Lilly's Redemption

By Ann Marie Jameson

Eighty-three-year old Lilly Bordelon finds herself alone in a hospital battling a dreaded illness.

In the midst of lamenting her dire circumstances, something extraordinary happens that shakes her to her core. Suddenly, she is thrown into a whirlwind of scenarios and emotions as she floats precariously between life and death. As Lilly navigates through the situations in which she finds herself, she is forced to re-evaluate many of her past choices in life and assess her shortcomings. Along the way she learns some valuable life lessons.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wings ePress, Inc.
• Release date: Jul 16, 2023
• ISBN: 9781597054720

Book preview

One

Ms. Lilly

FROM THE CONFINES OF her bed, Lilly Mae Bordelon took in her austere surroundings for the umpteenth time since the ambulance had brought her to this hell hole. She wondered how many days she had been in the drab twelve-by-twelve cubicle—ten maybe? She wasn’t sure because she slept so much her days and nights all ran together. On top of that, there was no one there to acknowledge the passing of the days.

Charlotte, Lilly’s eldest daughter and a nurse, had first admitted Lilly to the hospital in Natchitoches, Louisiana where they lived. However, once Lilly’s condition was determined to be too serious for the overcrowded, small-town medical facility to handle, she was transferred to a larger hospital an hour away in Shreveport. In Lilly’s mind, though, ‘hospital’ wasn’t the right word for the place she was in. A more appropriate word, Lilly thought scornfully, would be a prison, since the patients or inmates have no visitation privileges, and we are at the mercy of a woefully inadequate staff. Plus, the food, if you can call it that, looks horrible. I guess I should be thankful for small blessings, though. If I had any appetite, I wouldn’t have much of a choice but to eat the grossly unappealing slop. Actually, Lilly had no idea what the food tasted like, because along with her loss of appetite, she had lost all sense of taste and smell. The only thing she had managed to eat were minute bites of fruit here and there.

After a few more choice comments about the inadequacies of the institution, Lilly’s thoughts strayed to her family. She had last spoken to her two daughters yesterday via a short video call on her tablet since they were not allowed to visit because of her COVID status. Lilly interpreted that to mean she was a highly contagious pariah with whom no one was allowed to be in contact except for the fully-masked medical staff in this sordid establishment.

In Lilly’s eighty-three years, she had never known of such draconian rules as those the United States government had enacted on its citizens ever since COVID had come to its shores ten months earlier. The mandates were supposedly enacted in the name of public health and for the well-being of its people. Lilly knew many of the same crazy policies were being enacted in most countries around the world, but at the moment she didn’t have the fortitude to be concerned about all those other countries. She was only concerned about what was happening in her country and, in particular, in the institution she was currently inhabiting. Lilly had wondered for months how the government was getting away with such overreaching practices when Americans’ freedoms were supposed to be protected in the Bill of Rights, but she had finally chalked up her disillusionment with the system to just another indication that the whole country was going to the birds.

Lilly brought her attention back to her dreary hospital room. Her eyes paused briefly on the only picture that adorned the walls, a cheap print of a steamboat. From there, they moved on to outside the large window to the right of her bed. It wasn’t much of a view, just a parking lot full of vehicles. From Lilly’s position in bed, she couldn’t see much, but she thought she could make out what looked like a red sports car. The automobile reminded her of a red Corvette one of her friends had years ago. Lilly found herself wishing she could commandeer the car and drive it far away to someplace exotic and fun. Of course, most all the fun places were still shut down due to the COVID restrictions.

The noise from the television interrupted Lilly’s daydream of riding into the sunset in a shiny red sports car, but she was not interested in what was playing. The channel was set on a news show, and the newscaster was talking about how many people in the United States had died of COVID so far this year. That was the last thing Lilly wanted to hear. She had already lost several friends and relatives to the dreaded illness. She had even read in the paper that one of her archenemies in life, retired Louisiana Senator Theodore Perot and his wife, Joy, had both succumbed to the illness a couple of months earlier. Reading their obituaries in the paper had brought a smile to her face, but now, ironically, here she was struggling to avoid the same fate.

Lilly turned the television off and looked away. As she did, her eyes caught sight of the repulsive potty chair to the left of her bed. She had been forced to use it since she arrived because she was too weak to walk to the bathroom unassisted, and no one could be bothered to help her. It was one more insult to Lilly’s dignity she had been forced to suffer since arriving in this prison. As she fumed over her toileting situation, it occurred to her that it could actually get worse. The prison guards could relegate me to a bedpan or a catheter. Oh, how awful that would be! she thought in disgust.

The more Lilly despaired over her dire predicament, the more upset she became. This caused undue stress on her already weakened heart and compromised lungs. Suddenly, she felt a sharp pain shoot through her chest and then to her left shoulder and down her arm. She had difficulty breathing even though she was receiving oxygen through a tube inserted in her nose. As she gasped for air, the monitoring equipment attached to various parts of her body began beeping incessantly. Lilly knew the loud noise meant her vital signs were going downhill at an alarming rate, and she couldn’t understand why no one was coming to help her. She tried to press the button on the side of her bed to alert the nurses’ desk, but she had become so lightheaded she had difficulty locating it. By the time Lilly found the button, she was only able to press it a couple of times before blacking out. Still no one came. By the time someone finally did show up to check on her, the monitor indicated Lilly’s heart rate had flatlined.

Oh, no! the nurse’s aide murmured as she ran out the door to get help.

Well, it’s about damn time! Lilly yelled after the aide from her perch on top of the television.

While waiting for the cavalry to arrive to save her, Lilly pondered how much she could sue the hospital for. I guess I’m going to have to find a new lawyer to take my case since my no-good-for-nothing lawyer/boyfriend, Roy, ran off to Florida with that floozy, she commented dryly.

As Lilly contemplated what she could do with all the money she was going to squeeze out of the hospital, it dawned on her that she was no longer inside her physical body which was still lying in the bed below. She grimaced as she realized how lifeless and old her face looked. Oh, my God! Lilly exclaimed. I think I might be dead! Wait a minute. If I’m dead, why am I still here?

Two

Am I Dead?

A young doctor ran into the hospital room followed by two nurses. He grabbed the defibrillator from the wall mount and yelled, Clear! as he tried to shock Lilly’s heart back to life, but nothing happened.

Not wanting to look at her own seemingly dead body any longer, Lilly floated out of her room and into the hallway where she observed life outside her cell for the first time since arriving at the hospital. There was a hubbub of activity as nurses and doctors ran in and out of patients’ rooms. Lilly Mae wandered through several patients’ rooms as well. As she did, she noticed many of them were having as hard a time as she had earlier. Some were crying while some were praying, and some were doing both. One man was begging God to take him home to be with his beloved wife and Jesus. That reminded Lilly she was still there when she should be in Heaven with Jesus and at least one of her deceased husbands. She hoped it would be her first, Sam Johnson, because she had a much better chance with him. Her second husband, Jack Bordelon, probably didn’t want anything to do with her after the way she had treated him before he passed away, not to mention the way she had treated his eight children after he died, especially his daughter, Mary LeBlanc.

Raising her eyes upward, Lilly asked, God, what’s happening to me? If I’m dead, why am I still here?

After several seconds went by without getting any answers from God, Lilly figured He was either too busy to talk to her or He was still trying to decide what He wanted to do with her. Not knowing what else to do, Lilly decided she might as well explore the hospital while she waited for God to determine her fate. First, she floated into a room where she saw three nurses sitting at a table eating while they discussed how tired they were from all the long hours they had been working. Lilly recognized one of the nurses who was complaining about how difficult some of her patients were.

Boy, I’m glad I don’t have to take care of the old lady in room 215 today! I had her three days in a row, and she was so crabby. Poor Allison got her today.

Lilly gasped when she realized 215 was her room number. Disdainfully she yelled, I dare you to talk about me behind my back like that! However, as soon as she spoke, she realized no one could hear her. It was as if she were a ghost. Sullenly, she thought, If I ever get back in my body, I’m going to give that prissy young nurse a piece of my mind! How would she like to be in my shoes—sick with a dreaded disease, all alone in a prison where your family isn’t even allowed to visit, and totally at the mercy of incompetent strangers who have no compassion?

While Lilly Mae continued to stew about the prissy nurse’s uncomplimentary remarks about her, a pretty, Hispanic-looking nurse got up and walked to the door. She glanced out the narrow window in the door then rushed back to her seat and whispered, Did y’all hear about Dr. Graham in Emergency?

Both nurses shook their heads before the prissy one asked, No, what happened to him? I hope he didn’t get married. He’s so good-looking! I would love to go out with him!

The Hispanic nurse rolled her eyes. He’s been put on an indefinite leave of absence for refusing to follow the government’s strict COVID protocols for hospitals. It seems he’s been sending patients who test positive for COVID but who are not sick enough to be admitted to the hospital home with unapproved therapeutic prescriptions.

The older nurse shook her head as she responded sarcastically, Well, we can’t have good doctors thinking for themselves and actually trying to help people get well, can we? After all, they need to be admitting patients to the hospital under a COVID diagnosis so the hospital can get their COVID bonus money from the government.

You would think with all the money they’re raking in, the prissy nurse added, they could hire more nurses so we wouldn’t have to work our asses off every day.

The worst part of it all is seeing so many elderly patients being put on vents when it isn’t always necessary, the Hispanic nurse lamented. And there’s nothing we can do about it but watch them die. I wish I could say something to someone in the press like that nurse in Florida did, but I’m a single mom with three kids to support. I can’t afford to lose my job. My parents risked everything to come to the United States from Cuba so my brother and I could have a better life. Now, it feels like America is going down the same socialist path Cuba went years ago. It’s so sad to watch.

Lilly couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She wondered if the therapeutics they were talking about were the same she had heard about on the Laura Ingraham Show. She had asked her doctor about them as soon as she became sick, but he had immediately dismissed her inquiry and told her they were unproven and ineffective. Lilly wanted to hear more about what was going on in the hospital right under her nose, but a doctor walked in just then causing the nurses to immediately clam up. Seconds later, the nurses picked up their various lunch containers and hurried out of the room.

Since there wasn’t any more conversation going on in the break room for Lilly to eavesdrop on, she floated out of the area and into a waiting room where she noticed a woman and a man sitting together. The woman appeared to be reading her Bible while the man was anxiously fiddling with his phone. Lilly was surprised she could hear the woman’s thoughts. She was pleading with God to let the surgeon be able to save her son, Ricky’s, leg. Then she tried to make a bargain with God. If He would save her son’s leg, she would never allow him to go near a motorcycle again. No sooner had Lilly begun feeling sorry for the poor young man than she found herself inside a surgical room where a teenage boy was having one of his legs operated on. Assuming he must be the couple’s son, Lilly floated down to get a closer look at what was happening to the unlucky lad.

As she observed the delicate surgery being performed, Lilly’s thoughts drifted to her own twenty-one-year-old grandson Carson, who had once broken his leg playing football. Before she could finish her thoughts about the football incident, Lilly found herself sitting in a chair at the breakfast table next to Carson and her younger daughter, Caroline. Carson was wolfing down a sandwich while Caroline was trying to convince him not to drop out of college to join the Air Force. This came as a surprise to Lilly since she had no idea her grandson was even thinking about joining the military. The last time she had spoken to him, he had said he liked being in college, and he talked about all the cute girls he had met.

Lilly listened intently to the conversation between her daughter and grandson. At one point, she tried to add her own two cents. Then she remembered no one could hear her. She wondered if there were a way she could make them hear her or at least feel her presence. She wanted her grandson to know she thought joining the military like his grandfather Sam had done was a brave and honorable thing, and she would be very proud of him if that’s what he chose to do with his life. Lilly also wanted to let her daughter know she loved her, and she wished she hadn’t pushed Caroline to get a degree in education because back then being a teacher was the more sensible career choice.

Caroline had wanted to follow her dream of being a professional artist, but instead, to satisfy her mother, she had become an art teacher. Lilly knew Caroline secretively blamed her for not supporting her daughter’s desire to pursue art professionally, but they never talked about it. It’s a shame parents only learn their mistakes raising their children after they’ve made them, Lilly sadly lamented, since it was almost always too late to fix them after the fact.

Glancing around the room, Lilly noticed a framed picture of herself on the top shelf of the baker’s rack. She was posing with Caroline and her family several years ago at Caroline’s daughter, Claire’s, wedding. Lilly went over to the picture and blew on it as hard as she could. To her delight, the picture wobbled slightly and fell over. It didn’t fall off the shelf, but it made a noise which caused Caroline to turn toward it. Caroline got up, walked over to the baker’s rack, and picked up the picture. While Caroline looked quizzically down at it, Lilly reached out and wrapped her arms around her daughter as best she could in her ghost-like state. Caroline shivered as she held the picture to her chest.

Looking up from his plate, Carson asked, What’s the matter, Mom? You look like you saw a ghost.

Caroline chuckled. I’m not sure. Something feels strange. I don’t know how this picture fell over, and I know this sounds crazy, but I swear it felt like someone just gave me a hug.

Lilly jumped up and down in front of Caroline, clapping her hands and screaming, It’s me, Caroline! It’s me, your mom! but Caroline didn’t hear or see her, and before Lilly could do anything else to get her daughter’s attention, Lilly was scooped up out of the house and thrust into a vast tunnel of darkness. At first, she felt like she was floating inside the tunnel, but then she moved through it at a faster and faster pace until it felt like she was flying at the speed of light.

Three

Heaven Can Wait

Before Lilly could