the gateway [not finished]

My name is Mable, and I'm stuck in St. Mary's Hospital for Children. They say I have a rare form of cancer, and that I might not live much longer. I'm only 12, I hope I make it to 13. I want to at least be a teenager just for a little while. Baxter, my older brother who is 14, says that when the minute hits that your no longer a "youngin'," you feel different. I can't wait to feel different. With all of these tubes they stick in and out of me, I havent been feeling very good. The medicine makes me hallucinate. I like to see little faeries roaming around my room. Soft, delicate wings of the palest pinks, blues and greens. Twinkiling happily, fluttering around, waiting for me to smile. My nurse, Kathy, plays along with me. She's a nice middle-aged women. Her laugh lines havent set in, so she still looks young. She has fire red hair and deep brown eyes. I love her hair, its different. My hair is just boring mud brown, and my eyes used to be ice blue, but ever since I got sick, they just look dull gray. Baxter tell's me I resemble my Mother. "You got her face shape, and her nose, and her freckles," He would always tell me. I wish I could have met her, but she passed away when I was just a couple months old. She died from Leukemia. Baxter doesn't get sick, like I do. I guess I get that from her too. Baxter says I also got her imgination, and that he doesn't care for that "Stuff, it's for women." Kathy began preparing all of the colorful pills I've been perscribed. "This one is cherry flavored, it's red and matches those cheeks of yours...and this one is blue, like blueberrys, and youre eyes..and look, I've even snuck this up here for you!" She handed me a sugar free cola, she's a nice lady. I giggle and take my medicine with my bubbly drink, it makes me burp, and I giggled some more. Most kids, when they see me, their eyes get wide, and they barely talk. I'm dying, but I'm not dead yet. I can still laugh and smile just as easily as you, Baxter or even Kathy, with her loose crimson curls. Her head resembled spiriling fireballs. But anyway, I turn 13 in four months, and the Doc's say I'll only last for two. Me being sick has made me as delicate as a hummingbird, small, frail, but I keep my my brain strong. It's all I've got. Sometime, I create worlds in my head, and with the medicine, I can see them sometimes. Glimpses of turquose water, completely still, other then the water slowly twisting and churning at the base of a waterfall. The water glitters, and smells like vanilla. The are smells like cinnamon. But these were only glimpses of images, I never got to explore or touch or feel the air kissing my face ever-so slightly...until Mr. Toad came. Kathy said he visited all the kids "like me," He was sugar coated and always happy. What she was telling me was that he cheered up dying kids one last time before...

I didn't like the sound of him. I was already happy, and bubbling with imagination. I mean, the hospital's plain white walls and bright lights, and constant soap smell drive me crazy sometimes, but it's what I have. I liked day-dreaming about tropical get-always. But they were fake.


Mr. Toad was a paperclip, essentially. I mean, he is thin and looks easily bendable. His height is a couple feet taller then me. If he has any other hair then a few black curls wildly looping out from under a short brimmed bowler hat, I'd never know. The hat is a deep plum color, which exagirates his tanned skin and jungle green eyes.

"Mable, I've heard so much about you," his voice delicate and smooth, like milk chocolate. At first, i think he is a normal man, just a boring old dope who has no children of his own, and all the time in the world.

My nose will itch, and I will be where I am meant to be. Maybe not this time period, and maybe not even this very world.