Read Online The Waiting Room by T. M. Wright - Free Book Online Page A

big, watery hazel eyes. He was thin, and his Adam's apple bobbed as he talked. "Oh," he said in a creaking, high-pitched voice, "what was it that you were saying?"
    I thought of telling him it was none of his business, but he seemed harmless enough. I raised my chin to indicate the transit signs above him. "'Generation,'" I said, "seems to be the word of the hour."
    "Does it? Why's that?" His congenial smile became quizzical.
    Again I indicated the transit signs over his head. "I was talking about the advertising up there, above you."
    He leaned my way in his seat and craned his head around to look at the advertising. "Hiram Walker?" he said. "I don't understand." He straightened, looked at me.
    I forced myself to smile. My headache was gathering strength. "No, no, I mean ... if you look again, you'll see that some of the advertising has the word ‘generation' in it---"
    "It's thirty-eight years, you know," he cut in happily. "A generation is thirty-eight years. Most people don't know that. I know it. I'd guess that we're"—he pointed quickly at his chest, then quickly at me—“a good generation apart—"
    "Yes, sir," I said; I was growing annoyed with him. "I suppose we are."
    "But I don't see what it's got to do with the advertising." He looked again. "’Be a Pepper'? What's a Pepper?" He looked back at me. "What's a Pepper?—I know what salt is." He chuckled to himself.
    I nodded. The headache was very bad now; I put my hand to my temple.
    The man said, "You talk to yourself quite a bit, do ya? I had an aunt once who talked to herself from morning till night, nonstop—she talked about her life , she talked about her children, she talked about her lovers—I guess she probably had as many lovers as a dog has fleas—and she talked about all the Presidents she'd seen come and go, 'specially Hoover, 'specially Roosevelt—Teddy, not Franklin Delano—"
    "Please," I cut in sharply, "I'd rather just sit quietly."
    "And she talked about her houses, and she talked about her"—I closed my eyes; I realized he was going to rattle on for quite some time—"and she talked about her cats, she had plenty of cats, and she talked about everything under the sun from morning till night—"
    "If you don't mind . . ." I stopped; I was on the verge of shouting.
    "And she talked about sin, and she talked about God, and she talked about—" He stopped suddenly. I heard a harsh, gurgling noise. I opened my eyes, looked.
    The red-haired woman looked back; she was standing behind him, her eyes wide, hands hard on his throat, and he was groping crazily in the seat, eyes as wide as hers.
    "Love," she shrieked, "is sacrifice. Love is giving, and taking. Now do you love me, now do you love me?"
    The Puerto Rican couple vaulted from their seats, ran to the car ahead.
    The man in the gray pinstripe suit went limp under her hands.
    It was only then that I realized that the woman was the same woman I'd met on the ferry, the same woman who'd knocked at my door.
    I threw myself across the aisle at her, caught my groin on the seat edge, tumbled over so her heels were near my mouth, grabbed her by the ankle, yanked hard. She fell toward the window, hit it with the side of her head, and crumpled so her thighs fell across my arm, so her stomach went into my shoulder and a gust of foul air escaped her.
    I grabbed my groin and launched into a fit of panic-ridden cursing that continued a good minute or two, until, at last, I pushed myself to my feet and saw that except for the body of the man in the pinstripe suit—who had fallen over the seat, mouth open wide, feet on the floor—the car was empty.
    The train stopped moments later.

TEN
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    It was clear that the man in the pinstripe suit was dead.
    A well-dressed black man in his early thirties got on. He saw the man in the suit, gave him a quick once-over, and glanced questioningly at me.
    "Bum," I managed, "dead drunk," and shrugged. The man