It is December in Alabama and everyone has the flu or strep throat or a sinus infection. My own throat is raw with swallowing words that are not mine. I have been waiting in this room for an hour. There is nothing here but a blank wall, a metal chair, the exam table, and a red sharps container. There is no window to reassure me that I am in the world of the living. I unload the exam papers from my tote. I grade them in my lap. My neck aches from looking down so long. I stretch. I cough. I move the essays onto the white paper liner. The exam table is too soft and not conducive to writing. I wonder if the nurse will glower at me and then sanitize the space where the papers have been. I don’t remember how to spell the words I mean. My brain is pulsing and my running nose tastes like metal. The red pen scratches and then runs dry so I toss it into the sharps container. When the young-faced doctor arrives 45 minutes later, I really can’t remember if I am in his office or if he is in mine.
Joyce Kelley is a professor of English at Auburn University at Montgomery where she teaches courses in British and American literature.
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