”That mole
is far too big for the jar,” I thought as I stared at the offending body part
on my desk.
The mole
filled the entire jar, the sides pressing against the clear plastic. My
knowledge of mole anatomy isn’t what it used to be, but I’m almost certain this
thing was mooning me. The doctor told me it came from the backside of a man who
was very nice, which is pretty obvious since he’d have to be pretty damn nice
to be kind enough to let his unformed twin live on his backside for half a
century.
 |
| It was bigger than this one. Way bigger. The thing had its own moon. |
Alas, the
twin was gone now, sitting on my desk, waiting for me to ship it off to a pathological
laboratory where someone would cut it up, probably to find perfectly formed
teeth and hair and the stray dog it had for dinner before unceremoniously being
chopped off, dumped into a jar and dropped off at my desk.
I was
debating using my lunch to bribe the mole into jumping into the padded envelope
on its own without me actually having to touch the jar when I heard it.
The silence.
My office
is situated in a very long hallway used by people to get from one part of the
healthcare center to the other. All day long people walk past, using varying
degrees of vocal restraint and stomping volume. But now, grave-like silence
settled over my forgotten hallway.
And then,
the footsteps. Slow, shuffling footsteps. Someone was making their way toward
my office, one agonizingly slow step at a time. And then I heard the grunts. Whoever
was in that hallway was slowly limping and grunting their way to my door and I
thought about the Walking Dead episode I saw last night. The only difference
between the sound the walkers on the show made and the sound this person was making
was the surround system. I was fairly sure I hadn’t seen any zombies walking
around when I got to work, but I was still pretty much asleep at that point.
 |
| I was pretty sure it was this guy coming for a visit. |
The steps
came closer, and stopped outside my door. As if in slow motion, someone grabbed
the handle and rattled it, no doubt trying to get in to eat me. And not in a
good way, either. I grabbed the closest weapon I could find, and stapler in
hand, I opened the door.
It wasn’t a
zombie. It was worse.
In the
hallway stood one of the patients from the mental ward
in the other end of the building. This particular patient killed his parents
with an axe when he was just a little boy, and is at the mental level of a
4-year old. He can’t walk very well and wears a helmet 24/7. He’s allowed to
walk around in the healthcare center as long as he doesn’t stop to harass
anyone. Like, with an axe, or something. I sternly told him to go back, and the look
he gave me couldn’t have killed anyone because looks don’t kill, but it was not
a nice look.
