"Can you tell me what time it is?" I heard her ask from the curtained-off part of the room, where we were invisible to each other. "It's 4 A.M.," I answered. She thanked me. It occurred to me, one aged person to another, to add some innocuous comment, about how that was the time we used to be arriving home, but I didn't say anything else. I didn't want to add to her distress or make the presumption that she would care to relate to me. She was born June 13, 1920, and her name was Katherine. She was regularly visited by her involved and caring family, and it was obvious that she'd lived a full and adventurous life, far more interesting than mine. I didn't want to burden her with the obligation to respond to an anonymous voice who happened to share her room. The nurses were invariably courteous and considerate of her needs, which at the time were substantial, her having had surgery after a fall at her home. The last words I heard her say on the morning I was discharged were "Somebody please help me." When I looked, she was sitting slumped over and appeared to be almost asleep. The nurses arrived to help her, but I don't think that's what she meant.
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