My Aunts Suffering Death

By: Sam Guthrie

Me, my brother, and my cousin had just gotten back from a long tiring bike ride, my mom walks through the door about ten mins later and says, “Your grandma just called and your Aunt Cinnamon is in the hospital”.

    We all packed our stuff really quickly and drove off to muskegon, it felt like a really long drive there, but it was only an hour and a half. As we walked quickly through the hospital doors I was worrying about how my grandma was doing, but more importantly, how my aunt was doing.

    My mom walks over to the front desk and asks, “What room is Cinnamon Johnson in”, “She is on floor 3 in room number 117”, “Thank you” my mom said as she swiftly walked down the hall to the elevator yelling to us to follow her.
    We walked now really slowly on the third floor so worried to see the family in the room, but when we walked in, there was only my grandma, my cousin Missi, and my aunt Tonya, including Cinnamon of course, “Wheres the rest of the family”? my mom asked worriedly.
    “Cinnamons husband and Candy (her daughter) were just here about ten minutes ago”, my grandma said sobbing while holding hands with her passed out daughter, I walked over to my grandma and gave her a big hug to try to soothe her sobbing, she stopped a little bit and I didn’t want to stop hugging her but I wanted her to be able to hold hands with her daughter.
    I walked over to the chair next to my grandma and sat down while now holding hands with her, I told her that I couldn’t take it anymore because everybody was crying, so I walked into the waiting room and sat down, thinking about how my grandma was feeling, Cinnamon had a drinking problem and she had been to prison but she was a good woman, but if you picked a fight with her, you had better pray that she likes you so that the least she’ll do is give you two black eyes and punch you in the gut a lot.
    My mom walked in, my grandma followed behind her, my cousin Missi behind her and my brother and stepdad behind them, all of the women were crying, all of the men each staring at one of the four walls, thinking.
    I walked over to the other side of the small room and asked my grandma,” Would you like anything to eat or drink?”, “No thank you” she said smiling for a slight second, we sat in that small room for about 10 - 20 minutes but we didn't want to leave Cinnamon alone for very long.
    We all got up at the same time and walked very slowly down the long white hall that smelled of medicine and diseases, I was first to walk in but stepped off to the side so that my grandma and other sobbing family members could get through without any trouble, my grandma sat in the chair that was closest to Cinnamon.
    At that point it was about 12:30 - 1:00 and no one was tired, they had to keep on pumping air into Cinnamon to keep her heart and blood flowing so her whole body was bulging with air and getting fatter and she was wearing a whole bunch of rings that were now stuck on her fingers, we all stayed in the room talking about her and what she was like and the kind of stuff she did for the family.
    Like how she made a cast for my grandmas cat smudge when he got hit by a car (hes an outdoor cat), and how she helps fix things that you need help with fixing, and when she needed  help my grandma basicly all the time helped her unless it was something that she couldn't help her with.
    At about 3:00 we went back to the waiting room to take another break from the pain that just sits there inside you when you know that you're around someone to long because there’s just something like if you like them or you feel bad for them or if there’s just something that you don't like about them.
    My aunt Tonya turns around in the hall and says,”I’m really tired so i’m going to head back home so i can get some rest and come back in the morning, “Yeah me and Tristan are going to go and get some sleep too”, my stepdad said while staring off into space, “Alright, me, Missi, and mom will stay here, grandma do you want to go home and get some sleep”?, “No, i'll stay here with my daughter, I don't want to take the chance of her dieing and i wasn't here to say my last goodbyes”.
    As my aunt, brother, and step dad walked through the security floor doors the rest of us walked back into the waiting room, and made jokes, we looked up stuff on our phones, we drank coffee and by the time it was about 5:00, it was just me and Missi in the waiting room, we stayed up watching tv but by 6:30 i dozed off and then woke up at 7:00.
    Me, my mom and Missi walked down to the breakfast center and brought food back to the waiting room and ate, after we ate we walked back to the room and saw that even more nurses were in there working with my aunt, I walked over to a chair, sat down, stayed up till 9:00 and then fell asleep.
    I woke up at about 10:30 and gazed around the room, I saw about the whole family in the room, the nurses were in the middle of putting my aunt down, and about half of the family turned and looked at me like I was crazy and a jerk for sleeping through my aunts death, but the thing is I stayed up for a whole 26 hours.
    At that point, seeing all of my familys hurt faces, I felt like crying, but I didn't for some reason, I sat up and walked over to my aunt Cinnamon, and I prayed to her, I said,”I’m sorry that I slept through your death, I didn't mean to, I tried to stay up as long as I could and I am truly and deeply sorry”.
    I walked out of the room and sat out there in a chair, I look up and see my aunt Myra crying and eating an egg omelet, I walked over to my mom and said,”Mom, I don't want to go through this anytime again soon and if it does, I don't think that grandma would be able to handle it”.