What it means to wear White Gloves

"I'm sorry, he didn't make it."

His tired, raspy voice reluctantly uttered the words no one wanted to speak or be heard spoken, nonetheless, they were still words he spoke many times, gaining much experience over the gradual course of time, developing much resistance, but never an immunity.

I stood behind his back as he told her the words, his formerly blue dress riddled with scarlet marks of new blood and splotches of dried maroon blood covered the rest of it body, his white gloves standing quietly upon his hands, covering those trembling fingers while singing songs of burdening respect as he held in his hands what others held precious.

Accompanying the ability to hold what others held precious was the possibility of dropping it, its slow impact against the ground would shatter it into a million pieces as the sonorous echoes of spreading cracks would be heard, leaving even the most skilled artisans incapable of repairing it.

He told her those words, 'her' being an old woman aged 84, born in Iran and moving here with her husband at 18 after having fled from war, widowed to one man, former-mother to a life which now left her a mother to a dead son while family to none.

Wrinkled aged eyes that saw through times we couldn't even begin to imagine, with each passing year bearing one of the hundred burdens upon her hunched back, her frail body propped up by the wooden walking stick while her aged mind not buckling over by the sheer inability to process the words uttered.

She was a nice person, one who inhabited the white rooms of the hospital for a long time, living upon a delicate balance of modern medicine, having gone through 3 surgeries, but despite having teetered upon the boundaries of life and death on so many occasions, never have I seen her so tired of the bitter delicacies that life would force down everyone's throat.

A capricious flood of despair would flood the life of this old woman, forcing itself down into a full stomach, etching itself desperately into the soul to never be forgotten, wishing to scream out thousands of thoughts and feelings, but brushed away by a tired sigh.

No tears, no screams of despair nor sobs that would ring clear through these silent halls which had seen many alike, with a pain greater than what I would dare to imagine brushed away with a sigh of that one tired of life.

Dead eyes that wished to see nothing but closed eyes that saw everything while biding time that mattered not, only living because she was still alive, even if in name only.

She muttered out a quiet 'thank you' to us, simply turning away under our broken eyes, her old back fading into the distance as she moved down the hall, her figure crumbling with each step as the thud of the walking stick would beat against the ground, shouting farewells to those behind her, like a bard singing poems of men lost at sea.

I've been an assistant for about a month now after having graduated at the top of my class with years of careful studying, this being my second surgery, the first one having been completed without a hitch, a relatively simple job of fixing a fractured leg, a tense environment for me but a tiresome amount of effort was all that was required from me.

However, this one caught me unprepared. 

Needing to take out a Mercedes' debris from a person's ribs was an exhausting task, staying awake for 40 hours, rushing by days as if they bore no power upon the human body, with no rest in sight, only constant chaotic shouting encumbering my mind with too many commands to process.

It wasn't some big mistake I made, it was just a small delay in a few actions, overburdened by all those commands, but forcing myself through to do what I must, I handed him the tool.

The fatigue slowly accumulated, bearings its weight upon my mind and my body, while delays slowly stacked upon each other, time pushing itself upon a broken body, furthering the cracks until it could no longer be held together.

The constant beeping I was so used to hearing inevitably dropped quiet, with that jumpy green line refusing to stand back up, the silence echoing throughout the room, bursting into the ears of all these blue masked people.

No one made a major mistake either, but grasping a falling object would need the delicate control of the entire hand, with each finger carefully working together, still slipping by and cracking if the shifts were ever so slightly not in your favor, with delicate winds, shining lights, and the terrifying fragility life bore all left in the hands of fate.

My eyes fell to the ground, recalling each moment with frightening detail, those instances when I was slow, the failures and the fatigue of my body, the lost cognizance of my mind and each drop of blood seen flowing in and out of his body and the incisions crafted upon his heaving chest.

I could clearly remember the pulsating heart as it stood naked, leaving itself under the care of those it trusted, its redness still entrenched deep in my mind, its four chambers clinging upon the last bits of life it could.

If only...

The man who uttered those words patted my back, as my crestfallen eyes still glued to the ground before speedily turning between each of these white gloves I bore upon this human skin.

He'd seen many like me, he too, had been one that stood in my shoes with the same white gloves.

"You'll have to get used to it kid, everyone has to."

Giving a smile that held no happiness, no despair, no anger, no tears nor any emotions or a semblance of life, while his brown eyes directed towards me but not looking at anything, staying in a distant land but staring as if wanting to shout thousands of words and millions of feelings, all packaged into a dark corner of his heart, left alone in hopes that it would never be opened.

.........................................................................

It's been 20 years since then, with my hair grayed and hands wrinkled, while those disgusting words now wrung true, either having forced themselves upon my mind or I had tricked myself into embracing them.

It was like that for everyone still here, their sanity necessitating that they start distancing themselves from these fractured lives, as everyone who desperately held clung to those falling objects would have their sanity slowly dragged down along with them, rendering them incapable of thought or emotion.

Even if I've distanced myself from that didn't mean I'd thrown my humanity away, at least as of yet.

Telling them about the green line that laid asleep along with those that they held precious and hearing the painful cries of children, mothers, fathers, husbands, wives, and friends would still carve itself into an isolated corner within me, packaged into a tiny box and sent to far-away land unknown to me.

I would still try my hardest, not forsaking the slightest bit of effort, and being given these countless awards and accolades would only drive a further repugnance for myself due to those I'd left unable to see them, and while I sat on this land breathing fresh air from these trees, they were left in tiny boxes to either rest or to stay hidden to hide the pain others would feel.

The "thank you's" heard from those grateful would always give me a rush of relief like that of a drug, but as soon as they stopped, the grieving sobs would continue echoing as I would attempt to deafen myself.

These white gloves of mine would desperately catch as much as they could, training to grasp as much as it could within its tiny reach, but some would still slip by, their cracks refusing to not echo into these closed ears of mine.