Michael's Texas Embrace

I scanned the waiting room until I spotted an empty seat by an attractive woman. A brunette, older than me but still attractive, sitting next to a decrepit woman trembling in a wheelchair. The old lady had liver spots creeping across her head like slugs, some unfathomable migration towards death. The air smelled of menthol and disinfectant and some unsettling undercurrent—potpourri mixed with putrescence.

I sat beside the woman and casually looked her over as I reached for a magazine. The only choices were magazines on cooking and housekeeping or golf. I chose cooking and housekeeping.

“Waiting rooms always want to teach you to cook or putt,” I remarked with a smile.

The brunette returned my smile in a pained sort of way but said nothing.

“My father used to say, ‘Teach a man to putt, and he may win a round of golf, but teach him to cook, and you feed him for a lifetime,’” I said.

The old woman coughed and her wheelchair shook all over like a temblor was upon us. Her hazy, milky eyes bulged and watered.

My brunette friend wrapped her arms gently around the old woman’s shoulders, as if too much pressure would shatter the woman’s shoulder blade. The old woman issued a low steady moan and something viscous and dark slid from her mouth.

“I can see why you’re having her put down,” I remarked.

The brunette shot me an unkind look. “Put down?”