Chapter 4: Echoes of the Operating Room

The air in the surgical wing of the old Sacred Heart Hospital (which used to be a Nursing School run by the Nuns) and Chapel l always held a peculiar chill, a damp, musty scent that clung to the peeling paint and the linoleum floors. But on this day , it was more than just the usual disquiet. It was a palpable tension, a prickling on the back of the neck that whispered of things unseen. I was doing my usual work shift. a at many times solo house keeper pushing My heavy cart through scary hallways and underground tunnels to get to the other 2 outer buildings ,cutting through the oppressive twilight , the only sound the rhythmic squeak of my sensible now blood stained shoes and uniform from the internal organs that some.of hurried Nurses forgot to wrap up throw away.....that in itself was a horror to behold. The tunnels were terrifying..many of the medical and housekeeping staff would at often times hear the ghostly screams of the lab dogs being put down to be dissected There was also the earth shattering appearances of the long deceased Nuns and patients seen down that very long dark tunnel..it seemed the faster You would walk the further down the exit seemed.

I’d always avoided the multiple operating theaters Even when it was active, a place of sterile efficiency and hushed urgency, it had felt…heavy. Now, with their self moving gurneys gathering dust and its surgical lights long extinguished, it was.more than a tomb. But as I passed its heavy, double doors, a sound drifted out, faint at first, then growing undeniably clearer. Every day when I would come to work My heart and blood pressure would race ,My face covered in cold sweat,My hands and legs would shake uncontrollably. My Husband Rex would wonder and ask when He would what was wrong and why I would stay there....( We needed the money and I needed the work credits to be honest.

It was a whimper. A low, pained sound, like a patient stifled by terror. My heart leaped into my throat, a frantic bird against its cage. My hand, slick with a sudden sweat, fumbled for the flashlight. I’d heard plenty of strange noises in Salt Lake Regional Hospital– the creaks of an old building settling, the distant hum of machinery from the active wards, even the occasional phantom cough from an empty room. But this was different. This was human.