The Flatliners

Chapter 9

He tossed the tray with surprise, falling to the floor to clean up my (or whosever it was) leftovers.

"Charlotte. I would have never guessed. She's out of you league on every level."

"What? Wait. No. Huh? Gah. I-"

I hated blubbering. "Shut it. I know it's her. I smell her perfume on your scrubs. Nice try, Hallie but I remember Tilisha getting it for her last Christmas."

Hal scraped the dishes onto the tray slowly, avoiding looking up from the floor. He sat down, defeated on the cold tile. "I just... we didn't want... I mean-"

"You didn't want it to become public because you think you'll feel too pressured when the nurses keep asking you what you're doing for her and what romantic gifts you give. I don't care. I just wanted to know who it was. Now I need to tell Charlotte how she's making a huge mistake."

"No!" his face shot up, eyes and, well, everything else, begging. "I've been trying so hard. Don't you dare mess this up."

Through my tough thinking process, Charlotte came in. Hal's face went crayon red and he scrambled up onto his feet. Charlotte tried to smile encouragingly but the man didn't have much going for him and he spilled the tray again, blabbering to his supposed girlfriend.

Charlotte nodded along but was waiting to tell me whatever she was told to. I bounced my legs impatiently and finally yelled over Hal. "Just go! The janitor will take care of it."

His shoulders slumped. It was gluten-free food on the floor not a dragon. Slaying it wasn't going to earn him the admiration of the witnesses. Although apparently, he'd already won Charlotte. The thought was driving me mad. She deserved so much more of a man.

"Bev wants you in her office. She's decorating the ficus."

I looked between Hal and Charlotte a long time, trying to envision a semblance of relationship. There was nothing positive I could think of so I continued around the halls.

Bev was sifting through I small box labeled 'ficus décor'. Her glasses slipped mid-way down her nose and forehead creased with slight concentration. I sat in front of her, resting from my one minute walk. The ficus décor was old and crumpling. All the paint on the ornaments was chipping or fading.

"I'm really not up for Christmas anything right now."

Bev shrugged a shoulder. "Neither am I. But if I don't have it done by the end of November, the nurses will spread word that I hate Christmas."

She sort of did hate Christmas. Not the meaning or the holiday itself, just the memories her life threw at her around that time.

I was administered to the hospital about a month before Christmas so, as anyone would imagine, last year I had been very narked. Bev was about the only person who could tolerate me whatsoever and decorating her ficus was a way of calming us both down about the season. I was trapped in a hospital, she was remembering how seven years ago, she got news that her husband in the navy was dead.

I think I probably would have died if we hadn't spent six hours hanging ornaments. It had been a cross between a silent and drill sergeant sort of therapy session that would last the rest of my life.

Her office was small and neat. It always smelled like house plants and Lysol but she kept it warmer than the rest of the building. I closed the door, typically unnerved by silence but passed it off.

She handed me a box within the box of dull, round ornaments. She never had anything sparkling or glittery like mum always did. Then again, mum decorated an evergreen rather than a ficus.