The Kingdom Land (31 page)

It was the doctor's unwillingness to talk that
worried Erik the most. It was obvious that the problem was more
than a scratch. Dr. Irvin arranged an appointed with a doctor in
Great Falls for the next day. He didn't give Erik an option about
whether he wanted to go or not.

The appointment was set for 11 am so the Coopers
would have enough time to drive the two hours to Great Falls. The
doctor said Erik shouldn't be driving and the Coopers would have to
take him. The specialist would be more qualified to tell him more.
He didn't want to say anything else and make a false evaluation.
That refusal, combined with Dr. Irvin's side-glances and whispers
to his nurse, made Erik's thoughts run wild in speculation. Erik
didn't dream in the bunkhouse. Neither did he sleep.

When Erik got back to the Coopers', it was decided
that Henry would take Erik to Great Falls. Dr. Irvin had personally
called the Coopers to make sure Erik didn't make the drive himself
or simply stay home. The Coopers knew as much information as Erik
when he pulled into the driveway leading to the farmhouse.

Mary would stay home to make meals for the one hired
hand that was left after the harvest. They also felt that it was
making too big of a deal of the matter if they both went. They knew
it was serious, but until they knew exactly what was happening they
didn't want to scare Erik even more. Besides, if Mary had insisted
on going, she knew she would talk constantly on the way to Great
Falls because of her nerves. Neither man needed that.

The two had to leave the farm by 8:30 to make sure
they had time to make the trip and find the office. Great Falls was
still only a medium-sized town of 100,000 to most, but a large city
to anyone from Fairfield.

As Mary turned the last batch of bacon, it was clear
that neither had slept. The silence also made it clear that neither
man was looking forward to the trip today. Usually the trip to
Great Falls carried a certain excitement. The trip meant going to
the “big city” and stores that Fairfield didn't have. Not that day.
Erik had never been to any doctor except Dr. Irvin and he
envisioned a specialist's office as a sterile combination of
machines and sick people. Henry stole looks in Erik's direction as
often as possible. He was afraid of Erik's reaction as much as he
was Erik's eyes. Each time his uncle looked, the car went over the
center line.

“
You might want to pay more
attention to the road than looking at me or we'll both be seeing a
doctor, but not a eye doctor,” Erik said, his stare remaining
straight ahead.

As they passed through Shelby and headed south to
Great Falls, Henry tried but wasn't at all successful in getting
Erik to talk. Erik would only engage in trivial matters about the
farm and soon grew flippant in his remarks. Every time Henry would
ask about Erik's eyes, Erik would get even more sarcastic. It was
an old habit that Henry hated to see. It was obvious that there was
nothing Henry could do. Under his breath he prayed, knowing that
Erik had retreated into his own world. He had been through so much
with Erik that it was impossible to imagine what might happen
now.

Erik's mood changed quickly as they pulled up to the
brick building that housed the eye clinic. There was something
about the reality of those bricks that could not be overlooked or
flippantly put aside. As they walked into the office with its
brightly colored partitions and magazine shelves, both men were
silent.

A receptionist was arguing with a patient about a
bill that needed to be paid before the visit. The Hispanic-looking
man had problems speaking English, and this only increased the
fervor of her pleas. Erik wished the argument could be solved so
that he could check in and be seated. He wanted to lose himself in
the waiting room like he had in his own bunkhouse. As he looked
around many of the patients had large patches or thick lens
glasses. Still, he told himself that none of them had a problem as
great as his. Somehow seeing those other patients finally made him
acknowledge he had a problem. He couldn't yet define the magnitude
of the problem, but he knew the consequences would be great. In a
strange way he now wanted his problem to be greater than the
others.

It was a full hour before Erik was taken back to a
room, and another half hour before the doctor came in. Erik told
Henry to go get something to eat from the diner they saw next door.
Of course, Henry refused and even insisted on going back to the
examining room with Erik. Many thoughts passed through Erik's mind
as he waited for the doctor. None of them were positive. The only
positive presence was Uncle Henry. Erik felt like a little kid
whose mommy had brought him to the doctor, but that was a feeling
he cherished as he sat there looking at a bad picture hung on the
wall.

When the doctor finally arrived, it was obvious he
was a busy man who was already behind in his schedule. He stuck out
his hand as a hollow gesture of greeting, and stated that his name
was Dr. Adler. Adler didn't wait for Erik's response. He was
focused on his job, not the person. He turned down the lights and
put a banded light on his head that reminded Erik of a miner going
to work. Uncle Henry was not acknowledged as he sat in his corner
of the room. He leaned forward to hear the doctor but still far
enough away to not get in the way.

Dr. Adler quickly asked Erik a series of question as
if reading from a cue card. “Have you seen strobe light flashing
lights? When did you first notice the sight loss? Do you see better
in the morning or evening?”

Many of the questions Erik couldn't answer. If
something seemed different it was just a bad day and not an eye
problem. It was just an eye, and nothing would happen to his
eyes.

Then the doctor asked even stranger questions of
Erik. “Are you constantly thirsty? Have you lost weight recently?
Are you constantly urinating? Are you having problems with
depression? The nurse will be putting drops in your eyes so I can
see them better.”

The doctor left without saying when he'd be back. The
nurse put the drops in his eyes and said he'd have to wait twenty
minutes and she was gone. Erik and Uncle Henry were left in the
semi-dark room alone.

Neither Erik nor Henry talked for the forty-five
minutes before the doctor returned. Every minute or two, Erik would
look at his watch to see how long they had been waiting. He didn't
know if it was the drops or the darkness or a worsening of his good
eye, but his watch was both a marker of time and his worsening
sight. The quiet room carried thoughts of the worst scenarios.

When the doctor returned, the exam did not take long.
Dr. Adler directed a light that was bright enough to hurt. The
doctor firmly held Erik's eyelids open, and gave a series of
directions.

“
Look up towards the ceiling. More,
as far up as you can. Now look to the right. To the upper right.
Now to the lower right.” He barked the orders like a drill
sergeant. He was as a man who had done this so many times before
that it had long ago lost its significance. He had Erik turn both
eyes in every possible direction. Although the doctor's grasp was
firm, the pain wasn't that bad, but Erik still grew sick in his
stomach. He tried to hide his emotions, but then that didn't
matter. The doctor's exam was too close and too thorough for there
not to be a problem. The doctor placed the light on the table, and
reached to flip the room light switch to on.

“
Erik, do you have any history of
diabetes in your family?” the doctor quizzed.

“
I…I don't know. My parents are
dead.”

“
None that we know of,” Henry
contributed from the back of the room.

“
Well, for one reason or another,
you've had a growth of blood vessels on the retina of both eyes.
Usually that's attributed to diabetes. We think the eye does not
receive enough oxygen because of the diabetes, and the eye tries to
compensate for this deficiency by growing additional blood vessels.
Unfortunately, those vessels are weak and randomly scattered like
weeds in a garden.

“
You may have been a diabetic for
years and never known it because you didn't have the common
symptoms. Type II diabetes, which you might have, still produces
some insulin in the body. You're young and active so you might not
have noticed it. At the same time, it could have attacked your
body. But I can only guess at that. You'll have to go to an
endricologist, a diabetic specialist, to find that out. What I know
is that these vessels have grown. The vessels are extremely
delicate and grow in no set pattern. They can become like clothes
lines from one side of your eye to the other. That has happened in
your left eye and is in the process in your right eye. In your left
eye the vessels have burst and filled your eye with blood. That fog
you mentioned is your own blood.

“
The other eye obviously hasn't
hemorrhaged yet, and we'll start treatment right away to minimize
that possibility. We have developed a new laser treatment by which
we shoot the retina of the eye with a laser beam. It actually kills
the spot we hit and tends to make the vessels recede. We've had
success with this treatment if we do it early enough. I wish you
would have come in earlier. I'm not sure how far the process has
spread or if we can stop it at this point.

“
Your bad eye is in a different
category. When you first saw specks in your left eye, we could have
helped it with laser. It's too late for that now. We'll have to
look at other surgery for that. I don't do that surgery. You'll
have to go to Seattle if you want to try it.”

“
But what made it bleed? I was
sleeping when it happened. There's no way I could've strained it.”
Erik had developed a frightened edge to his voice as he heard words
that made no sense to him.

“
The hemorrhages can happen at any
time. You could have hibernated for the winter and they still
would've burst. It's not a function of exertion. It's a function of
the disease process. Small vessels have developed. The traction
caused by those vessels are tugging at other vessels and pulling
them loose, causing the bleeding. The bad news is that if that
condition remains it will pull your whole retina apart and there
will be no chance for your eye.”

“
What's the chance for it
now?”

“
I've got to be honest with you, Mr.
Winters. We don't exactly know. The specialist in Seattle will be
able to tell you more, but they have only been doing the surgery
for two years now and it's still somewhat experimental. The results
are sometimes not satisfactory. Just be glad because two years ago
you wouldn't even have had this option.”

“
What is the surgery?”

“
They will place two tubes in your
eye. One tube will remove the blood and vitreous fluid, and with a
micro-drill they cut away the clothes line vessels. The other tube
will replace the lost fluid to keep your eye at a constant
pressure. It's called a vitrectomy.”

“
What happens if I decide not to do
it?”

“
Your eye will continue to have the
traction placed on it, and at some point the retina will be torn
loose. At that point there is no treatment for your eye. You'll be
totally blind, not just legally blind.”

“
When would I need this
vit…whatever?”

“
As soon as possible. I'll contact
Seattle, but you should start making arrangements. The longer the
traction exists, the worse it will get. You have already waited a
long time by not coming in. Actually, because of the strain on your
bad eye, we'll have to put off laser treatment on the other eye
until we have your eye stabilized after surgery. Your good eye is
in an advanced stage, and it could hemorrhage at any time, but we
will wait because of how bad the other eye has become. It would
have been different if you had come in earlier, but there is now no
time to wait. The sooner we can get both eyes done, the more hope
there is that you don't have a total loss of vision.”

“
Why do I have to go to Seattle? Why
can't you do it here? You said it was just putting in two
tubes.”

“
Those tubes constitute probably one
of the most delicate surgeries around, and, as I said, it's still
experimental. Seattle and San Francisco are the only two places
west of Minnesota that do the surgery. You'll be in the hospital
for about a week, and it'll take a month to recover at
home.”

Erik didn't want to hear any more. Previously, his
stomach had felt nauseous with the bright light. Now he was sick at
the thought of what lay ahead. He just wanted to get out of that
room with its smell and its darkness. They were wrong. The whole
crummy place with its bad pictures and crowded lobby was wrong. He
just wanted to get out. As soon as the doctor moved his equipment
to the side, Erik was gone. He didn't exactly run, but his feet
were quick to move towards the door. Henry tried to stop him,
saying there were arrangements that needed to be made, but Erik
told him he could make the arrangements. No one could keep him in
that office any longer.

Once outside the building, Erik walked. He didn't
walk in a specific direction, or with any destination in mind. He
walked with long, quick strides that took him past the city
buildings. This was not a metropolitan area, but Erik saw the
pavement and stuffiness a city brings. He saw objects that he
normally would have overlooked; a sign marking a pedestrian
crossing, the sculptured face work of the older buildings, and
people of every description walking without seeing each other.