Chang-Rae Lee - A Gesture Life

We arrived at the clinic well after dark, a few minutes before Dr. Anastasia. We waited in silence. When he drove up he got out of his car quickly and went straight to the doors, his keys out. He nodded at us and let us in and locked the doors behind us. I’d known him only casually; he was one of many obstetricians with privileges at the county hospital, but the only one I knew of who also worked at such a clinic. He was older than I, and not originally from this country, and he always seemed utterly purposeful and competent if not always warm, the sort of professional one could admire for his straightforward nature and his efficiency. I believe he sensed my appreciation and so obliged my request for an after-hours appointment. But when we were gathered in the brightly lighted waiting room, he looked somewhat put out, disturbed. I didn’t offer anything and then he asked Sunny if she was ready to be examined. They went into the next room. After a mere five minutes Sunny came out, and Dr. Anastasia called me in. Sunny walked past me and sat on the waiting room sofa.

When he closed the door the doctor said, “What are we doing here, Mr. Hata?”

“Excuse me, Doctor?”

“You told me she was around twenty-eight weeks. Are you mad? But then you, especially, should know better, being in your profession.”

“She was unsure of her dates.”

“Notwithstanding,” he said, thoroughly annoyed. “It’s not possible now. She’s no doubt past an acceptable point.”

“But you hardly examined her.”

“I didn’t have to,” he said. “Anyone with eyes can tell what’s the case. She has no option left but to carry to term.”

“I tell you she does not want it.”

“It doesn’t matter, Mr. Hata….”

“Let me speak, please, Doctor. I tell you she cannot have it. There are many unhappy reasons. She barely finished high school last spring and doesn’t have a job. The father is somewhere in Washington Heights, and he has practically abandoned her. He is a longtime drug addict besides. I’m afraid she has also begun taking the drugs with him. You well know there’s a chance the fetus may have grave injuries as a result, if not certain mental deficiencies. I’m here now to help her but I’ve run out of patience and willingness. I am sorry and ashamed to say that this is the last effort I have for her. But I will do this. So I’m asking you to help because of who you are and your experience and skills, so that she won’t go to someone else, which she will, and no doubt suffer terrible injuries. You will be preventing further trauma. I apologize for not being more forthright on the telephone, but you see I had to speak to you in person. I feel I must convince you.”

“I do not involve myself in the lives of my patients, Mr. Hata. I attend to them after they have made decisions. But this decision comes far too late.”

“It’s not too late,” I told him. “There can be medical necessities, as I have mentioned. I understand these operations can be very complicated, particularly at this stage, and much more costly than usual. I am willing to do everything I can to have you help my daughter. This is not to insult your professionalism but only to make clear how resolved I am. And I am resolved. We are desperate, sir, and I will do all I can to get her out of this trouble.”

He was quiet for a moment, and then said, “I have done them this late but not in this country. There are different standards.”

“Yes.”

“She appears unsure as well.”

“Perhaps she is,” I answered. “She’s naturally fearful, as I am. But she has confided in me, and I tell you she is ready. We are ready even tonight, if it’s possible.”

“My nurse won’t come here now,” Anastasia said. “I can anesthetize her, but I need my nurse to attend me. I believe, however, that she would likely not agree to assist such a procedure.”

I told him, “I’ll stand in for her.”

“You?”

“I was trained, once, in surgical methods and nursing. A long time ago, during the world war. I’m sure all you in fact need is another set of hands, to give you instruments and such.”

“This is mostly true….”

“I can do that for you. I’m willing to do that.”

“Yes, but Mr. Hata,” he said, considering me grimly. He spoke slowly and resonantly. “You understand what you will have to see. What you will look at. This will be an indelicate action, which I would not wish upon anyone.”

“I understand, Doctor,” I said. “I’ve witnessed such things. Similar things.”

“Perhaps you have. But she is your daughter, Mr. Hata. It will be different.”

I said to him, “I understand.”

“Do you really?”

“Yes, I do,” I said to him, as unwaveringly as I could utter the words, enough so that I was quite convinced myself. He took me at my word, and within an hour she was in her gown and he had given something to relax her. All I had asked of him was that she be heavily sedated, even before being administered the numbing spinal, so that she wouldn’t realize I was there, or much remember anything of what was done, which he did for me, and with success.

The following evening, in fact, when she was recuperating in her bedroom, she would ask if I had come into the operating room, and I told her that I had done so only briefly at the end, as she had called for me. This was true, for she did say, “Poppa,” out of the blue, and I had held her hand for some moments, patting her fingers gently to try to comfort her. It was the first time since she was quite young that I had caressed her so, and the final time, too — still right up to now — for she would leave again just as quickly as she arrived, having a taxi come to the house and take her to the train station for the first express of the morning. She didn’t know that I had been awake all night, or that I’d heard her walk down the hall and slip a note under my door, which read, “Sorry for all my trouble to you. Goodbye.” I almost went to her then, to plead that she remain, but I saw a beam of headlights sweeping up the drive, and before I could even pull slippers on my feet she was quickly down the stairs and outside, closing the cab door behind her.

If Sunny were to ask me now, I would not tell her I was in the operating room throughout the procedure. I would have to lie. For it was much more difficult than even Dr. Anastasia expected, and owing to his skill and great care he didn’t injure her at all, Thomas being proof enough of that. And so I remain grateful to the doctor, for the force of his patience and focus, as it was obvious how much heed he gave to each operation and step. I watched his face and the movements of his hands, his concentration and purpose astounding to me. Once he began he never showed even a shade of consternation, comporting himself with utter professionalism, as though it no longer mattered how much I would pay him (which I did, overgenerously), nor that she was much too far into her term. Sunny was eerily quiet while he worked, her eyes glassy and unfixed, though every so often she would gaze up at me almost searchingly, as though I were some faraway figure in her dreaming, this dimmed man in the distance, made of twilight and fog.

The doctor was right about my presence and participation. For what I saw that evening at the clinic endures, remaining unaltered, preserved. And if in my life I’ve witnessed the most terrible of things, if I’ve seen what no decent being should ever look upon and have to hold in close remembrance, perhaps it means I should be left to the cold device of history, my likeness festooning the ramparts of every house and town and district of man.

But it is not. And I do not live in broad infamy, nor hide from righteous pursuers or seekers of the truth. I do not mask my face or screen my doings of each day. I have not yet been banished from this earth. And though nearly every soul I’ve closely known has come to some dread or grave misfortune, I instead persist, with warmth and privilege accruing to me unabated, ever securing my good station here, the last place I will belong.