Waiting

Karen hurried into the library and looked up at the clock above the information desk as she made her way past rows of bookshelves. Four o’clock. Good. She wasn’t late after all. The doctor’s appointment had taken longer than she expected, and not wanting to keep her student waiting, she had flown down the freeway and run in from the parking lot. She slowed her step when she looked left toward the four oblong tables in the Teen section and saw no one was there. Relieved and annoyed at the same time, she slung her black tote bag full of books and tablets down on the third light oak veneer table. She pulled one of the slate blue upholstered chairs up to the end of the table and positioned another one just around the table corner to her right before she sat down and sighed deeply. The chairs, she noticed, were just like the ones in the doctor’s waiting room.

* * *

“He’s running late today,” Sally the doctor’s receptionist said. “Take a seat, Karen, and I’ll call you. You know the drill.”

Karen found a seat on one of the stiff blue chairs in the waiting room. She had once asked Sally why they had such uncomfortable straight-backed chairs, and Sally said that type of chair was easier for the moms-to-be to get in and out of. Karen had just nodded, thinking that they were still damned uncomfortable chairs. She squirmed in hers, trying to get settled as she looked around the waiting room.

A young girl with long straight blond hair was engrossed in last month’s People magazine. Her bangs shielded her eyes and her free hand absently stroked her belly as she read. Early twenties, Karen guessed, six months pregnant. Maybe she should have done that, Karen thought, instead of going with the career first.

Across the room a couple in their mid-thirties sat holding hands, talking softly to each other. Karen remembered when David used to come to these appointments with her. This morning he’d left for Chicago on business and she hadn’t even told him she was seeing the doctor.

* * *

Okay, where was her student? She looked up at the clock again. The white minute hand jumped to 4:03 on the round black face. There had been no voice mail from Josh on her cell phone, but the others hadn’t called her to cancel either. Four of them had bailed on her already this week with no advance notice. Was Josh going to be the fifth? She hated changes in her plans, hated having her time wasted. With another sigh, Karen pulled the calculus workbook out of her tote, retrieved a pencil from her purse and sat back to wait.

She had purposely chosen the library for her tutoring sessions. It was quiet, centrally located and all the kids and parents knew where it was. It was a neutral setting, non-threatening and efficient. She usually scheduled two or three students in an afternoon at one-hour intervals. As one finished up, the next one arrived. When the last student left, Karen packed up her books and followed him out. There was no down time – no lingering in the stacks after her work was done.

* * *

Sally called out for Tiffany Sellars, and the twenty-something blond put down her magazine and pushed herself out of the chair. She looked over at Karen with a sheepish grin and said, “I feel like such a cow. I can’t wait to get rid of this stomach.”

Karen tried to be polite, to return Tiffany’s smile, but all she could muster was a slight upturn at the corners of her mouth. She couldn’t think of any words for the girl, at least not any that she could say out loud. She looked at her watch instead, as Tiffany disappeared through the door to the back office. She’d been here for fifteen minutes.

“Mr. and Mrs. Wells?” Sally called out. The couple against the far wall got up and went to see the doctor. They kept holding hands until they got to the door. Mr. Wells pushed open the door for his pregnant wife and put his hand gently on her back as she passed him. She was just starting to show. Karen imagined they were going to have a sonogram today.

The chair was so hard Karen couldn’t sit there anymore. She walked across the room to look at the magazine selection on the end table. Family, Working Mother, Redbook, Us, People. Karen picked up the People that Tiffany had been reading and sat down in Tiffany’s chair. There was a two-page spread on stars with baby bumps. Karen closed the magazine and looked at her watch again. She was going to be late for her tutoring appointment. Her student would be waiting for her if she didn’t get called in soon.

Tiffany came out, made her next appointment with Sally and left. Karen looked up at Sally expectantly.

“My turn?” Karen asked. Her heart was starting to race again.

“Yep. C’mon back,” Sally said.

* * *

Karen looked around the library. The Teen section bordered the Children’s section and a menagerie of huge stuffed animals sat atop the bookshelves. From where she sat she could see a tiger, a panda bear and two gorillas, one bigger than the other. The bigger gorilla’s floppy right arm rested on the little one’s shoulder. They all looked a little worse for wear, like children at story time had snuggled up to them, rubbing the fur as they listened to the librarian read. Karen imagined pre-schoolers gathered around on the floor with the big stuffed animals the librarians had moved down from their shelves for the occasion. She imagined her own children hugging the animals at story time. The flutter in her chest and the lump in her throat surprised Karen.

“It isn’t time to worry yet,” the doctor had said. “You’re young and healthy and there’s plenty of time. Just relax. It will happen when it’s meant to happen.” He had patted her hand and once again given her a kind smile.

She swallowed hard, sat up straight and looked back at the clock – 4:15. Where was that boy? Was she going to be stood up again? She couldn’t see the door from the Teen section, but she stared at it anyway, tapping her pencil on the table, waiting for Josh to get there.

Copyright 2011 by Liz Zuercher