Mikhail didn't like his job very much but he was glad to have it. After all, it was a job. Something not easily gotten these days, especially for an immigrant from Ukraine. Only in this country long enough to obtain citizenship, Mikhail still struggled with his English language skills.

That was the one reason his job in the environmental services department did suit him; he didn't have to talk to anybody; just his boss and occasionally his co-workers, most of whom spoke English as a second language as well as making him feel comfortable in their company. He lived alone in a rented room for the same reason; he preferred solitude.

What Mikhail did not like about the job was its location, a hospital. Raised as a Russian Orthodox Christian, Mikhail had a strong faith in God that, in his mind, protected him from any exposure to the occult or supernatural. Still he felt uneasy having to be around sick and dying people. He couldn't exactly say why.

Maybe it was the smells; disinfectant urine feces room freshener spray all mingling together assaulting his senses in a most disagreeable way.

To be sure, the fact that many of the patients were uncomfortable and moaned or cried out from time to time did not help to relieve Mikhail's apprehension. He tried his best to ignore the smells and sounds and for the most part he was successful in doing so.

The night that Mikhail first began to question his beliefs had begun like most of his nights with him performing his custodial duties. He was wiping down the interior surfaces of an elevator when he was paged to clean up a spill in one of the intensive care unit rooms.

He didn't know what had been spilled, he never really did, only that it needed to be cleaned up and the job had fallen to him. He went to his storage closet got his cleaning cart and headed into the ICU.

The charge nurse directed him to the spill which lay just inside the sliding doors leading to room five. Mikhail moved his cart closer to the room and looked in at the floor.

It was the nature of the spill that caused a chill to creep up his spine. It had no odor but its color was an odd, almost fluorescent, shade of blue. Most noticeably, however, the spill was in the distinct shape of a cross!

Mikhail looked about the room. There was a female patient in the bed. There were two visitors standing on the far side of her bed. The older visitor had the same long gray hair as the patient and was holding her hand. She may well have been her daughter while the other much younger visitor may have been a granddaughter.

Beyond the women were the large picture windows that overlooked the parking lot. The ICU was on the second floor so no curtains were needed to prevent being seen from the outside. It was snowing outside and the fat flakes were visible as they floated down.

Mikhail caught his breath as his eyes focused not on the flakes, but on the window nearest the head of the patients' bed. It looked to be fogged over and in the middle of the fog was an image of another cross just like the one on the floor, same odd fluorescent blue color.

Both crosses resembled the one Mikhail had carried down the aisle of his church as an altar boy many years before.

Mikhail's hand trembled as he reflexively crossed himself and took a step backward. His eyes went from the image on the window to the patient. Her head was turned toward him, her closed eyes giving her the appearance of being comfortably asleep; just resting while getting well.

Mikhail knew better. He had cleaned the patients' room before and knew that she had been gravely ill for days and was not likely to survive. He had seen it before, many times, especially with the older ones.

Family members and close friends visit and pray and leave messages of love and encouragement against the hopelessness of the situation, taped to the bed rails where the patient could see if her eyes ever opened again.

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