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The Waiting Room

This chair is stiff and stale-smelling. This whole place is kind of musty and cold. I almost feel claustrophobic in this square, plain-walled room. The off-white color is unsettling, or maybe the walls have just turned into a dull white over time. It feels lifeless in here but I wondered if it was because of all the people who looked lifeless. I think I can feel someone staring at me, someone sitting close to me. I don’t like this feeling; I should have just awkwardly stood to the side but I already made my way to the back corner where the only empty seat was. It feels like I'm trapped back here now. The room is so quiet but it seems so loud.

I feel a little anxious as I lift my head to peek out from under the hat that’s covering my sight of view. I can hide under this hat all day. There are a ton of different faces; each person unique with a different story. I'm intrigued. I lay my arms in my lap because the feeling of these brick-like arm rests pain me. Then it happened…

I made eye contact with someone and for that split second my body felt uncomfortable and hot. I wondered if they thought I was staring at them. I wondered if anyone was even staring at me in the first place. I wondered if they were actually staring at me, what they were thinking about. Were they trying to figure me out? Did they think they knew my story?

I heard someone cough and gather the phlegm in the back of their throat as if they were about to spit. I feel repulsed but curious enough to look. It was a young girl; her blue eyes looked sad and lonely. She was about 20-something, distraught, her shoes worn in from years of wear. I caught a glimpse of the tiny tattoo on her wrist; it looked like a connect the dots picture of nothing. I don’t know why, but I tried to figure her out. She ran away from her suburban home a while back because she couldn’t take the pressure from her parents, I thought. She wanted to come to New York for fresh start, just like she always saw in the movies. No money, no nearby family; just a little hope she could piece her life back together. Then it clicked. The dots were obstacles or challenges she wanted to overcome... She wanted to connect the dots. She coughed again, this time the sound of the phlegm really nauseated me. She didn’t even cover her mouth.

My butt cheeks are tingling now from sitting too long without moving. I can feel my toes becoming numb too. The receptionist calls in the next patient and it shakes me from my daze. I lose my train of thought as I shuffle my body around in this hard chair to get comfortable.

Tap, tap, tap... I can hear this faint, consistent, annoying  noise that makes me twitch every time. I realize he’s not going to stop anytime soon. I don't think he even realizes his flimsy plastic slippers are making that noise. He continues to anxiously shake his leg. He’s in his mid-30’s, decent looking with hazel-blue eyes, a defined jawline, and broad shoulders; his hair was styled with a modern day pompadour. He was a anxiety-driven businessman disguised in cheap sweats and slippers, I thought. He kept checking his Apple watch. The lack of sleep from long hours at the office left him weak, pale, and sick. All he could think about was the conference call he was about to miss. I can tell his runny nose is bothering him, mostly because he doesn’t have any tissues. He’s frustrated. He adjusts his legs and starts tapping the other foot. The sound of this slipper hitting the floor is far more irritating than the other one was. I shift my body away but it's not like it will stop the noise.

I can hear music but not clearly; it’s muffled. It sounds miles away but I know it’s so close. It's coming from the headphones of a gloomy-looking, middle-aged man. He was buff but not in an attractive way. His growing beer-belly peeped out from in between his old Cape May t-shirt and tearaway pants. He was disheveled; his finger nails were still filthy with dirt from yesterdays day of work. He keeps viciously scratching the back of his hair-covered neck with those dirty fingers. I think I can tell his neck irritated and red under all those thick brown strands of hair. He worked in construction, I thought, and contracted something along the lines of poison ivy while on the job. The music stops for a minute as I see him adjust the earbuds. I think he pretended to, just so he could get a few more scratches in without anyone noticing. I wondered if he noticed me noticing him? He touched the arm rest and end table with those fingers. I think he touched a few magazines that were sitting on the center table earlier too. The thought of his rash has me feeling queasy now.

Click, click, click… That clicking sound effect the iPhone makes is going to make me rip my ears off. If only he could turn the volume off. And there he goes, with no regard, he continues to text and play YouTube videos. I can hear the video crystal clear; someone is trying to play an elevator prank on someone else. It sounds funny. I wish I could peek over and just see what’s happening. I see him wipe his running nose with the sleeve of his shirt and I immediately repeal that wish. That was disgusting. He’s young, but looks mature. He just turned 21 and wants to explore the world, I thought. He's thirsty for fame. He's waiting for his Instagram followers he just purchased to load so he can officially hit 30k followers. He watches the YouTube videos filled with jealously; I can kind of see it in his eyes. He sniffles then lifts his sleeve to wipe his nose again. His mucus-covered sleeve is disgusting.

It was an hour later when I was finally set free from that germ-infested, padded-cell-type room. Merely twenty minutes later I had to revisit it to check out. Some of the faces I had seen earlier were gone, some were still there. The musky odor and the drab, overbearing claustrophobic feelings were definitely still there. I never realized how aware or observant I really am. I never realized how boorish people could be. And I still wondered what they thought of me, what story they curated of me. The room is still so quite. 

I guess I never expected to learn anything from sitting in a waiting room.