The television in the doctor’s office is blaring news headlines. It plays disturbing footage, followed by politicians who explain that the world itself is crumbling.
The people in this waiting room watch the TV. Most are sick. If you close your eyes, you’ll hear hacking and coughing.
Welcome to the Fifth Circle of Waiting-Room Hell.
The woman beside me is dog sick. On my other side is a boy with a snotty upper lip. His cough sounds like a ‘67 Buick Roadmaster on a cold morning.
I move to the other side of the room, away from people who look like they’re about to write their own obituaries. I sit next to a man whose eyes are closed.
He hears me.
“Hello,” he says, without opening his eyes.
His name is Dan. He’s blind.
Dan wears a smile on his unshaven face. He shoves his hand in my general direction and we shake. We start talking.
The television overhead is loud enough to drown
us out, but we manage.
“I play guitar,” Dan says. “I’m not very good, but I play. Thinking of learning piano, too. My wife bought me a keyboard for my birthday.”
His wife is beside him, reading. Silver hair. Lines around her eyes. “He can do anything,” she says. “He even drew a portrait of me.”
Dan tells me that he printed a photo of her. She pricked holes into the paper with a needle, outlining the facial features. Then he traced.
His wife shows me the portrait on her cellphone. The word impressive comes to mind.
Dan also tells me he had a dream a few nights ago.
“It wasn’t just any dream,” he says.
It was a visual dream. The first time he’s seen anything since age two. At least he thinks he saw something. Truth told, Dan doesn’t even…