Doubting Thomas by Adam Grinter

Doubting Thomas by Adam Grinter

Author:Adam Grinter [Grinter, Adam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-11-06T16:00:00+00:00


Ruth

John threw himself into his job as handy-man/caretaker at Auden House, very quickly he’d proved his worth. He fixed the lights, he put up shelves, he helped in whatever way was needed. He never complained, he always smiled when asked to do something and he completed everything in a timely fashion.

After a year of mending and fixing behind the scenes he was asked to replace the fluorescent lighting tubes in the TV room. He walked in with his ladder, a couple of boxes under his arm and he started the job. One of the residents looked up at him as he worked and Mother told him, ‘go to her, help her.’

He climbed down the ladder and approached the elderly lady. He knelt down beside her chair and put his hand on hers. She grasped it hard, with a strength John wouldn’t have thought she possessed considering how frail she looked.

“Oh, John it’s so hard.” She croaked.

“What is?” John whispered.

“Dying.” She said solemnly.

‘Give her peace.’ Mother told him.

“I’m here.” He reassured her, not sure what else to say.

He knelt next to her, holding her hand for two hours while her breathing slowed. Nurses fussed around him and tried to help her. With her strength fading and her eyes dimming she shooed them all away. She told them she was at peace now, her time had come, leave her be. The nurses emptied the room until there was only the two of them holding hands in the middle.

John knew the nurses were just outside the door. They hadn’t quite shut it properly and he could see indistinct shadows moving about in the hallway outside.

Her breathing eventually stopped and she was at peace at last. John hoped he’d eased her final moments, she’d felt the love he had tried to impart through the softly spoken words he babbled while she passed away.

He gently removed his hand from hers. On legs that were slightly unsteady, after two hours of kneeling, he opened the door and allowed the nurses to remove her body.

That night in his tiny bedsit, he cried. His Mother comforted him and told him the lady had been at peace when she’d passed over.

John wailed and moaned about how unfair it was, she was a nice old lady, she didn’t deserve to die. Mother told him everyone dies. It might not seem fair but there is a plan, he just can’t see it all from where he is now. She told him the lady, Ruth, wanted to tell John what a help he had been. This brought him some peace, he knew Mother wouldn’t lie to him. He accepted the pain to himself as a trade off with the comfort he’d given Ruth.

Over the following year John connected with the residents on a level he never had before. He spoke to them, he tried to help them in other ways than just maintenance. If they needed something, he tried to anticipate this and provide for them. Blankets, pillows, emotional support and just being company for many of the lonely, isolated residents.



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