost Ballad

“Non Non Non. Répéter”, said the teacher. Amy adjusts her posture and places the violin between her shoulder and chin, closes her eyes and starts playing. As the teacher hears Amy play, he can’t help but think of the potential and how he can mould her to be the youngest and the greatest violinist the world has ever seen. She will be spoken of in the same league as Mozart, Beethoven and so will I as her teacher. His thoughts were interrupted by the silence. He looks up and watches Amy writing something down in her diary.

“Qu'est-ce que c'est? What are you doing?”, he shouted angrily at her.

She was so involved in her writing that she didn’t hear him. He walks up to her and drags her to the chair and hands her the instrument, motioning her to play. She sighs and starts playing.

Amy Gifford was 15 and stayed with her mother in Paris. Her father died when she was 7, leaving her as an only child. He was a violinist in the Orchestre des Concerts Pasdeloup. He was an accomplished player and had a lot of potential, but let go of several opportunities to go on premier concerts around Europe to settle for monthly pay checks. His parents were old and he was the only support they had. Before he knew it years flew by, he was married and Amy was born.

When Amy was 3, he noticed she could recognize musical notes and so he started teaching her. By the time she was 6, she had mastered Mendelssohn’s violin concert and matched Jascha Heifetz’s record.

She showed great potential and her dad was determined to provide her with all the opportunities to become a great player, something he wished he had. He encouraged her and told her stories of all the great music maestro's-Mozart, Beethoven.

One day Amy comes up to her dad and asks,”Papa, would you like to hear a song I wrote?”
He nods and puts his violin aside to hear her. She then plays one of the most melodious musical compositions he ever heard.

He is surprised and asks her, “You wrote this?”

“Oui Papa, Tu aimes ça?You like it?", asks Amy

“Oui, Mon Cherie, Always play from your heart and you can never go wrong”, he says and hugs her.

Amy missed her dad a lot and whenever she was in doubt, she thought of him and she knew what she had to do.

Her mother was a simple woman who tried to provide Amy with all the love and opportunities that her husband wanted for her. Not knowing how to start she asked her brother, a concertmaster to help her after her husband died. Her brother, hearing Amy play decided to use her talent to his advantage. He started training her and got her to play all the classics in his orchestra and traveled all across Europe with her.

Amy was lonely and wasn’t happy with what she was doing. She loved playing but what she loved more was playing what she composed.

Her uncle finally managed to get his orchestra to play at the famous Théâtre Mogador in Paris. The concert had been completely sold out for months. It was a very important concert for her uncle and he wanted everything to be perfect. He made Amy practice the whole day to make sure her solo performance would be the best.

On the eve of the concert, her uncle caught her practicing one of her compositions.

“What the hell are you playing? Stop fooling around and get back to practicing. People are paying good money to hear you play”, her uncle roared.

“But uncle, I composed this for dad and was wondering if I could play this in the concert tomorrow”, Amy requested earnestly.

“What? No. I won’t have you jeopardize our futures by letting you play something as silly as that. It isn’t even worth the money you get to play the classics. So forget about composing dear, your not good at it. Just do what I ask of you and we can become famous and very rich”, said her uncle and closed her diary.

“Please uncle. I wrote this for dad. I am sure he would have loved to hear me play this, besides it’s his birthday tomorrow”, begged Amy

“Stop the nonsense and get back to practicing. You don’t want to get me angry”, he said and walked away.

Amy stifled her tears and started playing Tchaikovsky’s Serenade melancholique.

On the morning of the concert, Amy received a parcel. The note said it was from her mother. She opened and read it.

“How are you doing? Hope your doing well. I miss you a lot. I was clearing things from my room when I came across your father’s diary. I know you would love to have it, so I am sending it to you immediately. Your father will be so proud of you. Play well my love.”

Tears rolled down Amy’s cheeks as she opened the parcel to read her father’s diary. As she was browsing through it, she came across the page of her first musical composition that she gave as a gift to him on his birthday. Her father had written something below it.

“Mon Cherie, This is a beautifully written piece. You will grow up to be an amazing composer and player. Each of us has music within us and all of are trying to find and define it. When in doubt listen to your heart and you will hear the music within. Always play with your heart and you can never go wrong”

Amy started crying bitterly, wishing her father was here with her and desperately hoping she could play his song.

At the concert hall, Amy hears the announcer call out her name. Dressed in an elegant black dress, she walks to her chair, bows to the audience and sits down. The whole concert hall was buzzing with silent excitement in the anticipation of her playing. She sees the notes of Brahms' Fourth Symphony on the stand in front of her.

She rests her violin between her shoulder and chin, adjusts her posture, takes a deep breath and closes her eyes.

She plays for her dad. It was perfect.