I am a nurse in one of the most renowned children hospitals in the country. I have worked here for almost 8 years and I can only say it stands true to its title. The pay is good and I get along with my coworkers without much problem. Everything is perfect in this hospital except one thing,its Rizo the hospital clown.

When I joined this hospital I was told by my fellow colleagues about this rumour that has been circulating in the hospital since its establishment. The rumour is about a certain clown named Rizo (weird name right) who roams the hospital and visit the sick children. None of the adults has ever seen him but so many children have seen him over the years that it can't be considered as an elaborate prank.

When they told me about him  I thought they were trying to tease me for being a newbie and I took it as a joke and said yeah perhaps Cinderella visit on sundays too. They gave each other a look and left the topic at that. I got busy with work and completely forgot about our conversation. In my third week at the hospital I was doing the morning checkup on every patient on the floor when I entered Kevin's room he was awake and smiling from ear to ear.

"Good morning,why are you up so early?" I asked

"The clown came to me at night,he was so funny when he entered the room his pants fell and he duck walked to my bed because he was juggling balls so he couldn't pull his pants up" Kevin replied in one breath still smiling as if remembering the last night's event.

I remembered the conversation with my colleagues and thought perhaps they have set up an elaborate prank by involving this kid. This was going too far. I was a bit mad so I quickly finished the checkup and went to confront my Coworker. Her name was Emily. She has been working here for 13 years. She was the one who told me about the clown so naturally I thought she was the culprit behind the prank. She was in the lunch room drinking a cup of coffee.

"You need to stop with the prank,it has gone far too long and it isn't funny" I said approaching her table.

"What are you talking about,what prank?" She asked looking at me with confused look.

I rolled my eyes and said "don't act naive,you told me about the clown and to scare me you even involved a child to play part in your prank"

She stopped sipping on her coffee and gave me an odd look and said in a serious tone "explain from the beginning."

So I did just that I told her how I was going the routine rounds and told everything about my little chat with Kevin. After I was done I looked at her for an explanation.

She just sipped her coffee and stared at the table. Her face looked a little paler from when I entered the room and I noticed her hands were shaking a little bit. I stood there impatiently and was about to speak when she spoke.

"The clown is real." She continued."You can ask anyone from the staff it isn't a prank or test for new workers,the clown is real or as real as a ghost can be."

"A ghost?" I was a bit shocked to say the least. I do not believe in ghosts. I think the concept of them was created to scare small children.

"Yes, I don't know how to properly explain it but it has been here before I joined. No one knows who he is or where he came from. All I know is he can be seen by children only. We have tried to capture him in CCTV but there has been no evidence of a clown in any footage. He visits patient randomly we can't figure out any pattern in his visitations. He visits the patient make them laugh,talks to them and leave."

"So he is just a friendly clown that entertains children while they are sick,what a friendly ghost" I said jokingly .

"So it seems." Replied Emily " but we always pray that no child ever see that fucking clown."

"Why?"

She took a deep breath and looked me in the eyes and said " He is the harbinger of death. Whenever he visit someone, the patient dies within 2 days of seeing him. So all of us pray none of the patient ever see him. But now he has made an appearance. Poor kevin" sighs

It took a moment to understand what she was saying. "So you are saying kevin will die within 2 days?" She nodded.

"You know I almost believed your story but now I know your are full of shit. We just successfully removed his appendix. There is no real threat to his life. In fact, he is getting discharged today.  So you are saying a kid who has no serious health problems will die within 2 days just because a imaginary clown visited him. That's ridiculous."

Emily just stared while I was ranting and when I finished she got up and left the room. While passing me she said "you will realise soon enough." I stood there for a minute and then left the room to continue my work.

Just to make sure I visited Kevin's room and checked on him again. He was doing perfectly fine and was eager to go home. At 1 p.m. he was discharged from the hospital and next day he was dead.

His mother had gone to supermarket for groceries while his dad was at work. He was watching YouTube on his phone when she left. When she returned she called him to help her with carrying the groceries to the kitchen but he never answered. She went to her room and saw him lying on bed. She called him again but didn't stir. She rushed to check on him but he wasn't breathing. She called the ambulance but it was too late. The paramedics declared him dead.

I was beyond shocked when I learned about this news. He was doing well when he left yesterday. I inquired about his cause of death. Apparently the cause of his death was unknown. While I was still processing the information I came across Emily.

"From the look of your face I guess you have heard about Kevin's death. I already warned you this was going to happen but you didn't believed me."

I was getting angry as she spoke as if she was the reason kevin died. If she hadn't told me about the clown kevin would still be alive. I looked up and was about to yell at her when I looked at her face and realised she wasn't trying to be mean she was sad as well.

She continued "this is your first time right ? I have seen dozens of these deaths throughout my career and I was unable to stop them even when I knew about them. So I know how you are feeling."

"Is there no way to stop him ?" I asked softly.

She shook her head "no,if there was why would I have kept it a secret."

"Then why is this hospital still open why doesn't management close this hospital if we can't stop that clown from killing these poor children?" I asked a bit angrily.

"Because Rizo only appears in front of 3 -4 children in a year. As you know this is one of the best children hospital in our country,we save thousands of lives every year if we shut down what will happen to them. Setting up this kind of hospital will take a lot of time and money and still there is no guarantee that Rizo will not follow to new hospital."she replied

"Then we should forcefully shut the hospital down. We should inform the media or at least parents of these children. If they know nobody will bring their child to the hospital and then the clown will never appear." I said desperately.

"Did you believe me when I told you about the clown?" She asked.

I was silent.

"You didn't. Same will happen if we try to inform the world. No one is going to believe it. I mean, a clown no one can see except children and they die after seeing it, people will think it is just a publicity stunt to attract people's attention towards the hospital." She continued "besides some of these children require expert medical treatement which only we can offer. So some parents may bring their child even if they know about the clown just to save their child."

I stood their as a I knew she was correct. I have seen some of these children who will die if there were not in our hospital. I was feeling helpless. I was not sure what should I do.

"You should try to save as many of these children as you can. The clown will take a few but you should try to focus on the patients you have saved through your work. This may help a you little to keep you sane."

With that she left me there standing alone to continue her work. I stood their for a while thinking about her words and I decided then and there I will follow her words I will try to save every patient that I can no matter how much time it takes.

Years passed and I threw myself into work. During the first 6 years of my work Rizo appeared 23 times in front of children. All 23 of them died. These last 2 years Rizo didn't appear at all. Me and everyone else thought he has left for good. But all of our Hope's were shattered today.

There were 283 patients in hospital rooms last night. He appeared in all of them.