A thin band of light invades through the crack, illuminating the shadowy corners. My eyes become alert as footsteps cause an eclipse. The outline of a person appears in the doorway—backlit like an angel. The figure’s head turns to the side and searches the hallways like a child looking both ways before crossing the street. I hold my breath. Nurses visit me constantly. They come as often as circus clowns emerging from a tiny car. Bringing medicine after medicine, they fill me with an entire diet of pills in small white cups. I haven’t been able to avoid taking them. Now there’s so much medicine inside of me that I’m melting away like ice on a summer street. I dread the nurses’ visits. But this is not a nurse slipping into my room and letting the latch lock behind them. Nurses never lock themselves in with me. Nurses enter with marching steps and the flick of electricity to fill the room. Their noise is as loud as an alarm—not the soft padded sound approaching me. My eyes are adjusting to the dim haze from the security light in the parking lot outside.
