Chapter 19: The Waiting Room

The waiting room at my clinic has a dozen chairs, a fish tank and a basket of old magazines.

I know the chairs.

I know which one wobbles and which one faces the fish.

On Monday morning I sat in the one by the window.

For the first time in two years, there was a man in the chair beside me.

Padraig had his work boots on and a clean shirt, and he held my coat on his lap.

"Is that all right?" he asked.

"Better than all right."

"I'm not sure where to put my hands."

"Put them on the coat."

He did, and he looked at the fish.

Four couples sat across from us, holding hands and whispering.

A woman in the corner filled out a form with one hand on her stomach.

She looked at my coat in Padraig's lap, and she smiled at me.

I smiled back.

At ten minutes to ten the front door opened.

Travis came in wearing a gray suit I had never seen.

A thin man with a leather folio walked a step behind him.

Travis scanned the room and found me, and his face did something quick and complicated.

"There she is," he said.

"Sit down, Travis," Padraig said.

"Stay out of this."

"Mr. Colburn," the thin man said, in a low voice. "Let me handle it."

He crossed to the front desk and put a business card on the counter.

"I represent the father of Ms. Colburn's child," he said.

He tapped the card.

"My client has a legal right to be present at this appointment."

The receptionist, a young woman with a pink lanyard, looked at the card and then at me.

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