medicinal
She walks past the desk, catching my attention. Her husband sits in a navy blazer over a vanilla sweater over a light-blue button-down and dark tie. Ordinarily strange but less so today.
Thirty seconds pass; I can’t turn away. He’s not dripping sweat? Added to the double amputee and the knitting woman in the ankle brace and adult diaper, his drawn-on, cartoon glasses border on normal.
He’s studying Hebrew, using a Byerly’s bag as a briefcase and wears blue-striped cotton pants. I’m drowning in odd. My insurance expires in days, forcing a halted, unwelcome and extensive medical tour.
I rarely visit the doctor—preferring the emergency room. This is a crash course in the clinical reality play. I have to wonder, Is this the usual cast of characters?
My dismissal was nearly inevitable but abrupt. Since, is a film out of focus with rare, fleeting scenes of foggy. Meals are spiced with uncertainty, anxiety stares at me from the corner.
Days pass without permission.
Dressed in an outfit a grandmother forces on her toddler grandson, the folded handkerchief in his front pocket snickers loudly. Still, it’s strangely reassuring.
He’s employed—maybe a professor, prop comic or seventeenth century author. Whatever the case, if he has a job, I will. A therapeutic mist drifts in from the hall. The fog thins slightly.