The Waiting Room

Waiting is like a midnight journey, and on a midnight journey there are only strangers.

I am waiting. It is a curious thing to be waiting. It is very much like a midnight transit from one event to the next. A person who is waiting should feel as if they are journeying on a dark road somewhere; he should never feel quite safe. A person who is waiting should treat each person he meets as a stranger. Until one has returned to some period of time without waiting, there can be no friends, only vague unsympathetic faces.

The room is too well-lit. The light shows all that a good light should, but it cannot restrain itself and pours over into the dirty corners as well. In these corners, behind cheaply made tables, are the corpses of insects and bits of dust. There is a person responsible for taking these things away, for cleaning these unclean corners. It is obvious that this person does not feel that responsibility. I would someday like to meet this person so I can tell them of my time in this room with the dirt they left behind. I would not condemn or berate them; I would simply recount my story.

I am seated. I require a form to file an application request. That form is located behind a number of hours of men and women seeking similar things for similar reasons. I do not begrudge them their task. Though, for each satisfied moment that passes between now and my own obtaining of a form, I am made slightly more their enemy. It becomes slightly more in my interest to see that someone should be too sick or too weak to wait in line. Perhaps someone could be called away by the news of a close friend’s accidental death at the hands of some purely random event. It would certainly be to my benefit if a homicidal maniac--a murderer of countless, nameless people--were in line in front of me. A police officer might also be waiting and recognize the creature. One would pursue the other in chase. The police officer would not need to catch this man; they will have already given up their places in line. The rules are the rules, after all.

There is a woman’s voice. I believe it has something to do with the woman beside me and it feels very far away. I turn my head slightly so as to be able to see the woman without being noticed. It is distant because she is speaking into a phone. The conversation is meant to be private and I am not to listen to it. Despite every word I hear, I cannot help but note how anonymous it remains. Words like “love” are said. The name Bernard is mentioned (a name which could belong to anyone, the least of which being the Bernards of the world). These words are moist and wanting and they feel even farther away. The words that come before and after are stretched as if they are trying to keep these special distant words in line. They are failing. The woman’s voice begins to crack.

I stare. I suddenly realize my head is turned completely towards her and I am watching her intently. She sees me and her face becomes red. I can feel myself become hotter and my ears become very itchy. I wonder how long I have been staring and how much shame I should feel in proportion. I am frozen slightly. Her conversation has now completely stopped. She places one fine delicate hand over the receiver of the phone. Her nails are painted a dark, rich red so as to denote a certain acceptable lust, but whether she knows this is unclear.

She accuses. She looks me straight in the eye and says, “Do you mind?” I believe the words are an accusation, but I don’t know what it is I am being asked if I mind or not. There are certain things which bother me. There are many things with which I am at peace. There are many more things I could simply never express my opinion about to a woman with red nails. What can I tell her? My answer does not seem to come quick enough.

She moves. The place she has moved to is perhaps three feet farther away. This is a meaningful distance to her. She seems to have put some thought into her new place. Her new seat is beside one of the many small brown plastic tables. It is located directly under an opaque glass window which obscures the darkened elementary school outside. Beside her is an old woman. Perhaps she trusts this old woman in a way she could never trust me. The old woman looks as if she may know something no one else does. I very much doubt that she would tell it even if tortured. The woman on the phone takes one last disapproving look at me and returns to her conversation. I imagine she will apologize for the interruption brought on by the rude man in the waiting room. That is all I will be.

I am the rude man in the waiting room. I did not want this. I look down at my hands. They look like the hands of a rude man, so perhaps I could not help it. My ears only become itchier. The urge to scratch them becomes unbearably strong, but I realize that this would be an improper, wrong thing to do in public. My hands make an attempt, but I manage just barely to keep them under control. After all, they are my hands.

A gruff male voice calls out. A number is called and I am reminded that I am waiting. I am waiting for my number to be called. I am waiting for my turn. I look at the occupants of the room. There is the lady, whose beautiful nails are too far away now. There is the old lady with the secret. Among the many other men and women seeking similar things for similar reasons, there are whispers and conspiracies.

I joke to myself. Among this collection of individuals, there may be one desperate enough to hold up the entire room like a bank and take all the forms. There is no reason to take more than the one as long as one uses pencil. Pencils are key in this world. Unless one wanted to deprive all others of them. This must be a person who has been passed in line by other more cunning people. This is a person who has been forced to the back of the line one too many times.

I search the room. I am looking for this wild-eyed maniac hoping that I might be in time to stop her. Perhaps I will be a hero. I begin to smile at how embarrassed the woman on the phone will be. She should have considered herself lucky to be the object of a hero’s stare, but instead she spurned him. I search the room with increasing energy, before I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I look like a wild-eyed maniac. On a midnight journey there are only strangers.