Don't Be So Quick To Pull The Plug! I feel as though I am floating, and when I try to turn over, I find myself still in the same position as before. Where am I? My eyes feel so heavy, I can’t open them at all. I can hear people talking, but I can’t understand what they are saying. I try to pick up my feet but find that I can not move at all. My arms will not listen to me! My body will not obey! What has happened, what dreadful thing has happened to make my body rebel against me? It must have something to do with what I was doing last. What was I doing last? I rack my brains and finally come up with the answer. I was walking, of course, walking to school. I remember it well. I was walking to school with my heavy backpack on my back, and I remember how my shoulders ached. Is that why you rebel, oh body of mine? But I do that every day, I tax your strength carrying the heavy load of work that my teachers assign me. I remember also that I was l ate, I was running to get to school. Is that why you do not listen to my, my body? There must be some other reason that my body now lies parallel to the floor, for surely, if I was standing up, my mutinous feet would not support me. I will think some more on this subject, as that seems to be the only thing I can do right now, think, although I can also listen. I hear the same indistinct murmurs, the same muttering, but it seems closer now. I feel something on my arm, my arm is rising into the air. But I do not want it to lift up; I’m not telling it to pick up in the air or flail around in circles. Have I no control at all? Something is pressing into my wrist. It feels like someone’s fingers. If there is someone holding my wrist, surely they will hear me if I talk to them. Maybe I’ll find out where I am, and why. I try to open my mouth, and find it to be glued shut. I was not eating peanut butter before I landed here, and I know it for a fact because I was eating a chocolate bar. Maybe that’s why I can’t move - maybe this rebellious body of mine doesn’t like chocolate so early in the morning? But I remember now that I dropped the chocolate in the street, in that busy, busy street that intersects our town, the one with five lanes and an island. Why, it’s so busy that there was an accident in two lanes and traffic kept flowing around the two cars. No one even stopped. Last year, a child got hit by a car, and the street was so busy that it took the ambulance an hour to get there! The person has let go of my arm, and is now touching my neck. Their hands are very cold and clammy, and I shout, ‘get off’, but no one seems to be listening to me, because the person is merely pressing harder on my neck. I feel like I will faint, it hurts when this person presses my neck! I can hear them say something, and the words are more distinct this time, although I only seem to catch fragments of what they are saying. "heart…blood…organs…" I give up. Of course I have a heart, and blood, and organs. But what does that have to do with anything? Blood… Blood, yes, I remember some blood - but when? Let me think, hmmm. It was right before this all happened, right before my body began to disobey my orders. I bent down in the street to pick up my chocolate bar, it must have been right about then. Oh! I remember! A truck, and big truck, it said Peterbilt across the front. I remember seeing that word, Peterbilt. I remember it clearly, like it was right in front of my face! It must have been pretty close to me for me to have been able to see it! I remember, I remember it now! I was crossing the street, dropped my chocolate bar, and bent to pick it up, and when I stood back up again, there was the Peterbilt! I am agitated, and can’t draw any connection between a Peterbilt and my mutinous body. I try to get up, and can hear higher pitched voices. I am very dizzy right now, and give up on getting up. The voices are right in my ear and I mentally droop backwards, since I never really sat up anyways, and I listen to the voices. "heart rate… dropping… blood pressure… lose her!" They must be talking about me! I’m convinced they are talking about me. Why don’t they talk to me? I want to know what is going on too! I raise my voice and scream, but no one hears me! Why can’t they hear me! I try again to open my eyes, and can not. But I can see a glimmer of light through my eyelids. If the room I am in was dark, I would see black, but I see red, so the light must be on. Why can I hear but not see? How can I be awake but also unable to move? It must have something to do with that Peterbilt, that big truck. I remember the driver of the truck too. He had a beard and was wearing a cowboy hat - he looked scary but he looked scared, too. He was crying. What could scare a truck driver, what could make someone so scared that they would cry? I remember that Peterbilt - why do I remember it so clearly? Why does it mean so much that I can’t forget it? And that I can’t focus on anything else? I try to put the truck in the back of my mind, and listen to the voices around me, which are getting louder and louder as I apply my mind to listening to them. I can hear full sentences now! "Doctor, will she ever wake up?" It is my mother’s voice, but she sounds different, strangled. I hear the doctor’s quick, business-like voice. "Doubtfully." He answers her. "If you wish to donate, please sign here." What could they donate? Why are we by a doctor? How could I have gotten to a doctor without my knowing it, without my willing it? I want answers, but all I can get are more questions, questions that develop as the conversation continues. My father’s voice jumps in. It is usually low, and growly, but it seems to have taken on a higher note. "Who would get them?" he asks. Get what? What are they talking about? I make another futile, frustrating attempt to talk, but nothing issues forth from my rebellious lips. The doctor is talking again, and I will listen and hear what he has to say, since it seems impossible for me to join this conversation. "Many different people. There are long lists of people in need of a liver, a kidney, a heart, corneas…" He goes on listing some body parts. Obviously, they are talking about organ donations. But who would donate them? There is an ugly, extended silence in the room, and I prick up my ears, thinking that I am missing some of the conversation. I can hear my mother sobbing, and my father blowing his nose. Finally, someone breaks the silence. "Here’s a pen." The doctor says. "Sign when you’re ready." I hear my mother’s choked voice cry out in anguish. "I can’t decide! How can I just write off my daughter’s life with one pen stroke? How can we let them pull the plug?" The doctor answers her, "She must be in terrible pain, and you would be able to help so many people with one act of selflessness." "It would be what she wanted," I hear my father whisper. "She would have wanted to be able to save other people’s lives. That was the kind of person she was." Why are they talking about me in past tense? What plug will they pull? My brain is hazy, as though I am an airplane and we are flying through the clouds. Of course I want to save other people’s lives - I just have to get in control of my own first. I hear a scratching sound. It must be the pen. They must be signing whatever the doctor wanted them to sign. I feel my mother kiss my forehead, and hot tears drip down onto my cheeks. Stop crying, mom, I want to say, but the words are stuck behind my clenched teeth. My father caresses my cheek, something he never does, and whispers, ‘I love you’ in my ear. I love you too, I think, but am unable to tell him so. The light must have gone out, because I all I can see behind my eyelids is black. I can hear the doctor’s voice, he is talking to someone else. "Prepare for surgery." He says. There is a briskness, a purpose to his voice that was not there before. His voice is getting closer to me, and I can feel anticipation coming off of him in waves as he gets nearer. He puts one hand on my stomach, and I feel as if he is using me for support as he bends down. "One life lost, many lives saved." He murmurs to himself, as though convincing himself of its truth, and the last glimmer of light disappears. My chest contracts inside. I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe! I feel as though I am stuck underwater, and can’t get above it. I am choked, I can’t feel anything. I can’t feel anything…
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