Kashua Sayed - Second Person Singular

The procedure sounded so simple and natural when Osnat explained it. But when I touched his inert body, a shiver went through me. Maybe it really would have been easier if I had spoken to him, as Osnat had recommended, but back then I was not able to relate to that thing at all. I wasn’t sure if he could even hear or see. While pulling down his blanket I tried to avoid all bodily contact. I stretched my arms to their full length, keeping my distance, and with unsteady hands tried to tuck the paper napkin into the neck of his pajamas. I felt the heat of his body and my hands jerked back as if I’d touched a poisonous snake.

“You can’t know what they know,” Osnat had told me. “You can’t know what he feels. But we have to be as humane as possible and treat him as though he were fully aware of everything around him. You shouldn’t mention his condition and you shouldn’t say things like ‘poor thing’ or ‘he’ll never get better.’” I reminded myself to act naturally and, inhaling through my mouth, I straightened the napkin under his chin.

I scooped up a flat teaspoon of the gelatinous purple food, just as Osnat had shown me, and tried putting the spoon into his mouth. Nothing. He did not open his mouth at all and I wound up smearing the food across his lips and down his chin. I took a napkin from the drawer and cleaned his face. Then I put some more food on the spoon and tried to pry his mouth open with my other hand, using a thumb and finger on either side of his jaw, feeling his teeth through his skin, but his mouth remained shut. I was scared that he’d suddenly open his mouth and clamp down on my fingers but I reminded myself that if he bit me it would be considered a medical miracle and that everyone would be glad.

Using a lot more strength than I had anticipated, I finally managed to open his mouth and guide the spoon inside, but nothing happened. The food stayed on the spoon. I turned it over in his mouth and shook the food off onto his tongue. “Slide it all the way back,” Osnat had said. There was no movement whatsoever, no sign of swallowing. I pried his mouth farther open and looked inside. Just as I had thought. All the food remained exactly where I had left it. Nothing had been swallowed. What do you do with this thing?

I knew this was not for me. I should have refused the job. But I hadn’t, and now I had no choice. I was alone and there were tasks that had to be done. I slid the long spoon back into his mouth and moved the food back toward his throat. With my other hand I raised his chin in the air, forcing his head back in a movement that reminded me of my grandmother and the way she used to feed her chicks. I wondered if something had gone wrong, if his situation had somehow changed since I had arrived. Otherwise Osnat and Ayub would have told me that feeding him is one of the most difficult chores. I tried my system again — squeeze open his mouth, insert the spoon, deposit the food, raise his chin — and then again. It wasn’t easy or fast, but it worked. When the food was consumed, I moved on to the water substitute, employing the same technique. By the time the meal was over I realized that I had touched him without so much as a second thought and that a full hour had passed.

I removed the napkin and wiped his face with two wet cloths. Then I used the button on his bed to return him to a prone position. That was it. All I had left to do was to rotate him every few hours and to watch him fall asleep. “He goes to sleep right after the meal,” Osnat had said, “and he stays asleep till morning.”

But Yonatan did not fall asleep. His eyes remained open and fixed on the ceiling. I decided to flip him onto his side. It wasn’t difficult: with one hand on his shoulder and another on his hip, I tugged once and he was on his side, staring me in the face. I should have flipped him the other way, I thought, so that I wouldn’t have that incomprehensible look staring me in the face. I could have moved my chair over to the other side of the bed, but that wouldn’t have looked good. You have to be mindful of his feelings, I reminded myself. I stayed put, doing whatever I could to avoid his gaze. Every once in a while I looked back at him to see whether his eyes were still open. They were, hauntingly so, but more than anything else they simply testified to the fact that he was not asleep.

A sharp smell filled the room. It was nothing like the unventilated, medicinal scent I had encountered when I first came up to the attic. No one had mentioned this to me. Not Osnat and definitely not Ayub, that son of a bitch. I went over to the window and opened it all the way, trying to overcome my nausea and cursing myself and Wassim and Ayub and Osnat. Yonatan, there was no longer any doubt, had defecated in his bed. I considered calling Osnat and telling her that I was very sorry but that I would be leaving right away. Instead I found myself on the phone apologizing for bothering her at this hour and asking all too politely how I should handle the situation. “It’s very simple,” she said. “You take off the diaper, clean him up with some wipes, and put on a new diaper. Strange, that almost never happens at night.”

I tried to work on autopilot. I marched over to the bed and pulled down his blanket. His body was surprisingly robust and athletic, considering, and he wore what looked like rather expensive pajamas. I decided on two things: I would get this done, and I would quit. This would be a one-time thing. I’d stay through till the end of this awful night and then go back to my life in Beit Hanina. At this hour, Majdi and Wassim were probably home. What I wouldn’t give to be with them.

The excrement had stained the waistband of his pajamas. Without thinking, I pulled his pajama pants down. It was worse than I had imagined. The excrement was smeared across his back and legs. I tried not to breathe. I flipped him on his back, undid the diaper tabs, and pulled. Then his bottom half was bare and for a moment I felt sorry for him, wondering if he could tell what I was doing and how it made him feel, if he felt anything at all. The situation was ghastly: most of his body and the bedding were covered in shit. Wipes were not going to be of any use. I remembered what Osnat had said about showering him, even though, as she put it, “this is hardly relevant because I give him a shower in the morning,” and I decided to put him in the special showering wheelchair, the one with the hole in the seat. I decided that there was no other way. A shower was what he needed.

I raised Yonatan’s head and tucked my arms under his armpits. He was far heavier than I had anticipated. My hands were wrapped across his chest. The special wheelchair was positioned alongside the bed. I pulled him as hard as I could and smeared shit all across the sheets. With considerable effort, I managed to get his uncooperative body into the wheelchair. According to the explanations I had received, this was all supposed to be relatively simple. He was to be placed in the chair and then tied in for support. Only there was no way to keep him steady and tie him in at the same time. Each time I took one hand off him he started to slide out of the chair.

You have to act as though you’re under fire, I told myself. I summoned every ounce of strength I had and in the end was able to press his heavy body into the chair and tie the straps around him. I took the sheets off the bed and threw them into the washing machine in the bathroom. Then I pushed the wheelchair into the bathroom and turned on the shower, waiting for it to get warm. What does this person, this thing, even know? If he felt anything at all, it must be hatred for me. Yonatan probably hates me more than anything else in the world, I thought. I’ll get this over with, deal with the rest of the night, and never see him again.