Sunday, March 30, 2014

Nine and a Half Weeks

Mr. Rellim and I walked into the waiting room for the follow-up with his orthopedic surgeon.  It has been about two months since his shoulder surgery.  On the way in, I noticed a teenage boy who had the tell-tale signs of a fresh ACL repair.  Mike walked to the receptionist to check in while I stopped briefly to chat with the young man and his father and encourage him to keep his chin up.

After speaking with them, I turned around to look for Mike, who (I thought) was already sitting in the back corner messing with his iPhone.  As I slinked into the chair next to him, I leaned on the shared armrest, clearly into the man's space, to check out what he was doing on his phone.  It was at that time that I noticed two bandaged fingers on his left hand.  I gasped and said, "What did you do to your fingers?!"  (I mean, how could Mike have hurt himself and gotten bandaged up all in the short amount of time that I had spent chatting with the other waiting room waiters?)

Then, my brain kicked in and I realized that this phone-surfing gentleman was not Mr. Rellim.  I quickly stood up and said, "Oh!  I'm so sorry!  I thought you were my husband."  I scanned the room for Mike and found him still standing at the receptionist's desk with his back to me, slowly shaking his head.

An older lady giggled.  The man whom I had frightened did not.

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