"It's OK," Pretty Hair offered, tucking a perfect lock behind her ear when she bent over to speak to me quietly. "I know," I replied. My expression must have given me away for she perched on a chair to give me a gentle pep talk. "I'm fine," I assured her and exhaled with relief when she left.
I declined a colleague's offer to go with me, promising I'd call if I changed my mind. Looking around to make sure nobody else was coming, I returned to paging back and forth through my images, fibroid lurking at the bottom edge, near the base of my spine.
I swallowed a sick feeling of dread when I looked at them with the doctor. She was kind and gentle, regarding me with enough sympathy to elicit tears when asking if I was married or in a relationship or thought I'd have children someday.
I'm very near a state of despair over this. Stop, I order myself firmly, but I think of the mass of tissue and how it probably doesn't matter because I'm unlikely to find someone who loves me and I can't breathe. I swallowed hard, fighting back nausea, as I lay on the table, paper crinkling beneath me when I winced and shifted. I hurried my mother off the phone, telling her I didn't know anything more and I'd be fine and I didn't want to discuss it.
I've returned home to huddle in quiet safety, grateful for the gentle rain and gray clouds that offer a suitable environment for moping. I'll speak of other things, I decided as I understood I can't seem to get perspective on this for some ridiculous reason. But, for today, there isn't anything else.
