Sugars up and down

Laurie
Sugars up and down
Stabucks, June 25, 2007

Richard’s in bed when I go to make tea. I bring him a cup, and he’s propped on pillows, eyes open, and he’s saying something emphatic and incomprehensible. What? There’s always lag time recognizing a low sugar. “Let’s do a test,” I say on the way to the kitchen for the kit. “I’m fine,” he insists, sounding like a surly drunk. “Don’t do this. You will make me angry.” I’m scared I’ve really set him off, but even if he resists I’m supposed to jab his finger with the spring needle, squeeze out a drop of blood, hold it against the testing strip, wait for the count down from five on the glaucometer, and read the screen. It says 56. Not that low but the reason for his mood.

I bring glucose tablets, and he chews three fast. I toast bread and spread it with jam. As he comes back, he says he doesn’t remember fighting. He’s tired. His muscles hurt. His t-shirt is drenched with sweat, and he needs a fresh one.

We don’t get out until pretty late and when we return he lies on the couch reading The Jewel in the Crown, grooving on the gorgeous set-piece descriptions, breathing the air of empire that is part of being English, the way drinking smoky Typhoo tea is. I’m at my computer and when I turn around he’s on the floor. “I feel funny. Something is wrong with me.” His voice is coming from an echo chamber. He’s dripping wet. I get the kit. He tries to get on his knees, but his head goes down to the floor. His eyes look through me, though he’s sort of smiling, not belligerent, jellylike. “I don’t think this is just a sugar. I think something is wrong with me.” I test his blood, and the meter reads 42, not as low as it’s sometimes gone but down there. He drinks orange juice, and I make a sandwich which he chews slowly, like an animal at a formal dinner, vaguely amused. Coming back from the low, he shivers from the drying sweat. I get a fresh shirt, and he has trouble getting his arms through. Gradually he returns, smiling softly. “I had no idea who I was, didn’t know my name, what I did, where I was, but I recognized you and knew your name.”