On black screen the sound of hospital machinery, beeps and whooshes and splunks. As if from a deep murky well, a face appears. An old man staring down, noise of a buzzer, then immediately a female voice, “Yes, Sam?” “Get in here quick; he’s stopped breathing.” Then, a young woman in nurse cap replaces old man’s face, she too staring down, noisily fiddles with something and then as loud as anything yet we hear the sound of a heartbeat, then the gasp of a single breath. Then another.
Fade. Slowly developing image of young man in ill-fitting hospital gown. Scraggly beard. He is at the window and places hand on glass, makes for a palm print on the icy pane. Nurse comes in and calls his name. “Larry, over here, time to take your pills.” L looks up and into the glass, starts a bit, as if for the first time he sees himself as he is, wasting away, as if he has been a POW in the South Pacific, hint of being hardened to his fate but then something sad comes to mind, and he bows his head, body shuddering, weeping.
