Dear Life

who was getting ready to test my mental stability. And then what would he have to say?”
    At the moment there is no doctor to be seen.
    Well, there wouldn’t be, would there? Doctors don’t sit behind desks here waiting for patients to show up.
    And she isn’t even here for a consultation. She will have to explain again that she is making sure of the time and place of an appointment for tomorrow. All this has made her feel rather tired.
    There is a rounded desk, waist high, whose panels of dark wood look like mahogany, though they probably are not. Nobody behind it at the moment. It is after hours of course. She looks for a bell but does not see one. Then she looks to see if there is a list of doctors’ names or the name of the doctor in charge. She doesn’t see that either. You would think there would be a way of getting hold of somebody, no matter what the hour. Somebody on call in a place like this.
    No important clutter behind the desk either. No computer or telephone or papers or colored buttons to press. Of course she has not been able to get right behind the desk, there may well be some lock, or some compartments she can’t see. Buttons a receptionist could reach and she can’t.
    She gives up on the desk for the moment, and takes a closer look at the space she has found herself in. It’s a hexagon, with doors at intervals. Four doors—one is the large door that lets in the light and any visitors, another is an official and private-looking door behind the desk, not that easy of access, and the other two doors, exactly alike and facing each other, would obviously take you into the long wings, to the corridors and rooms where the inmates are housed. Each of these has an upper window, and the window glass looks clear enough for anybody to manage to see through.
    She goes up to one of these possibly accessible doors and knocks, then tries the knob and cannot budge it. Locked. She cannot see through the window properly, either. Close up the glass is all wavy and distorted.
    In the door directly opposite there is the same problem with the glass and the same problem with the knob.
    The click of her shoes on the floor, the trick of the glass, the uselessness of the polished knobs have made her feel more discouraged than she would care to admit.
    She does not give up, however. She tries the doors again in the same order, and this time she shakes both knobs as well as she can and also calls out, “Hello?” in a voice that sounds at first trivial and silly, then aggrieved, but not more hopeful.
    She squeezes herself in behind the desk and bangs that door, with practically no hope. It doesn’t even have a knob, just a keyhole.
    There is nothing to do but get out of this place and go home.
    All very cheerful and elegant, she thinks, but there is no pretense here of serving the public. Of course they shove the residents or patients or whatever they call them into bed early, it is the same old story everywhere, however glamorous the surroundings.
    Still thinking about this, she gives the entry door a push. It is too heavy. She pushes again.
    Again. It does not budge.
    She can see the pots of flowers outside in the open air. A car going by on the road. The mild evening light.
    She has to stop and think.
    There are no artificial lights on in here. The place will get dark. Already in spite of the lingering light outside, itseems to be getting dark. No one will come, they have all completed their duties, or at least the duties that brought them through this part of the building. Wherever they have settled down now is where they will stay.
    She opens her mouth to yell but it seems that no yell is forthcoming. She is shaking all over and no matter how she tries she cannot get her breath down into her lungs. It is as if she has a blotter in her throat. Suffocation. She knows that she has to behave differently, and more than that, she has to believe differently. Calm. Calm. Breathe. Breathe.
    She doesn’t know if the panic has taken a long time or a short time. Her heart is pounding but she is nearly safe.
    There is a woman here whose name is Sandy. It says so on the brooch she wears, and Nancy knows her anyway.
    “What are we going to do with you?” says Sandy. “All we want is to get you into your nightie. And you go and carry on like a chicken that’s scared of being et for dinner.
    “You must have had a dream,” she says. “What did you dream about now?”
    “Nothing,” says Nancy. “It was back when my