Stages of Grace - By Carey Heywood Page 0,11
just randomly hit something. If it was with another car could I be sued for damages? Did he hit something or was he hit by something? Part of me wants to march right up those stairs and demand answers from him, while another part of me is scared of his reaction.
Once my car warms up I begin my drive into work, paying special attention in case it seems to handle funny. I’m in luck because it’s driving okay. As I cross the river, I think about my parents. My mother would have known what to do with Jon, or my father would have beat him up, not badly, just enough to scare him. I feel overwhelmed and weepy, wishing they were still alive. I had been close with my mom. We talked more than any of my friends and their moms. I could pick up the phone and tell her anything. My mom was good at not judging and seemed to always have the best advice.
I wish I could have called her right then. I don’t want to talk to any of my coworkers about Jon. It was embarrassing. Between moving to the new apartment and being so busy with Jon, I had lost contact with my girlfriends from my single days. Would they even care or understand? Would they just want me to give up on Jon and call it quits? No one would be able to understand how good we had been together and how desperately I wanted that Jon back. Right now, though, what I wanted most of all was someone that I could talk to.
When I get to work, I take care to park the car in a way that the damage could not be seen by my coworkers. I switch my computer on and go to put my lunch in the fridge. Nikita is starting her computer and chatting animatedly about what she had done over the weekend, asking if I had done anything fun. I am checking the appointment log, thinking to myself that it is going to be a busy day, and didn’t hear Nikita the first time.
"Did you do anything fun over the weekend?" Nikita repeated herself.
"Oh, no, not really. Laundry."
Nikita's expression makes it clear she thinks that is a waste of a weekend. I listen quietly, nodding at all of the right moments as Nikita continues to gush about her weekend. I feel a little jealous, partly wishing I could go out bar hopping with a group of girls. Almost as though Nikita is reading my mind, she gives me an open invitation to go out with her sometime. It’s sweet, but as I look at Nikita, with all of her enthusiasm for life I just cannot relate to her. I thank her and go back to getting set up for the day.
It’s wintertime in Cleveland. To say we are busy with sick appointments is an understatement. I am on my feet most of the day and grateful for the distraction from Jon. At lunch, after bathing in hand sanitizer, I eat my sandwich and comb the want ads for anything Jon could be qualified for. There are some promising ads I circle. I brought a copy of Jon's most recent resume with me to work and fax it off before clocking back in. I spend the afternoon avoiding sneezes and coughs, silently admonishing some patients to cover their mouths. There seems to be a bug going around. I suck on a vitamin C drop and hope it skips me. Getting sick is the occupational hazard of working in a doctor's office.
In general, I am somewhat impervious to most of the bugs that go around and am very good about getting a flu shot every year, considering they’re an employment perk of where I work. Still, a bug knocks me on my ass every couple of years, and I am due for one. Just the thought of it make me squirt an extra dollop of sanitizer onto my hands. Once the last patient is checked out, I sit down to catch my breath. It doesn’t last long. I still have to tidy up the waiting room. My plan is to avoid getting sick, so I put on a pair of gloves before I stack and straighten all of the magazines in the waiting room. Considering the very visible waste basket in the waiting room, I am not pleased to find candy wrappers and used tissues on one of the tables.
Nikita and