Waiting Room

She shifted her weight on the chair, the fake leather complaining audibly beneath her. The skin on her thighs stuck slightly to the shiny finish and pulled at her, like a gentle pinch.

She felt she had been there too long. She feared she had not been there long enough. How odd, to have your mere presence mean something, to offer inactivity as one’s only helpful contribution.

It was hard to be so passive, to do nothing and have nothing to do. Elsewhere, in other circumstances, she could find something, however menial: switch the laundry, start dinner, sweep the floor. She itched for one of such mindless tasks that could allow her to pass time while feeling purposeful, a task that didn’t ask too much but could offer a faint whiff of accomplishment.

None of that, here. No way to feel useful; the only useful thing she could think to do was sit in this chair, fidgeting, listening to the protesting pleather beneath her, waiting, afraid to hope.

——

The windows were a kindness. They looked down on the valley below from enough of a height that she could get some distance from the lives below. Being a few stories removed helped to ease her bitterness, which flared and blinded her when she was too close. A couple, bickering at the grocery store. A child, crying at the park. These things irritated her, made her rage: where was their gratitude for breathing under an open sky? How dare they fail to celebrate their working limbs, to praise the hearts that beat without a second thought?

In moments of honesty, she knew the anger came because she had been among them, had been them, herself. She had held the same flippant attitude, the same forgetfulness. Now, she wanted to shake them awake, as if she could shake her former self.

Here, at least, from up high, those lives merged into a general and faceless Human Existence, a more comforting abstract, spanning generations and millennia, merging into the dance of time and space. She could look out this window, in her own fraction of time and space, and let the hills on the horizon (which never seemed ungrateful), help her escape.

——

He stared at the carpet beneath with more attention than, frankly, it deserved. It had been designed, he was sure, to hide filth and wear more than to offer any actual aesthetic appeal. Tiny whorls of polyester bundled in a tight, drab pattern: there had been a person, or several persons, who had decided this was the right carpet, the right pattern to put in this room, where he was now trapped. He had already paced the shapes and colors into his memory, creating an imaginary labyrinth through the subtly repeating patterns. It gave a vague purpose to his restlessness, a way to rationalize putting one foot in front of the next.

——

He wasn’t even sure if he should be here. When the news came, he was robotic; bought the ticket, made arrangements, gave the staff at the front door his name. Not till he arrived here, stepping off the elevators, had he stopped to wonder what prompted him: duty? Love? Shame?

He felt further away from him now than when the miles had sat between them. Before, there was an unspoken but retained right, the shelved but possible opportunity, to call, to visit, to repair. Now, that possibility had shrunken to a persistent, nagging Rolodex of Should Haves. Should Have said that, done that; Should Have Not said that, done that.

Hunger made a weak protest, a reminder of missed meals. He seemed glued to the chair, without enough willpower to stand and locate the cafeteria. Eating alone seemed more lonely and final than sitting alone in this waiting room, and vaguely selfish. It was the only form of penance he had accessible to him: letting his empty stomach churn.

——

He couldn’t help but think of the last time he had seen these logos, fonts and colors. This place was like a smell planted deep in memory, rushing back with waves of recall now that he was faced with it again. When he was here last, he was bursting with the anxiety that comes with anticipated joy. He was giddily nervous, then, when being here meant welcoming her into the world.

This time, he was afraid she would leave it. This time, he barely had the strength to refill his flimsy waxed cup at the cooler. The chair, with its plastic armrests, seemed an island, and he was shipwrecked there, hoping to be rescued by the only person he could not imagine saying goodbye to, and fearing he would have to.

——

They felt rather nonchalant, this time. Odd, how tasks such as finding the cafeteria was no longer a laborious process, needing clarification from a scrub-clad employee. It had become routine, nearly as much as rummaging in their own own kitchen.

They knew their absent-minded movement in these halls gave them a veneer of confidence, of boredom, even. Their focus could afford to be elsewhere, with repetition having bred the brain pathways needed for autopilot.

The overwhelming newness that stunned the other visitors seemed a luxury. How lovely, to not know where the second bathroom is, when the closer one is occupied. What would life be like, to not know to avoid the burger in the cafeteria, and get the chicken patty instead? Such meaningless pieces of knowledge, accumulated unwillingly; it was maddening to find they held them so casually.

They settled in. They always picked this chair, where the floor to ceiling windows met at 90° angles. By facing out, the truth of where they sat was out of view entirely. They knew they wouldn't be able to stand being anywhere but here, but sometimes, it was nice to pretend.

——

The ground kept shifting on her, and so she stayed seated. The four straight legs beneath her were far more reliable than her two. The shock, now days old, still reared it’s head from time to time, threatening her ability to control her limbs. It was better to sit.

The what ifs made her grateful: What if they hadn't been passing through town just as his symptoms started? What if they had decided to ignore them another hour before getting home? What if they had been traveling separately? What if?

The what ifs also threatened to double her over, since relief hadn’t: What if they had checked out (what she now know were) the warning signs a week ago? What if they had delayed the trip by a week instead of hoping to escape not just the problems of home but also the problems that came with creeping over the age of 60? What if they had followed through on their plans for change sooner, maybe ten years ago, when told about that first diagnosis (take this pill) or problem (and this pill). What if?

She tried to quiet the thoughts that scurried like flies on dung. She focused on the landscape panorama on the wall across from her: an attempt to bring a peaceful scene into a world of drips and tubes and eyes of loved ones that remained closed. She focused on the presence of her chair and the sound of the cold elevator doors opening intermittently behind her. She looked out over the streets below, silent from here. She eavesdropped on the staff at the nursing station, arranging for lunch breaks. She fixed her attention on what was here, and was comforted that it was, indeed, all here, each bit. Somehow, the tiniest detail felt vital to the survival of the one she loved, from the tissue box on the end table to the staff that buzzed along the hallways.

She remembered a time she had thought about working in a place like this. After decades of doing her best to forget those notions, it was both sweet and painful to acknowledge them again. Love and purpose hadn’t aligned for her, at least not as easily at it seemed to now for the generations after her. She had staved off regret with the pungent, tactile reality of love, and refused to consider the fear that kept stealing her strength: What would happen if he was gone?