Listen Doctor

A Story by Emily

Just a short story that I wrote for a school project. The idea was to go off a Poe style of writing, hope you enjoy

Listen, Doctor

The sound of a crisp, white sheet being pulled over a body of chilling flesh is the only noise I can remember of that moment, pounding in my ears like a drum filling me with a dreadful nervousness. Such dreadful nervousness. I quietly slid my pale finger tips over the young man’s blank yet boiling eyes before he disappeared forever under the great, vast whiteness of the sheet. A surcingle�"maroon and worn-- was strapped around his chest as he was prepared for the charnel. Twitching in the back of my mind gave way to pain. Pain of failure --of everything that is wrong and unholy-- trying to seep into me all at once. Fighting to enter my very soul, to tear away every aspect left of the old me. And it did. The normal sounds of people, minding their business, became a cacophony in my ears; as if they all combined into the sulphorus cackle of the devil that often awakes me now in the liquid darkness of my prison cell. The low chuckle that seemed to bubble up from the fiery inferno below had slowly environed me in the room, and I found myself clawing at my ears; never had the sounds of my failure assaulted me so boldly before. Another life wasted; another treatment dead along with it. I offered to show my latest victim to the morgue, and left with the ever-so-warm body before the udder of assent could enter my ears.

As I wheeled the remnants of my complete and utter failure down the hall --away from the hellish laughter�" I couldn't help but curse myself. This one�" his name was William�"passed from a severe infection in his left leg. The empty anger that so often irked me, cascaded through my being like molten lava. Something as rudimentary as an infection defeated my thoroughly thought out plans; my search for the panacea of my pain. The perfect patient. A patient brought to me on their death bed that I miraculously brought back within moments of their arrival. I had come so close with this one; had even seen him through an almost impossible surgery, but I had to amputate his leg to do so. The treatments I gave were in vain and so�"while knowing what I’d have to do later�"I took his leg from his body. He was no longer perfect; he was a failure, and he had to be destroyed. A couple of days after his surgery, I slipped a lethal dose of morphine into his supper. He was dead before the sun broke the horizon, and I felt the blood that so long has saturated my hands, become a shade darker.

Down, down, down we went; deeper and deeper into the hospital’s morgue. The bodies of unclaimed people littered the floor, and with no real type of preservation, they were left to rot into the earthen ground. The stench leaked into my nose, burning it with the distinct smell of rotting flesh and formaldehyde. I felt as if the bodies knew I was there, knew what I had done. The pitter-patter of the water trickling from the ceiling roared in my mind. Twitching, the annoying twitching that now overwhelms my life, started up again. Nerves coursed through me, and the petrifying high brought tears of anger to my eyes. So many mistakes.

Deeper I took him, still, quickening my pace at the sound of another doctor roaming the chilly halls, or the sighting of an older corpse who had become a home for the creatures of the tomb. Further I took him, until we came to an apithet in the wall that was too small for his bed to fit through. I gathered the stiffening figure in my arms, and snaked my way through the tunnel. I was plunged into the cool comfort of darkness, of stillness, of quiet. The young man’s head lolled from side to side as if warning me to stop, to turn around, but I kept going; drifting through the thick dark void that I felt always permiated my vision. Finally we reached a wooden and brass door which I pushed open with a newfound will that was strengthened by darkness. The room was cavernous. My victims strewn across the floor. I took the motionless figure and placed him delicately on a surgical table. I gingerly removed the shroud of white fabric, and used the same pale fingers I used before to open his lapiz eyes. That’s when I took the knife to his face, and in a few well-placed swipes, disfigured him to a point of unrecognizable ugliness.

Then the unexpected happened. The sound of footsteps behind me, the shriek of a colleague, and the horrific clink of metal around my wrists. I was caught, trapped in the very tomb of the other children I had tried to perfect! The sounds of footsteps weren't random. They were there for a reason. They were following me. The twitching turned into spasms, the silence into a scream! I was caught. I was caught.

To this day police still ask me why I “savagely” tore his face apart. Why I never bothered with the other children I tested on. It’s quite simple really; I’m surprised you haven’t guessed it yet! I did this because I never wanted to see him dead again. I did it because he was my son.