Writers Jam

It is theorised that when you go incredibly close to a black hole, time starts to slow. One hour there could amount to a couple of years back at this rock where we stand. Could one experience such time dilation here too?

A man sits in a waiting room at the hospital. He doesn’t know how to keep his mind at bay. He has thought of every possible outcome. He has seen mirages of his lived life coming back to him. The man is distraught, reasonably so. The seating there is not at all comfortable compared to the one he has at home, but he doesn’t care. He has gone physically numb. He doesn’t hear the commotion of a psychotic patient yelling at a nurse for more morphine. He doesn’t realise there are so many more impatient well-wishers sitting next to him, trying to comfort him. Their words reach his ears but cannot penetrate his brain. He is oblivious to the fact that he hasn’t eaten anything in well over 16 hours. It has been a long day for him.

The TV keeps switching between a dozen channels. Two friends are fighting with the head nurse as to why they don’t have a particular channel; they want to watch their favourite team play a match. The waiting room walls are filled with infographics. It has the photographs of all the genius specialists working in the building. The fan slowly rotates, making an annoying sound, the kind that would piss him off on a regular day. His legs won’t stop shaking, his mind won’t stop running, and the tears would be rolling down his face if he hadn’t run out of them a few hours back.

The man has a wife. They have been married for 44 years and have spent 50 years of their lives together. The man relives the time he and his wife would go out bar hopping in their youth. He misses the occasional cigarette they would sneak when their lives got overwhelming. He remembers when she got him a record player and ten of his favourite rock albums on vinyl for their 25th anniversary. There were some bad memories too, in his mind palace. The time he was let go amidst their financial issues. The time she had a miscarriage and then found out that they could never have any children. All the times they found themselves cornered by bad luck and felt like it was just the two of them against the world.

This was one of those times, too, except he was alone this time. His wife was inside the operation theatre. She was diagnosed with a brain tumour 2 months ago. The tumour had metastasised to cover a chunk of her brain. Today is the day of the surgery. A surgery which is extremely risky because of the tumour’s location and his wife’s old age. A surgery that has gone on for far too long. A couple of dozen hours feels like a lifetime to the man. He has had his fair share of instances of agony in his lifetime, but this was the first time he had experienced time dilation sprinkled on his severe anxiety.

The man prays to God to take him instead of his beloved. The man wants his dearest to be healthy and wishes there was something that he could do to make her well again. He knows the best neurosurgeons are on it. He yearns to hear her voice again. The voice that has been replaying in his head. All he can do is wait, wait for the surgeon to return his will to live again; wait for his companion of half a century, to fight off the parasite that has taken over her brain; wait for something that has enough escape velocity to pull him out of this black hole.