10/12/19
The song that Elton John Secretly Wrote Before Tiny Dancer- AKA Dunkin Donuts XI
I have been in trouble lately. Trouble with the pigs, with my shrink, with myself. Okay, maybe not with the police (I am reminded of some close calls as a police car has just driven past me while I sit in Starbucks writing this), but a little with my shrink, and a lot with myself. The reason is I have been to the emergency room at least thirty times in the past year. The first time the reason was legit, some kids were throwing rocks at my head and I got a concussion. It hurt, physically and emotionally, but I got over it. Then a month or two later, I was trying to get rid of any probably nonexistent Drano residue on my kitchen sink, and I took a shower after, and my hands burnt so badly that I didn’t know if I had chemical burns (it turned out to be dry skin), so I called an ambulance and was there at the ER before I knew it. Another time I went because I wasn’t sure if I had an eye abrasion after banging into a freshly Windexed glass door on the way out of my apartment building.
After that, the reasons started to get less reasonable, less legit, less necessary. The reason I kept on going back was that that is the place where I felt safest. Most of the time I was praying that everything was okay (most of the time the thing in me knew it was), but I also had much time to sit and relax amongst other people who were sitting and relaxing. One time I had a conversation with a German woman who told me (after I told her I would be getting Medicare soon as opposed to Medicaid) that Medicare wasn’t much better than Medicaid ( I guess you need the supplements for the best medical care). Another time another elderly man told me that if you can’t get in to see the doctor soon, the ER was your best bet. Then, a few nights ago, I met a guy sitting next to me who was very attractive, with black wavy hair and bright green eyes. We talked for an hour or so, about the weather, about the Chicago Marathon, about the cause of the anxiety that brought me to the ER. I didn’t realize he was an angel until I saw the outline of his wings as he walked out of the dark hallway from the bathroom that was directly across from where we were sitting. He left for a minute and then came back to sit next to me, again. When I looked him in the eyes, they gleamed green and white, without a pupil. It was just for a second, but it scared the crap out of me, just like how I felt when I googled lobotomies, and the only picture that didn’t fully scare the crap out of me (House on the Haunted Hill style) was one that looked like a boy who I used to know and went to school with, who used to “think I was cool.” Maybe the picture still had evil denotation, but I couldn’t see it because of what I used to feel for the guy when I was younger, when his stare could pierce through all the uncertainty of adolescence to bring the promise of tomorrow.
“Are you religious?” he asked.
‘No. What’s your name?” I asked.
“Gabriel,” he said. “and I believe in God.”
‘Well, duh,” I said, “you’re an angel. And I guess I have to believe in God since you are here. I saw your wings when you were walking out of the bathroom.”
“Sure, you can think he exists,” he said, “but do you believe in him?”
I sat back in my chair and propped my head against the brick wall behind me. Oh shit, I thought to myself, I forgot to feed Ralph.
“My dog in heaven’s name is Jackson,” he said, “his favorite park is South North, by the AA conference center.”
He folded his arms and smiled.
“Me and Mike are in charge at the Arc Angels meetings. They assigned Mike the Arc Angel to be the coleader after the fight with me and The Big Guy.”
“Who, God?” I asked.
He laughed. “No,” he said, “Jesus. Once he went to heaven and became 100% human, we started to not get along. I thought he did the ultimate sin of pretending,”
The guy in back of us snickered. Gabriel turned around in anger.
“Is there a problem?” He asked, his face red.
“No,” the guy said, “You are just talking crazy, that’s all.”
“Crazy or not crazy, it’s none of your business,” Gabriel said.
Gabriel turned back around. “So, what was I saying? Oh yeah, the Big Guy took my place in Mexico on spring day. But it wasn’t his fault, I later realized it was someone else, some guy who I later walked up to while he was dancing to ‘Tiny Dancer’ in his lonesome in the park.”
“Smith! Janet Smith!” a nurse shouted out from the kiosk.
“I basically just punched him and walked away, without asking about the nerve he had to pretend to be me in front of a whole church of Baptists. He introduced himself as Gabriel after taking my appearance. I guess, when evil is involved, all you have to do is concentrate really hard, and it is possible. The only thing is that he didn’t have my wings.”
I half smiled. I had heard so much crazy stuff in the past few weeks it passed through me with a familiar semi-numbness.
“Hajer! Gabriel Hajner!” the nurse shouted out. Gabriel sprung from his seat and grabbed his bag from the floor.
“Well, that’s me,” he said, “gotta go. But hey listen,” he ran his hand through his wavy black hair, “We’ll talk again. I have to show you the bottom of the Grand Canyon at midnight. It’s---awesome.”
Gabriel walked away, out of my life, just like that. And I sat watching Tastemade videos until I almost passed out with the integrity that he had just given me. Just like that.
And the sun had almost risen in my fourth hour waiting in the waiting room of the ER.