Pushcart Nominated: Saint Catalina

by Zaher Alajlani

Pushcart Nominated Short Story:

SAINT CATALINA

To my Godmother, Katerina S. M.

Spitalul de Urgenta (The Municipal Emergency Hospital) sleeps on a hill overlooking central Cluj-Napoca. It is a nineteenth-century structure made of brown bricks topped by dark green roof shingles. Rows of carefully trimmed hedges girdle its sides, and a large parking lot is opposite its entrance. The car park is nearly full on most days, and it is safe to assume that the expensive ones are the doctors’. Public hospital patients in Romania usually drive old Dacias and VWs with fading paint jobs and wheels resembling stale rubber cookies.

During the rainy period, from September through April, there is always a rainwater pool edging the first step of the short flight of stairs that leads to the day hospital. On the right side of the ground floor is the outpatient dental clinic, where the poor get treated almost for free. On the left is the doctors’ lounge, where dentists rest between patients, drink coffee, and eat.

Dr. Catalina Calinescu sat on the couch by the window in the lounge. Unlike the cloudy November atmosphere, her hazel eyes were bright, and her ivory face was as clear as a Greek summer sky. She was slender with delicate Eastern European features. Her button nose looked as though it had been made by a master artist, not by the uncomprehending forces of nature. Catalina’s face had an air of attractive dignity, one that stemmed from profound grief not fully overcome by hopeful stoicism.

She took her phone out of her pocket and began scrolling up and down. The news depressed her, and so did the insipid social media feeds. It’s either death, disease, famine, or wars or people with plastic smiles wearing nothing but sheer hypocrisy to the beach.

She put her phone down and let out a sigh. Catalina had always felt there was something more about life, something beyond the inevitable suffering, something those running the rat race wouldn’t comprehend. Yet, she was in that race, too. After all, she had a house mortgage, car payments, and taxes. So, there was the public hospital shift in the morning, the private practice in the afternoon, and the dental clinic in a nearby town on weekends. All that wore her down.

She appeared to have it all on the outside, but who doesn’t—only on the outside. Now, the ashen light showered her with a dismal gray hue, and she suddenly felt like a lonely, discarded doll.

Two of her colleagues came in. She knew them from university. One was her classmate, and the other was a year younger. But both had graduated and become annoying materialistic dentists who probably thought that there were only two options to find happiness in a post-communist country: either to die young or live long enough to buy expensive things, things that forty years ago would’ve been exclusively owned by the high-up comrades. These are negligible things, however, despicable things, things that won’t quench the thirst of someone’s soul, things that pile up on top of one another until they become a heap of nothing.

The two doctors always wore designer clothes, dated guys with expensive cars, and looked contemptuously at those who hadn’t figured out how to partake in the blessings of capitalism, the new opium of the masses that had replaced communism.

Laura, the younger one, had small eyes like a panda. The way she pronounced “Patient” always had a bourgeois edge, reminding Catalina of loose coins clinking in someone’s pocket. The other one, Cesara, had uncomprehending eyes that only lit up when one spoke of a luxury brand.

“Good morning,” they greeted Catalina in unison as if they’d practiced being friends and entering rooms together.

“Good morning,” Catalina replied.

She watched them make their coffee, muttering to one another and laughing with the excess of an Arab tribesman shopping in London.

“God! She’s annoying,” said Laura.

“She’s really, really annoying, and you can’t tell her anything because she’s old,” Cesara said.

The pair sat at the table opposite the couch. The panda-eyed woman took a sip, blew on her mug, then took another. “She’s already in the chair. She says she’s in pain, but I’m sure she just wants to babble like yesterday.”

“Who’s she?” Catalina finally spoke.

“An old gypsy patient who came in yesterday complaining about her tooth,” Laura said.

“And?”

“She had no tooth decay. Cesara and I just cleaned her teeth and then sent her home. She said she felt better. Placebo effect, I guess. But it took us an hour to do the job, instead of fifteen minutes.”

“Why that long?” Catalina got up and sat at the table with them.

“Because she won’t shut up.” Cesara’s laugh was high-pitched and condescending. “She kept shaking her head when we’re working on her, and when we’d pause to see what she wanted, she’d tell us how great her son was and then ask us personal questions.”

“Maybe she’s looking for a wife for him—Razvan or Radu, whatever his name was,” Laura said before shaking into a chuckle. “Anyhow, now she’s back. The receptionist checked her in, and we’re arguing over who’d take the bullet.”

“I’ll do it,” Catalina said.

The two women looked at each other, then at Catalina. “Are you sure?” one of them asked.

“Yes, are you sure?” repeated the other.

Catalina pursed her lips before offering a half-hearted smile. “Yes, sure. I’ll see her. Maybe she’s truly in pain.”

The last Catalina heard before leaving the lounge was some muttering followed by laughter. “Bride, groom, Radu, and lucky” were the words she could make out.

When Catalina entered the clinic, her eyes fell upon an emaciated old woman of about sixty. The years, apparently long and callous, had mangled the woman’s face, etching deep lines into it. Everything about her was old and joyless, especially that colorful scarf covering half her head.

Catalina saw the woman’s medical file resting on her legs. She smiled at her, “Can I?”

She smiled back, and the lines on her face got deeper. No smile or laughter could mask that agony, nonetheless. It just belonged to her face, like a nose or a pair of eyes. “Where are the nice ladies from yesterday?”

Catalina took the file and opened it. "Mrs. Saraciu, right?"

The woman nodded. “Where are the girls from yesterday?”

“They’re not here, but I’m on duty today, and I’d be more than happy to help you. It says here that you have no signs of tooth decay.”

“But I’m in pain.” The woman’s eyes protruded slightly. It was the kind of expression those whose anguish was often cruelly dismissed by others would involuntarily make.

“I believe you. Where does it hurt?”

She pointed at her left cheek.

Catalina laid the file on the counter before her. “Ok. Sure, I’ll take a look.” She put her hand on the woman’s shoulder and lowered the back of the dental chair. When the woman was almost supine, she placed the dental bib on her, pulled the nearest bracket table, and wore her gloves and mask. “Open wide, please. Wider, Mrs. Saraciu. Here?” She tapped on one of the teeth with the mouth mirror.

The woman raised her eyebrows.

“Ok. Here?” Catalina checked another.

The woman squinted her eyes, shaking her head slightly.

“Yeah, it’s soft. You have a cavity.”

Mrs. Saraciu tried to talk.

Catalina removed the instrument.

She immediately began, “The nice girls from yesterday said I don’t have anything. That my pain wa—”

“They’re doctors, not girls. And I wasn’t here with you yesterday so I can’t tell what happened. It’s clear you have a cavity here. I’ll clean it, then I’ll send you for an X-ray to make sure you have no other issues.”

The woman bobbed her head. “I was in pain all night long. They, the girls, I mean . . . the doctors did n—”

“Mrs. Saraciu, I can’t comment on my colleagues, but I’m very sorry about your pain.” I’m very sorry they are heartless and shallow, too. I’m very sorry they didn’t treat you with the same respect and dignity they’d treat their private clinic patients.

Catalina began working on the woman. Her first thought was, her teeth are not bad at all. She stepped on the foot control, and the handpiece made those awful drilling noises. Catalina was removing the cavity when the old lady touched her wrist.

Catalina hit the control again. The noise ceased. “Yes, Mrs. Saraciu.”

“Are you married?”

Catalina struggled not to laugh. “Why would you ask me that now?”

“Tell me.”

She pressed her mask’s nose wire. “No.”

“Boyfriend?”

“No.”

“How come?”

Catalina tapped the woman on her shoulder. “We’ll talk later. Let me clean your tooth now.”

She resumed working, frequently asking Mrs. Saraciu to gargle with water and spit it into the white porcelain cuspidor.

Mrs. Saraciu pulled the side of Catalina’s sleeve.

“Yes,” Catalina said before she took the instrument out of the old woman’s mouth.

“My only son, Razvan, is married.”

“How nice.”

“He’s married to an Italian woman.”

“That’s very nice,” Catalina responded, then turned on the handpiece again.

The old woman let her do her job for a few minutes before she asked to talk again, this time by waving her hand in the air.

“Did I tell you that Razvan has a child?” Without waiting for Catalina’s answer, she continued, “A boy. A beautiful little boy. Five years old now. They named him Mihail after my late husband. I’d show you his photo, but I don’t have one of those new phones.” The woman rooted around in her side pocket, then got an old flip phone out. “See, no camera or photos.”

“That’s quite alright. I’m sure your son will buy you one if you want.”

“I don’t want. I’m happy with what I have.” Her eyes looked broken, almost unreal, like a maid’s in a nineteenth-century expressionist oil painting.

Catalina rubbed the back of Mrs. Saraciu’s hand. She thought about taking a photo of the woman’s sorrowful face. The thought had to do with disbelief, the disbelief that there was such an tormented countenance.

The woman remained silent until the good doctor finished.

“We’re all done. The cavity was superficial.” Catalina put the dental chair upright.

Mrs. Saraciu got up. “Here,” she pulled a hundred RON bill out of her pocket, adding, “Please take it.”

Catalina felt her eyes widening. “This is a public hospital. It’s free.”

“I know, but—”

“But what?”

“But that’s how things are in Romania.”

“I know, but I try to do things the way they should be done.”

“But that’s unfair.”

“It’s unfair to accept a bribe from a patient!”

“No, it’s unfair because I gave each of your colleagues a hundred lei yesterday.”

Those snakes! Don’t they have enough money. “I see.” Catalina pulled out her prescription pad, wrote something, and gave it to Mrs. Saraciu. “Here’s the address of a public laboratory. They’ll do your X-ray for free. Don’t pay them. These are public services everyone who lives in Romania is entitled to get. Poor, rich, old, young, everyone. No one is doing anyone else a favor here. Keep your money for yourself.” Catalina’s voice was trembling, much like the rest of her body.

Mrs. Saraciu took several steps toward the exit before stopping to address Catalina, “You’re a good woman, Doctor. My son tells me there’s no kindness left in the world, but today, you proved him wrong.” There was a glistening film of tears in her eyes. “I’ll tell Radu that tonight.”

A resigned smile surfaced on Catalina’s face. “Thank you, but who’s Radu?”

“My son!”

“But you said his name’s Razvan!”

The woman scrunched up her nose, blinking. A single tear rolled from her right eye, and before it reached her lower jaw, Mrs. Saraciu wiped it with the tips of her fingers. “Radu is my other son.”

“But you told me that Razvan is your only son.”

“Well, he is,” she stuttered. “I meant Radu is my husband. I got confused.” The woman burst into tears. “I sometimes get confused.”

Catalina hugged the woman and patted her on the back. “Don’t be sad, Mrs. Saraciu. We all get confused sometimes.” She let go of her and kneaded the weeping lady’s shoulder. “But you said your husband is no longer with us, and his name was Mihail.”

“I must go.” Mrs. Saraciu scurried to the exit, opened the door, and rested her hand on the frame. “They’re dead. All dead. One car accident took them all from me, my husband, son, grandson, and daughter-in-law,” she said without facing Catalina. “Radu is my young neighbor. He sometimes visits me and brings me food. But he’s moving next week to Italy to work. I’ll be all alone now.”

The woman’s words swatted Catalina. And although could only see her back, somehow, she knew that Mrs. Saraciu was now gazing at the horizon and wondering if her pain would ever end.

“I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry,” Catalina’s sympathetic tone was laced with shock.

She walked toward the old woman with the same caution one would display when handling broken glass. Mrs. Saraciu turned around when Catalina tapped her shoulder and threw herself in the young doctor’s arms. There, as the cold Transylvanian wind lashed them, Catalina suddenly knew what a motherly feeling was, and that old woman became a child seeking comfort in the bosom of a stranger.

“You know,” Mrs. Saraciu stuttered as she pulled away, “It hurts. I don’t know how to deal with it. When I’m overwhelmed, I go to the forest and kick the trees until my feet bleed. It makes me feel better. It helps for a while, then the hopelessness comes again.”

Catalina didn’t say anything. Her answer was silence mixed with tears she could barely feel until they reached her neck.

The old woman gathered the pieces of her broken presence and left. Catalina watched her walk out, rushing underneath that drizzling sky, that dolorous, bleak sky.

Catalina’s shallow colleagues had already left when she reentered the lounge. But she still wasn’t alone. The agony of Mrs. Saraciu was still with her. The more she thought about what she’d heard, the more helpless she got.

She rechecked Mrs. Saraciu’s file and saw no telephone number listed. The address showed that the old lady lived somewhere about a two-hour drive from Cluj-Napoca. There’s so much suffering in this world, and I can’t do anything about it.

Then the thought hit her, and she remembered there was a forest nearby. Maybe she went there. Perhaps I can comfort her a bit more or ask if I can visit her occasionally. That would make her feel less lonely.

The rush hour hadn’t come yet, and the rain had ceased. Catalina drove absent-mindedly until she found herself at the forest entrance. “No food. No fire. No camping,” the sign next to the path said.

She parked the car, got out, and started walking. She didn’t know where to go exactly, nor was she completely sure that Mrs. Saraciu was there. But after a few meters, her doubts dissipated.

Weeping, banging, and swishing of leaves all came together to draw within a second a vivid, melancholic picture in Catalina’s head. And that awful sight in her head matched what she saw when she followed the source: Mrs. Saraciu was kicking a tree trunk and crying, her moans sodden with primordial angst, one familiar to all humans as cosmic waifs.

A sense of purpose in the old woman’s anger terrified Catalina. Lord have mercy. “Mrs. Saraciu, please.”

The woman’s eyes were so wide and deep that they seemed bottomless. She stared at Catalina, then began heaving. “Too much pain. Too much. I don’t know what to do with it.” She collapsed on her knees.

Besides Mrs. Saraciu’s colorful scarf, Catalina saw that depressing spectacle in black and white. It was like one of those tragic movies from the fifties.

Purpose can be infectious, and much like the old woman’s grief, Catalina’s sympathy was purposeful. She walked toward her with a mother’s resolution. Without saying a word, she knelt, hugged the old woman, and kissed her forehead. “Shh.” She rubbed Mrs. Saraciu’s back. “It will be alright.”

The old woman’s crying faded out like a sad radio song as the sound of drizzling faded in. And then the rain picked up, washing over the two unlikely companions. The sky above was still ashen, but beyond it, there was now hope, and beyond that, there was mercy, and beyond that, there was love.

ZAHER ALAJLANI

Zaher Alajlani is a Pushcart nominated Syrian short-story author, editor, researcher, and translator living between Romania and Greece. His work has been featured in various publications, including Agape Review, Ariel Chart, Bandit Fiction, Active Muse, Revista Echinox, The Way Back to Ourselves, and The Journal of Romanian Literary Studies. He is a prose editor for Agape Review and a proofreader for Metacritic Journal for Comparative Studies and Theory. Zaher is working on a Ph.D. at the Babes-Bolyai University of Cluj-Napoca. His research focuses on early modern horror fiction, the relationship between science and religion, and the 19 th-century mad scientist prototype. He speaks English, Arabic, Romanian, and Greek.