AIR-CLINIC WRITING CONTEST: Smoked Out

ikechi (43)in #air-clinic • 6 years ago

Williams could not move his persistent stare from the celling as he laid straitened on the hospital bed, a white celling fan whirled at a very torpid speed, and a fluorescent tube on the wall shone dimly. He didn’t even try to sit up due to the sharp headaches that had accompanied each attempt, but the headaches were nothing compared to the sharp pain which he felt at his left hand. The cause of the pain; a long needle inserted into one of his veins, it was connected to a transparent pipe through which a transparent fluid was being pumped into him.

It’s been four days after he had fainted at the park and was rushed to the hospital by some good Samaritans as the doctor had described them. Reminiscence after reminiscence followed, and all he could think of was the moment when the doctor had told him he had an ailment—lung cancer, he had called it and from the doctor's explanation, the infection was already metastasizing. He wasn’t a smoker and he barely drank alcohol which had made him more mystified as to how he could have been infected with lung cancer. A brief medical survey had cleared his confusion and what had turned out to be the cause was the diesel combustion fumes he usually inhaled at the railroad industry where he worked and also whenever he commuted through the congested public park.
According to the doctor, he had been exposed to a high level of fumes and also passive exposure to tobacco had had a hand in the metastasizing of the disease. He could remember how his wife had held his trembling hand as the doctor laid down their options, chemotherapy was their best solution, and the doctor had insisted that he abstained from any active and passive intake of fumes which meant quitting his job and avoiding any tedious labor. How was he to survive then? The railroad was his only means of sustenance and now, it was the prime cause of his malady. Auspicious, he closed his eyes and muttered a few prayers.