I’m a few minutes early for my treatment, so I sit out in the waiting area. Carol, my fellow hyperbaric patient, is already there, along with a man in a leg brace. A man and woman in scrubs walk by with a rusty goldendoodle. They approach the man in the leg brace and ask if he likes dogs. “This is a roaming service animal, if you would like to say hello.”
The man pets the dog and the couple moves on to Carol. “Oh, I love dogs,” she gushes, and rubs the dog behind his ears. Its tail wags madly. The couple and the dog then pass in front of me but do not stop, continuing on around down the hall.
“I like dogs,” I call after them, but they’ve rounded the corner. Carol shrugs. “Screw this shit,” I say, and head into the office, not caring if they’re ready for me or not.
*
KC was gone for a week. I missed her smart-assed banter. She's always touching me or punching me on the arm but she's like that with everyone.
While she was gone, one of the former hypberbaric patients stopped by and dropped off a large white rose for her from his garden. They didn’t have any vases so they placed it one of those bent plastic urinals, the same kind they give us to take into the chamber. “Here’s your good luck charm,” they always say as they place the urinal on our legs, the idea being, if we take it in, we won’t need to use it.
After a few days the rose begins to wither, and after a week, it has shrunken into a dry yellow fist. I comment on this and Jessica glances at it and says, “Yeah, not looking so good, is it.” But the next day it’s still there, and the day after that, and the day after that.
When she comes back from vacation, KC tells me about a stray cat that’s been visiting her new condo.
“Every time I open the door she just walks right in,” she says. I ask how her regular cat likes it. “Oh, Cathy gets really pissed but, then when the other cat leaves she runs after it as if begging it not to go,” she says. She shows me photos, leaning against me and holdng my arm as she flips through them. The new cat is milky white and pristinely groomed. Cathy is black and gray with spiky fur and deranged-looking whiskers. We both laugh at the contrast. Though KC is five years younger than me, lately her face looks pallid and worn. There's a sadness about her, but when she laughs ,her eyes narrow and her face erupts into wrinkles and she looks quite beautiful. As I hop off the bed, I glance at the windowsill. Sunlight is streaming in, causing the edges of the withered rose to glow like a smoldering coal.
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