There is a man dying in the next room. Very quietly, with the minimum of fuss, but very decidedly dying.

In March, Mr Cotton was diagnosed with liver cancer. He refused chemo.

I moved to the grey house at the top Coultart Grove in May, and most days Cotton never moved from his bench on the verandah. He could still speak, but the words slurred together until only his closest family could make sense of his wants and needs.

By early June, he had moved from his house next-door into the room behind mine, and he hasn’t left it since, save for two trips to the hospital in St Ann’s Bay.

It’s hard to know how to feel about the situation. Certainly, it is not comfortable, and I struggle to write about this in such a way as to be respectful, while still staying true to my own experience, so please, be patient with me.

How do I feel about it?
I have never had the privilige of knowing Mr Cotton the way Sister Betty does, or the way his friends do. By the time I arrived, he had shrunk away from the outside world to become a shadow of the man he must once have been, someone who was a loving father, a devoted brother, a good friend to many.
Now, without speech or mobility, he is a mere husk of a human being, and I am emotionally removed without being apathetic, if that’s at all possible.

It’s hard to see the toll this is taking on Sister Betty, and it amazes me to see how much strength is packed into this small Jamaican woman who has already lived through so much tragedy. In many ways, she is as crippled as Cotton. Her days revolve around the dying man, coaxing food into him, changing diapers, calling concerned relatives abroad, chasing down prescriptions. She cannot leave the house for long without worrying about what might happen in her absence. She is tired, so very very tired, bouyed up only by a deep faith and the knowledge that things could not be any other way.

An endless stream of visitors come to pay their respects. I dread Sister Betty’s departure, because I end up playing the gatekeeper to the sickroom. Newcomers greet me with caution and curiosity, then resentment that a strange white girl should deny them access to this man they’ve known so long. I categorically send everyone away, I am not comfortable deciding if Mr Cotton is well enough to see visitors, and I am loathe to disturb him.

Family comes from overseas, first a tall, glamourous daughter from Burmuda, then (now) another sibling, Sister Betty’s twin brother and his children from C-o-n-n-e-c-t-i-c-u-t. The house is full of belching, gut scratching, throat itching. Sideways comments about male family members are made and I have no response. The women have no time for me, they are brisk and efficient, glad to be needed. They move decisively around the kitchen, frying, roasting, boiling endless pots of food.

I have never felt more superfluous in my life, witness to this thing, this monumental loss in so many lives, but not mine. I wonder, will I cry? Will I be sad? Is it even my place to feel anything at all? I don’t know. All I can do is wash the dishes and wait, like everyone else, for the end.