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I glanced at the paper, then folded it and put it in ot the sentence out, she’d turned away, already back at work on the report she was typing I usedthe way you do when you wave back at so happily at someone else

On the way to my car, it occurred to ht be reluctant to give nes Grey If she was still a patient, I could probably get a roos et trickier Medical personnel aren’t as chatty as they used to be Too ht to privacy Best not blow abond, where I unzipped the duffel and rearoes anyplace It’s black, collarless, with long sleeves and a zipper down the back, made of some slithery, miracle fabric that takes unlimited abuse You can smush it, wad it up, sit on it, twist it, or roll it in a ball The instant you release it, the inal state I wasn’t even sure why I’d brought it-hoping for a hot night on the town, I suppose I tossed it on the bed, along with htly scuffy) low-heeled black shoes and some black panty hose I took a three-minute shower and redidlike a grown-up, or so I hoped

The Rio Vista Convalescent Hospital was set in thepainted a tarnished-looking Navajo white The property was surrounded by chain-link fence, wide gates standing open onto a parking lot The place didn’t look like any hospital I’d ever seen The grounds were flat, unlandscaped, largely sealed over in cracked asphalt on which cars were parked As I approached the main entrance, I could see that the brittle blacktop was limned with faded circles and squares of soh thein the foyer that I knehat I’d been looking at A playground This had once been a grade school The lines had been laid out for foursquare and tetherball The interior was nearly identical to the eles, wood floors, the sort of lighting fixtures that look like small perfect moons Across from me, a water fountain was still mounted on the wall, white porcelain with shiny chroht Even the air setable soup For a moment, the past was palpable, laid over reality like a sheet of cellophane, blocking out everything I experienced the same rush of anxiety I’d suffered every day of my youth I hadn’t liked school I’d always been overwhelers I sensed Grade school was perilous There were endless perforned and criticized, graded and reviewed The only subject I liked was h so all by yourself, which was death The other kids were even worse than the work itself I was se, always vulnerable to attack My classiven to all sorts of wicked plots they learned from TV And ould protect ot upset, they would stoop down to my level and their faces would fill ue planets about to crash into earth Looking back on it, I can see how I must have worried them I was the kind of kid who, for no apparent reason, wept piteously or threw up on myself On an especially scary day, I sorade, I was in trouble almost constantly I wasn’t rebellious-I was too timid for that- but I did disobey the rules After lunch, for instance, I would hide in the girls’ rest rooed to be expelled, i somehow that I could be free of school forever if they’d just kick me out All my behavior netted me were trips to the office, or endless hours in a little chair placed in the hall A public scourging, in effect My aunt would swoop down on the principal, an avenging angel, raising six kinds of hell that I should be subjected to such abuse Actually, the first tiot the hall penalty, I was mortified, but after that, I liked it pretty well It was quiet I got to be alone Nobody asked me questions or made me write on the board Between classes, the other kids hardly looked at lanced up A wo at s I could see now that the corridor was populated heel-chairs Everyone was old and broken and bent So sounds One woman repeated endlessly the same quarrelsome request: "Someone let me out of here Someone let me up Someone let me out of here…"