The Waiting Room

I'm in the very corner of the eye doctor's waiting room, waiting.

I'm waiting for my mum who's having an injection in her eye. I don't want to think about it. I'm reading my book.

It's The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, by Rainer Maria Rilke, and I just started it this morning.

The waiting room is full of old people, waiting for their drops to take effect, and the people who have come with them, reading magazines. The youngest person in the room is the receptionist.

An old woman in a blue coat comes in. I'm early because I caught the bus, she says. But your appointment is tomorrow, says the receptionist. The old woman turns to leave.

My book is not the best one to be reading. Once, says Rilke, people knew that they bore their death within them, like the stone within a fruit. These days (1910) you die as you happen to die; you die the death that comes with your illness.

I look over at the magazine rack. Tucked down the side is a yellow children's book called Bunny and His Friends.

I wish I was reading that.