LXVI | Some Consolation

❦

The plain nurse comes to fetch me
during medicine time.

I keep my head

down
the whole time

so it's only afterwards that I notice

Oman
is alone.

The armchairs

are no longer in a straight line
but defiantly

disordered again,

like they were
before.

Oman looks like a new patient
sitting alone,

knees up to his chest,
head buried between,

hands locking everything in.

Trying to look like
a cushion

on the armchair.

A male nurse
stands beside him

in place of Nina.

An uncomfortable contrast—

he must have been forced
to come out
just like me.

I also pull my knees

up to my chest.

But I balance my chin
on my knees,

thinking about Nina.

Maybe Oman's not dragged out

for medicine time,
maybe

she's in a coma because of him.

You never know,
right?

People aren't always

what they seem.

[Read the full story at novelconbini.com!]