The Angel Who Weighed Sixteen Stone and Smelled of Cheap Coffee
In the playroom of the oncology ward, there is a silence only interrupted by the soft rustle of paper and the squeaking of felt-tip pens. Its a delicate hushfragile as crystal. Theres far too much grown-up seriousness for children not yet ten. The task is simple: draw a Guardian Angel. The children put their hearts into it.
For Emily, the young volunteer, today is a challenge. Shes used to “proper” beautythe sort youd see in stained-glass windows at church: angels are always feather-light youths with golden curls and eyes the blue of an English June sky. She wanders between the tables, impressed: Toms angel wields a gleaming sword, Sophies has wings fluffy as morning clouds. All of it just as one would expectmoving, lovely, but honestly, all a little too alike.
Then she reaches Daisy.
Daisy is seven. Her scalps completely smooth from another round of chemotherapy, her skin so thin it nearly glows. She draws with utter focus, her tongue poking out.
Emily glances over Daisys shoulder and barely manages to hide her shock.
On her paper sits something unfamiliara round, solid man taking up nearly the entire page. No wings. A massive belly straining under something white, a bald, cuddlily potato-shaped head, and enormous, askew glasses perched on his nose like a spare button.
“Daisy?” Emily asks gently, crouching beside her, “Whos that? Were drawing angels, remember?”
“That is an angel,” Daisy answers softly but firmly, not pausing as she colours in the great belly with a white pencil.
“Hes a little unusual,” Emily ventures. “Why hasnt he got any wings? And hes so big!”
“He does have wings,” Daisy insists. “He just tucks them under his coat. He doesnt want to get them dirty. It can get mucky here.”
Emily smiles, slightly patronising. Ah, childrens imagination.
Out in the corridor, you can often hear a heavy, sighing breath, like a train rumbling in from a distance. Shuffle, shuffle. Weighty footsteps that make the linoleum tremble.
The playroom door swings slowly open, and in he comes.
Mr. Patrick Brown, consultant in charge of resuscitation. Hes enormous. Overweight, his triple chin folding over his perpetually undone coat, which always seems too tight for his frame. Sweat beads on his earthy-coloured cheeks and, fiddling with his thick-rimmed specs, a familiar gesture with his plump fingers. The air around him is scented with stale tobacco, salty sweat, and cups of cheap, instant coffee. Hes slept here three nights running, in the cramped little on-call room.
To Emily, hes always just looked like a worn-out, unkempt mansomeone who should have retired years ago, or at least found time for a decent shower.
“Well, then, young artists!” he booms, his deep voice rumbling up from somewhere behind his great belly. “Still with us?”
“Yes, doctor!” comes the ragged chorus.
He ambles down the rows, leaning heavily on the backs of chairs.
He pauses beside a pale boy hooked to a drip, laying one enormous hand gently on his brow.
“Hang in there, mate,” he murmurs. “Test results have come back. Well manage.”
Then he shuffles to Daisy. Emily watches as the girls eyes light up, hands reaching for the enormous man who smells of old cigarettes.
“Are you drawing?” he asks. And through his thick glasses, Emily sees, not exhausted clouded eyes after all, but fathomless, sleep-deprived blue.
“You,” Daisy whispers.
He snorts, pushing up his glasses. “No need to draw me. The paper would split.”
At that moment, an alarm pierces the corridora sharp, urgent beep.
Mr. Brown transforms in an instant. Gone is the panting; gone the shuffling. With remarkable agility for a man of his size, hes out the door.
“Everyone stay put!” he bellows from the corridor. “Samantha, crash trolley, now!”
Emily sits frozen, hands pressed to her chest. Beyond the wall, a flurry of commands, the sound of metal clattering, and his voiceno longer warm, but tough as steel.
“Breathe! Now, come on! Stay with us! Breathe!”
That cry is terrifying.
It is a plea and an order in one. Emily closes her eyes, frightened.
Forty minutes crawl by, infinite and drawn-out as toffee. The playroom is still. No ones drawing. Everyone just stares at the door.
It opens at last. Patrick Brown enters, holding onto the frame, shirt drenched, coat mottled with sweat, a bloodstain on one sleeve. He pulls off his glasses and rubs his eyes, exhaustion smeared across his face, then lowers himself with a groan onto a tiny childs chair, which creaks helplessly beneath him.
“Worked,” he manages, voice hollow. “Hes sleeping.”
Emily looks at him. And suddenly, as if a dusty veil has been lifted, she sees.
She looks at Daisys drawinga podgy, clumsy gentleman. Then she looks at Patrick Brown.
She doesnt see the heaviness or the sweat any more. She sees heft. Immense, solid loveexactly whats needed to anchor these delicate, fluttering young souls here, when they long to drift away. A golden-winged angel would be useless in this placetoo light, hed just float away with them.
But this sortweighty, real, smelling of earth and coffeecan pin life itself in place, scooping it back up with his great hands and growling, “Not letting go.”
His bald head shines in the lamplight like a halo. Not a golden oneno, a working mans, damp from honest toil.
Daisy slides off her chair. She steps quietly to the doctor, who sits, head down, and wraps her arms around his thick legthe highest she can reach.
“I told you,” she murmurs, looking at Emily with eyes far older than her years, “He hides his wings. So we dont get a draught.”
Mr. Brown places his heavy hand gently atop her bare head.
His fingers tremble.
“Hold on, my dears,” he whispers. “Just a bit longer.”
Emily turns to the window, unable to watch any longer.
The tears shes feared all day finally come. She weeps, ashamed of her blindness. Shed looked for beauty in shine and polish, but Beauty was sat before her on a battered chair, wiping sweat with his sleeveheavy, unlovely, and the holiest thing in the world.
