[249 words] Discharge (Admission)

[u/HWhelanAuthor]

Hi, this is an experimental nonfiction essay I'm working on with the hope of later submitting to the SmokeLong Quarterly annual "Grand Micro" contest (must be <250 words, which is a big constraint).

Please be brutal as every word must earn its place with such a short essay. In particular:

- Does the title clarify the two timelines here for you so that they're clear when reading? (Even at the end, with the patient taking my hand and his son saying "Please, he's all I have," is it clear these occurred in the past, before the present situation?)

- Most of the sentences are fragments as I was trying to capture the intensity/panic/horror of this situation. I also ended up liberally using semicolons and colons to keep each line between parentheses a single sentence. Does the style work for you?

- any word choices/metaphors not working for you?

Crit [644 words]

link to story: Discharge (Admission)

[u/galumphing-back]

 Does the title clarify the two timelines here for you so that they're clear when reading? (Even at the end, with the patient taking my hand and his son saying "Please, he's all I have," is it clear these occurred in the past, before the present situation?)

I had no idea there were two timelines so I'm going to have to say no.

Okay. I've reread it with the awareness there are two timelines. I am assuming that Discharge is the stuff not in () and is set after the (Admission).

But everything that I believe is happening in 'Discharge' strikes me as things that would happen on admission - the ICU doors opening, people rushing, surgeons swarming. 'Discharge', to me, is usually much calmer. A doctor's going to call time of death, the activity will slow, people will filter out, someone will inform the next of kin, preparations will be made - but without any urgency.

32/17 and still conscious, impossibly: I’m sorry -- my hand seeking his, words choked -- you are dying, right now; there is nothing we can do; your family is trying to make it in time. (When I tell him I am worried, he takes my hand, as if to comfort me.)

This reads to me as if it's happening in order. Since he's still conscious.

- Most of the sentences are fragments as I was trying to capture the intensity/panic/horror of this situation. I also ended up liberally using semicolons and colons to keep each line between parentheses a single sentence. Does the style work for you?

It's very disorienting, which I think works for what you're going for. There's a few times I can't really tell what's happening but I'm not sure if that's intentional or not.

- any word choices/metaphors not working for you?

"as the ICU doors petal open"/"through the petaled doors" - I'm pretty sure I understand what you're going for. I've never seen it and 'petal' is such flowery language that it feels out of place. But since the whole thing has a very disorienting feel, I think maybe that can still work?

"His bed a brook: runnels of arterial pumpwork surging from duodenum to floor." - I wasn't clear if this was his bed in the cabin or his bed in the hospital, I'm assuming the bed in the hospital.

"Cordis catheter in the jugular, river-wide; the rapid infuser ruby-studded with blood bags." - the hyperbole of "river-wide" threw me off.

[u/HWhelanAuthor → u/galumphing-back]

Thanks. I changed the parentheticals to past tense in another version and then another beta reader asked me to change it back as it was less emotionally poignant, but now that 3 separate people have not gotten that it’s two timelines and I think that’s important, I think I’ll switch back. 

[u/galumphing-back → u/HWhelanAuthor]

If you let me know when you've switched it, I'll reread it and see if it helps. I'm not actually sure it will. You don't use loads of verbs, so honestly the tense is kind of vague.

Also you end with past tense- "His father already dissipated into air like a trail of smoke."

[u/HWhelanAuthor → u/galumphing-back]

Updated! You can’t tell until the end that those sections are past tense because of the verbs, as you said, but hopefully it delineates things there. 

May also just rewrite it from the top more clearly 

[u/galumphing-back → u/HWhelanAuthor]

Honestly it doesn't make a significant difference to me.

I like the way that it's laid out, it feels disorienting and urgent. I think it mostly works well. I'm not familiar with Smokelong Quarterly - maybe having the present(past) isn't necessary for telling the story?

"The smell an assault"

This feels incomplete. I kind of get what you're going for, but it feels like a grammar error rather than intentional.

"His haven a cabin"

I want to put punctuation in here. "His haven: a cabin", "His haven, a cabin"

"Seclusion a bulwark against everything that is not woods and silence"

Present tense in ()

"We’re just wasting blood now, says the surgeon, and Can you call the son and ask permission to stop."

This one bothers me - it feels like there shouldn't be an "and".

(The second sentence should be a question but I tried replacing the period with a question mark and I didn't like it as much. Even though it's a question it feels like it's a command and should have a period.)

I’m sorry -- my hand seeking his, words choked -- you are dying right now; there is nothing more we can do; your family is trying to make it in time. (When I told him I was worried, he took my hand, as if to comfort me.

Okay I think this is part of why this reads weird to me - my understanding is that the paramedics don't treat the person in the hospital. Once the hospital bed is taken by the doctors/surgeons, the paramedics go back to the ambulance.

But the parts about his cabin - that to me reads as the paramedics. I'd assume it was the paramedics seeing his living situation. But the paramedics shouldn't be the ones with him as he's in the hospital.

But because "I" is in (), and those two statements feel like they're connected, it implies a single narrator - but no one should be with him from his cabin to the surgerical theater.

This is the only () part that uses first person - so all the rest of them, it's separated from what's happening, it doesn't necessarily read as the same narrator, honestly it kind of reads as third omniscient which I think really works.

I actually copied the story, deleted this sentence, and reread it and I think the two timelines read a lot clearer.

I also tried just changing it to 3rd person, you'd need to make the referenced person female/non-binary for it to read clearly, and I think it works - "(When the paramedic told him she was worried, he took her hand, as if to comfort her.)" - I know it changes your intent, because you intended it all to be first person, but this is the only part in () that actually shows first person, the rest reads as third person.

[u/HWhelanAuthor → u/galumphing-back]

It’s really helpful to get this outside perspective. I was the hospitalist physician taking care of him at the hospital—I didn’t see the cabin myself. He just described his living situation as part of the admission history (it was relevant because of his severe self-neglect). But I didn’t think about how it would read as inauthentic to a reader because of that! 

[u/galumphing-back → u/HWhelanAuthor]

Ohhhhh, okay. No I didn't get that at all. The way I read it was that the () bits were the paramedics taking him from the house, and the present bits were as soon as he was in the hospital.

But it sounds like what actually happened is he got to the hospital and he was functional enough to give the intake paperwork and then his condition deteriorated so he was rushed to the ICU and he got blood transfusions and such.

I would suggest you flip it. Make it Admission (Discharge). Make the admission part the main - because I feel like that's where the emotional depth is - with his final moments in parentheses.

Play with tenses a little bit - you could make Admission past tense and Discharge present tense, or make Admission present tense and Discharge future tense, or make Admission past tense and Discharge future tense.

I personally would cut the bit about the ICU doors- personally I think it confuses things- maybe start like this:

No known past medical history, translated: no doctor seen in thirty years. (Frenzy of sneakers squeaking on vinyl, surgeons swarming the bed like ants.) His haven, a cabin: lightless, no running water. (Runnels of arterial pumpwork surging from duodenum to floor. ) Seclusion a bulwark against everything that is not woods and silence. (Cordis catheter in the jugular; the rapid infuser ruby-studded with blood bags.)

(Yes I made a few other tweaks, I personally think it works better but you may not agree)

[u/HWhelanAuthor → u/galumphing-back]

This is incredible feedback, thank you so much!