Mercy

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You really don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.

On nights like this, when Walter McKenna could barely get air into his lungs, and each breath came ragged and raw, the lyrics from the Joni Mitchell tune popped into his head and he’d grimace, thinking she was right. Damn right. In Walter’s case, it was heart disease that had paved over the paradise of his good health. It zapped most of Walter’s remaining strength and left him perpetually exhausted.

With great effort, Walter managed to sit up in his hospital bed. He had to do something to take the pressure off his bedsores-decubitus ulcers, his doctors called them-that had again formed on his buttocks and back.

Even in this new position, Walter felt them rubbing on the bedsheets. The pain brought him to tears. To keep new ulcers from forming, Walter endured daily chemical debridement. But that was better than the hives that had broken out a few weeks ago. Those were brutal little suckers. The pale red bumps came on like a speeding train, coating his entire body, and causing horrible itching that antihistamines could barely subdue.

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