Paint

January 10, 2012. Women catch fever, and fear too. Jaya covered on an old metal frame, her face partially visible under a plaid dishtowel, blinks slowly, legs shifting occasionally. She remembers to smile when I crouch down next to her, and then stares past my face, a point below my eyes. A small heater runs, warming little in the drafty room. Windows are broken, air slithers through with chill. The stretcher placed next to Punja, who shivers under shawls and blankets, becomes a symbol in this space, this world. I perch next to Punja, my favorite patient, and she talks in shrill Hindi, her crone voice resonant, and I motion with my hands. I act out sickness, my body retching, pointing to Jaya. She affirms with a grunt, and we both stay on her bed, her eyes on the stretcher, mine on the others, darting to look at the fading light on the ground. Few come close, but clean floors and sort clothes and bathe and pretend not to notice the girl dying.
She is taken to the hospital, and because the doctor is not in, sent away for later. The stretcher is carried past, the living woman in a funeral procession, the vital dirge, and we are told to pray. 
I sit with Anita at the back of the room, and we watch men sweep the newly paved road. Flowers bloom and wither and open next to the lane, crawl up the surrounding stone wall. I ask if many get sick in the cold. Yes, she says, her voice a shaky frozen whisper. Does Jaya have the same as Gita? Yes, the same. 
Lunch is exaggerated, donated by the owner of a hotel who eyes me as he passes out food. People clap and sing and yell happybirthday DO YOU happybirthday DO YOU, and the women rush to gather flowers to give, and he carries a multicolored array of weeds. 
They have forgotten Jaya, waiting in line at the government hospital, and sit with eyes opening and closing for the sun.