The God Squad by Doyle Paddy

Author:Doyle, Paddy [Doyle, Paddy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781407084251
Publisher: Transworld
Published: 2010-06-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINE

My nightly terror continued as the weeks dragged on in Kilkenny. Each night out of a deep fear of dying, I begged God’s forgiveness for any sins I had committed and prayed fervently for a cure and a return to St Michael’s and the nuns. The light from the corridor shone through the mottled glass of the door. Whenever I heard footsteps outside or saw a shadow pass I cried aloud hoping to be heard. I couldn’t find a position that was comfortable. Finally when complete exhaustion overcame me I’d scream. I didn’t care what the nurses said to me any more, I was too terrified to, and besides even a bad-tempered nurse was better than the image of the hanging man. One night, a month after I arrived, the night nurse came in.

‘What’s wrong with you?’ she asked, trying to hide her irritation.

‘I can’t sleep,’ I sobbed.

‘If you’re tired you can sleep.’

‘I am tired, I am tired, but I can’t sleep,’ I pleaded.

‘Then there must be something wrong with you?’ she said, becoming more annoyed.

I wanted desperately to talk to someone who would understand the agony I was enduring and the awful fears that were my constant companions. I wanted her to understand the reality of the image I was seeing with increasing regularity. If I could do that she might understand why I was so distressed and anxious. Then I remembered the nuns and how they described what I was seeing as nonsense. Why should a nurse be any different? Because I said nothing which would have led her to understand why I had screamed the nurse told me to stop being ridiculous and to count sheep. I didn’t even know what she meant and as she left the room I pressed my face down into the mattress and cried.

Later when she checked and found me still awake and distressed, she returned with a doctor. He placed his hand on my sweating forehead.

‘What are you frightened of?’ he asked.

‘I don’t like being on my own,’ I said.

He told the nurse that I was hysterical about something and she agreed.

‘Has he said anything?’ he enquired.

‘Nothing.’

He asked again what was frightening me but again I couldn’t tell him. He asked the nurse for my chart, wrote on it and told her to give me two Phenobarbitone tablets immediately, and to keep me on that dosage three times a day. Within minutes the nurse returned with a tumbler of water and two capsules which she handed to me. One at a time I put them into my mouth and swallowed them with the aid of a drink.

‘Now, I don’t want to hear another sound out of you,’ she said as she held the bedcovers aloft to allow me to get down under them before tucking me in. ‘Off to sleep,’ she said, leaving the room and closing the door gently behind her.

It was dinner time next day before I woke. I was groggy and didn’t feel like eating the meal

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.