Sunrise

My eyes shift from opening and closing, hoping to shut the lights out but it doesn’t work. The blinds still in fact remained open and two feet away from me. The warm light lay on the surface on my cheeks leading to my mouth. My mouth forms into an upper-case O, a loud raspy yawn follows after.

“Ugh, is that my voice?” I said with disgust.

My throat tucks in as I forcefully clear my throat.

“Ahh, ahh, hello. There! Much better,” I said with my eyes still shut.

My body quickly shifts to the left to avoid melting into the sun’s rays, which doesn’t work at all, because now my back is exposed to the light. Great. A familiar, upbeat tune comes from my phone. My eyes open to the blank canvas ceiling. Clean, with no trace of markings or the sunlight tormenting at it.

“Okay, time to get up,” I said as I reached for my phone.

With the touch of one button, the tune is now silent. I head down to an open door; there a sink and toilet is in view. My feet touch the cold stoned tiles. As I sit on the toilet, I quickly raised my feet up, barely enough to keep it off the cold icy tiles. My big toe touches the tiles first then follows with my heel.

“Cold! I can’t do this.” I quickly tiptoed out of the bathroom and directly towards my brown wooden dresser. My feet have a sense of relieve from touching the carpet. I pull out a fuzzy green sock, my hand yanks onto one of the pair and slips it onto my feet. I look to the right for the clock on the wall, but my eyes get lost in all my unfinished paintings.

“I really need to work on that one. Sorry Caroline, I’ll be back for you.”

As naming my paintings was normal. The time is getting closer to my departure, I quickly rush to the bathroom. Teeth brushed, hair tied up, face clean of any eye boogers and most importantly, my nurse uniform is on correctly and not backwards like last time, which I’ll quickly forget now because I don’t want to recall such an embarrassing incident.

I dash downstairs and towards the door. As I open the door, the sun unwelcomingly invites itself onto the walls of my house. I lock the door behind me and enter an old-fashioned sedan. The key is entered into the vehicle, I turn the key to start the engine. A loud clicking and buzzing noise spew out from the vehicle.

“Oh, come on, not now! Work, Sally!” I said with a loud groan. Naming paintings was one thing, but a car was properly over stretching it. The car I had for 12 long years. What was I going to do? Not name it. Yeah, right. Sally was part of my life. Many attempts were made to start the engine.

“Oh, please work!” as I said on my sixth attempt, the car makes a satisfying whirring sound indicating that it was time to drive.

“Yes! Thank you! Thank you. I promise I’ll schedule you in for an oil change this week!” I celebrated as I kissed the steering wheel. I drive Sally towards an open bridge, there, the highway exit was present. I look at the highway exit and drive past it.

Yeah, not today, Sally. I want to take small roads, it’ll probably be more peaceful for us.

I drove with a lack of concentration, as I was familiar with the roads, bumps and even which potholes to avoid. With my inattentive focus to the road, my ability to concentrate on singing along with the music increased.

Okay, never mind…

I don’t remember the lyrics to this particular song. Multi-tasking is actually hard. Me, a nurse, struggling with multi-tasking. My co-workers would have laughed at me then ridicule me, followed with more laughter. Sally comes to a complete stop at a four-way intersection. Another car to my left, stops right after me. It drives off.

“Jerk! I stopped first!!” I yelled followed with a lot of unpleasant cursing.

“Sorry Sally, you didn’t need to hear that,” as I cleared my throat.

“That’s why your bumper is about to fall off!” I said followed with more rage. Okay, I’m done. Sally and I drive past another highway exit. I let out a sigh.

I should have taken the highway…

Sally and I parked close to the nursing home building. “Yes, close parking!” I quickly exit Sally and rush towards the doors.

“Good morning,” someone said with a dull, monotone voice.

It was coming from behind me, I turned around and looked up. A man as tall as the entrance door, with a petite figure, and small curly hair with icy blue eyes follows me. Ron quickly matches with my pace.

“Good morning, Ron,” I replied.

“You took my parking spot this time,” Ron said.

“Yeah, I finally beat you,” I said cheerfully.

“Lucky, I had to get coffee, or my mood would be worse than this.”

“Oh shoot, that’s what I forgot”, I said.

“Don’t worry, I knew that would have happened. Luckily, I have two. Buy one, get one free.” Ron pulls another coffee from his hand. It looked like a small in his huge hands, but I could clearly read the letter M on it.

“A medium latte in your presence”, Ron tried to say in an upbeat voice, but he still sounds monotone to me.

“Thank you”, I laughed as I grab the cup from his hands.

Up ahead, a nurse and doctor are standing in front of us. They look like they’re in an intense discussion with how quickly their mouths are moving. We make a stop at the elevator doors. Their conversation dies out. The elevator doors open. We all enter the run-down elevator together. In the corners of the elevator, you can see the rust branching out from the corners and stretching into the center. The elevator looks like it can fit probably up to three more people. The ride up was quiet with sounds of Ron and I sipping our coffees. The elevator stops on the second floor.

“Alright, I’ll see you on break,” Ron said to me as he stepped out of the elevator. I waved at him. The doctor and nurse continued their conversation from earlier. Their voices start to raise and get louder.

The doctor yelled out, “You have to follow my orders!”

The nurse lashes back, “I clearly don’t need to follow orders from someone who barely is in contact with the patient! You just come and go when you’re ordered.”

I contemplated if I should intervene or not. Maybe not. I tried to mute out their conversation, but it was nearly impossible to unhear what I heard.

Did they forget I was here? I take a huge, quiet step away from them. I slumped into the corners of the elevator, wishing I got off on the second floor with Ron.

The nurse gets off on the third floor.

Finally. Quiet time.

As the elevator door closes, the doctor aggressively kicks the rusted walls of the elevator repetitively. I look to the corner of the wall hoping to find more room to fit in or possibly hide in, but I was as close to the corner as I could possibly be. The doctor let out a cracked groan sound. His cracked voice is all I could think about.

Let it go. Let it go.

A laugh was coming up from my throat, I used my lips to seal out the laugh. I pushed it down and quickly take a sip of my coffee, hoping to make matters less awkward. The doctor looked over at me as I sipped my coffee. I avoided his glaze by looking down. The elevator door opens on the fourth floor. Time to get off.

Thank God.