As Ophelia strode down the pediatric wing of the Medical Center of Virginia, her white lab coat was swishing against her hips in rhythm with the squeaking of her hospital shoes on the floor tiles. Swish/squeak. Swish/squeak. She stared straight ahead, eyes locked on her intended destination. The brightly colored bulletin boards adorning the hallway flashed by in her peripheral vision, here and then gone, like billboards along the highway.

Upon reaching room 112, Ophelia squeaked to a halt. Before she entered any patient’s room, she always engaged in the same ritual: one deep breath followed by a slow, backward rotation of her shoulders. Other hospital staff that chanced upon this scene undoubtedly assumed that such behavior was befitting a chaplain such as herself, the physical actions obviously reflecting a meditation exercise or private prayer. But for Ophelia, this small gesture was really the smallest of self-affirmations: yes, you can still breathe…yes, you can still move your shoulders. Ophelia knocked on the door.

Hearing a faint reply, she pulled the door open to reveal a tiny figure, sitting with her adjustable bed in the upright position. The little girl was hugging her waif legs to her chest, chin resting atop her kneecaps. Bright, red hair vivified the hospital drabness; a blaze of fire, commanding attention even with the television blaring away in the corner.

“Ophelia! Have you come to play with me?”
As she listened to the voice coming from underneath the fiery hair, Ophelia was distracted by thoughts of the burning bush that spoke in the Hebrew Scriptures.

“Hello, Miriam dear; how are you feeling today?”

The dark coal eyes underneath the burning red hair narrowed with impatience.

“I said…‘have you come to play with me?’”

“Ah, well…hmmm…you see, Miriam…”

Miriam lifted her head from her knees and cocked it towards the chaplain in anticipation of her answer. Ophelia stammered:

“I’ve actually come to find out if you want to play with the other children. Do you remember that we have afternoon activities every week in the recreation room?”

The little girl sighed and put her chin back on her knees, but Ophelia plunged onwards.

“Well, this week we’ll be doing finger painting – which I know that you love – and lots of other children about your age have already signed up. Here, let me show you.”

Ophelia reached into her lab coat pocket and produced the list of those she had already confirmed for finger-painting. Approaching the bed, she pulled a chair up beside Miriam and smoothed the folds of the paper out flat so that the names could clearly be read.

“Look here; you see? All these names…don’t you want to add yours to the list?”

The little girl bit her lip as if she was about to cry. Ophelia reached out to her, intending to rub the bony, little back through the hospital grown, but Miriam recoiled from her touch, scooting on her bottom to the far corner of the bed.

“I want you to make another list right next to that one.”

She pointed at the paper and then lifted her eyes to stare Ophelia full in the face.

“Put my name on a list for kids that are going to stay in their rooms!”

Miriam crossed her arms across her chest and stuck her legs straight out in a perfect right angle from her torso, as Ophelia’s beeper went off with an impatient “beep” and an angry buzz. She checked the device; trauma in the emergency room.

“Miriam? I’m sorry, but I have to go down to the ER. It’s part of my job…”

The child turned her back to Ophelia, swinging her legs off the opposite side of the bed.

“Miriam, I do need to go, but I will come back to you in a little while…ok?”

“Fine…but don’t bring any lists back with you.”

Ophelia paused to afford herself a small, secret smile.

“Ok. I promise; no lists. Bye for now.”

Though she kept her gaze glued to the opposite wall, Miriam did lift a hand in silent, farewell salute.

Ophelia took the elevator down from pediatrics to the emergency room. She stood against the back wall, thinking about Miriam. When this little girl first came to the hospital for chemotherapy, she was Ophelia’s most avid participant in the art therapy program – remarkably talented for her age too. But ever since the reoccurrence of her leukemia, Miriam had withdrawn from all the organized activities. The child was like a balloon, once filled to the brim with life and energy, now rapidly deflating and spinning across the room, away from Ophelia’s touch…

The elevator dinged and the doors opened to reveal ER chaos.

Ophelia scanned and assessed the mayhem with one sweeping look: one nurse running into the waiting room, another knocking over an empty wheelchair to answer the blaring telephone, a patient in a hospital bed being wheeling towards her, two doctors arguing loudly off to her right. The moment after the patient’s bed passed safely in front of her, she slipped into the open space and cut left around the overturned chair by the phone desk like a football player running through the defense. She dodged a little boy sprinting in the opposite direction and then narrowly avoided his mother following him in hot pursuit, before snaking right around a corner and hurrying through the double doors to the main trauma room, giving the security guard an appreciative nod as he held them open for her.

Stepping into the trauma room, Ophelia was relieved to see one of her favorite people in the entire hospital. Jack had been in medicine for almost forty years, the last twenty as chief of the ER. She slid along the back wall, crossing the periphery of the room until she was by Jack’s side.

“Afternoon, Reverend Sir.”

“Hey there, Doc; glad you could join us in the ER.”

They both chuckled at their running joke of swapping job titles. Ophelia motioned to the main gurney, where bright lamps shone down on a team of nurses and doctors arranged in a circle around a patient.

“I just got the page. So, what’s the 9-1-1?”

Jack smiled; Ophelia had picked up that expression from him.

“Well, my young protégé, you’ve heard of drunk drivers hitting pedestrians, but have you ever heard of a drunk pedestrian hitting a parked car?”

“You’ve got to be kidding…”

“Nope. Mister Tequila Will-kill-ya over there stumbled right out of Tropic’s half-off, margarita-happy-hour and smack up against an SUV idling in the loading zone out front. Needless to say, the truck got the best of the exchange.”

“Well, this is certainly one for the record books…or at least the water cooler in the break room.”

“You bet; just when I think I’ve seen everything…” Jack shrugged before continuing, “To top it all off, this one makes up for what he lacks in coordinated mobility with profane verbosity.”

“You’re saying he’s got quite a mouth.”

“In layman’s terms, you’re ‘damn-skippy.’”

The team of medical professionals had finished the initial round of tests and one of the residents stepped away to prepare the obligatory catheter that all ER trauma patients received. Ophelia’s questioning gesture towards the patient was met with a confirmatory nod from the attending doctor. She turned back to Jack:

“Jack, I thank you for the play-by-play of tonight’s drama. I think I’ll just poke my head in to see if there’s anyone he’d like for me to call.”

“Roger that Reverend, but please don’t offer any of the holy wine; this one’s had enough of the unconsecrated version.”

Ophelia rolled her eyes in Jack’s face, but left smirking in spite of herself. She had to perform her little ritual to compose herself. Yes, you can still breathe…yes, you can still move your shoulders.

“Sir, my name is Ophelia and I’m here to help you by contacting any of your family members that…”

The patient interrupted her at the top of his lungs.

“No! Oh, HELL NO! I can’t have my parents find out that my drunk-ass is in the emergency room!”

Ophelia saw Jack’s point; she would have bet a million dollars that he was laughing his head off right now.

“Sir, it’s ok. Please calm down. I’m not going to call anyone without your permission. But perhaps there is a friend that I could…”

“Maybe you didn’t hear me; I said, ‘HELL NO!’ Look lady, I don’t want a goddamn soul in the world to know that I’m in here after smacking my head against a goddamn car! You hear me?”

“Yes sir; but in the event that you change your mind, please ask a nurse or doctor to page me and I’ll…”

“HELL NO!”

“Yes sir. Please excuse me.”

Ophelia turned around and her first look at Jack immediately confirmed her earlier suspicion; he was doubled over against the wall in silent hysterics. As she approached, he straightened up and removed his glasses to wipe the tears from his eyes.

“Well Doc; what’s the proper diagnosis? Potty mouth? Or perhaps a theological rationale; I believe Saint James refers to the tongue as ‘a restless evil, full of deadly poison.’”

“Very cute, Jack, and also biblically accurate.”

“That’s too bad about the phone call though; I was kind of hoping to meet the proud progenitor of such a young man of modesty, temperance, and…”

Suddenly, the patient yelled:

“JESUS H CHRIST!”

The catheter had just been inserted. Jack intoned:

“Well Ophelia, it looks like he needs your help after all!”

Ophelia was still laughing to herself, even after the trip back through the hectic ER and the return elevator ride to the pediatric floor. This time, the door to room 112 was open. Yes, you can still breathe…yes, you can still move your shoulders.

“Miriam? Can I come in?”

“I don’t know…can you come in?”

“Let me try that again…Miriam? May I come in?”

“I don’t care what you do.”

Ophelia saw that she hadn’t moved from her sitting position facing the far wall.

“Miriam, I don’t have any lists with me. I’ve come back to see if you still wanted to play…”

“No! I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want to play with you.”

“Well then, do you mind if I sit down and visit with you?”

“Fine…but, I’m not talking to you!”

She sat down and gazed at the little back, heaving with effort as if Miriam had to push the words up and over a great hill within her in order for them to be heard in the world.

Ophelia turned off her beeper.

“Miriam? Have you ever heard the story in the Bible about the woman that had the same name as you?”

True to her word, the little girl remained silent. Her sniffles told Ophelia that her back had actually been heaving from the effort of choking down tears.

“Well, the ‘Miriam’ in the Bible was the first person ever to be called a ‘prophet.’ Not only the first woman, but the very first human being!”

More sniffles. Ophelia gently leaned over the bed and ever-so-carefully dropped a tissue over Miriam’s shoulder. The child wordlessly accepted the offering and noisily blew her nose. Ophelia continued:

“Yes, Miriam was an amazing woman! She sang an amazing victory song of celebration to God that we still read today in the Bible. Another prophet, this one called Micah, named her along with Moses and Aaron as leaders of the Israelite people.”

“Does that mean that they were the best three?”

“Yes, I suppose you could say that.”

“Ophelia?”

“Yes dear?”

She turned on the bed to face the chaplain, eyes wet, nose running.

“I don’t feel like I’m the best at anything.”

“I think I might know what you mean; I don’t feel like I’m the best at anything either.”

Miriam considered this while studying the bed sheet, tracing invisible circles with her finger in the plain, white linen.

“Ophelia? Is there a woman in the Bible named after you?”

A laugh escaped from the chaplain.

“I’m sorry, Miriam. I’m not laughing at you. You see, when I was a girl – just about your age – I wondered the exact same thing!”

“You did?”

“Yes, I did! I had a friend named ‘Deborah’ in Sunday school and one day we studied a story about the ‘Deborah’ in the Bible. Afterwards, I ran all the way home from church and asked my mother if there was a story about an ‘Ophelia’ in the Bible!”

“What did she say?”

“Well, it turns out that there’s no person named ‘Ophelia’ but I learned later on in seminary that my name means ‘to help’ in Greek.”

“But there is no one else named ‘Ophelia?’”

“There is an ‘Ophelia’ in one of William Shakespeare’s most famous plays.”

Miriam frowned, so Ophelia added:

“The play is called ‘Hamlet.’”

“But William Shakespeare is not the Bible!”

“You’re right, Miriam. You’re absolutely right. Do you want to tell me what else you’re thinking about right now?”

“What does ‘Miriam’ mean in Greek?”

“Gosh, that’s a good question. ‘Miriam’ is actually a Hebrew word, which is a language even older than Greek.”

“Wow.”

Miriam slid across the bed, slowly inching closer to Ophelia.

“Yeah, and Hebrew is written from right to left instead of from left to right like English and a lot of other languages.”

“Cool!”

Now, Miriam had come close enough to touch.

“You bet; and in Hebrew, ‘Miriam’ means ‘beloved one.’”

“What does that mean?”

“That means that your name says you are ‘a person who is loved.’”

Ophelia punctuated her sentence by gently pressing her forefinger to the tip of Miriam’s nose.

“Ophelia?”

“Yes Miriam, the one who is loved.”

“I think that you help me.”

“Oh, I’m so glad that I could live up to my name…even if it is only in Shakespeare and not in the Bible!”

Miriam laughed and it sounded as pleasing to Ophelia as her mother’s wind chimes that hung over their old deck in the house in which she grew up.

Yes, you can still breathe…yes, you can still move your shoulders.

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