Getting Out
A short story
This is my submission for the monthly Symposium at the Soaring Twenties Social Club. This month's theme is 'Habit.'
Arthur Kitchingside was afraid.
He was afraid of his last name, which everyone inevitably asked him to spell. He was afraid of the hallway outside his apartment door with so many other doors leading off of it from which anyone could spring like a jack-in-the-box. He was afraid of the people on the street and what they might say or do and afraid of what he might have to say or do in response. He was afraid of forgetting his bus pass. He was afraid of remembering that he forgot his bus pass. He was afraid of remembering that he forgot his bus pass as he was getting on the bus and afraid of having to fearfully scramble for exact change.
It wasn’t so much that Arthur was an agoraphobe. He wasn’t afraid of going out into the world, he was just afraid of everything in it.
Arthur was twenty-eight, of average height but scrawny, with somewhat curly light brown hair and a pleasant, kind, naive face that screamed ‘Don’t worry, if you take advantage of me I won’t hit back.’
Arthur generally avoided all of the problems mentioned above by rarely going out and working from home for an electronic translation service used by hospitals, clinics, doctor’s offices, and other such medical establishments. For Arthur, it was a perfect job. He didn’t have to leave home.
Arthur spoke perfect Polish, a gift of his mother’s heritage, and was often called by various clinics in the Chicago area where there was a large Polish population.
The highlight of Arthur’s week was translating for a beautiful doctor at a small clinic called MedRite in Chicago. Her name was Dr. Fiona Pelley and she was a family doctor who saw patients of all ages. The Polish, specifically the elderly Polish patients, required translation services and Arthur was only too happy to get the call.
She was, to Arthur, glorious in every way. She was about forty, with Mediterranean looks, luxurious sweeping dark brown hair, full lips, and two eyes like almonds surrounded by the delicious just-beginning wrinkles of age, wisdom, and experience.
The first time he had seen Dr. Pelley as they exchanged pleasantries before the patient entered the room, he became so flustered that he slipped off the edge of his chair and had to go retrieve it from across the room where it had wheeled by the highly kinetic force of his dethroning.
Dr. Pelley had very sympathetically asked if he was alright. This murmur of concern plus her extraordinary beauty had swept away Arthur’s embarrassment and nearly caused his heart to explode within his chest and, he had thought, if there was any moment in his life when he was happy, truly happy beyond any doubt, at which he would have gratefully died without a single regret, that was it.
If not embarrassed, Arthur had still been so flustered that he had started speaking Polish to her and it was only after several seconds of her shaking her head, waving at him, and saying, “No, no, not me,” that he realized his mistake and apologized profusely before again succumbing to another bout of eros when she tilted her head back and laughed, a gentle lilting laugh, that showed the perfect horseshoe of her so perfectly imperfect teeth that had never been debased by being corrected by an orthodontist’s hand.
That first meeting had ended swiftly after Arthur translated for the elderly Polish patient and for the doctor in turn and said a quick goodbye after Dr. Pelley thanked him.
He had lolled in his chair nearly insensate, struck dumb by her charm and beauty. And then it crept up on him, the dawning realization that he was afraid. Afraid of Dr. Pelley because of her beauty and because of his attraction to her and because of how she made him feel and because he might embarrass himself, again.
And yet the opposing force of fear was met with the attracting force of eros, the burgeoning love he felt.
Love! Impossible. He had seen her once. But he knew it was true.
From that point on Arthur would sit in his little office, the spare room of his apartment that contained a small desk with a computer and a few bookshelves, and wait for the call from Chicago. Each week he would wait, hoping that the next call would be from her. Sometimes the call came on Monday. Sometimes he had to wait all week, sitting there agonizing until 6pm on Friday when he finally gave up hope.
When he was connected with Dr. Pelley he would try, in the few seconds they had together, to engage her in conversation although this usually took the form of him telling bad doctor jokes. He’d plan and research and prepare and write a script and the moment would come and he’d say, “Why did the doctor laugh at the x-ray? Because it was humerus.” And then he would wait for the pitying smile, the little ‘aha, very good’ or on other, rarer occasions, her genuine laughter.
One week, the call never came and he fell to pieces and didn’t leave his apartment all weekend, not because he was afraid of the world outside but because he couldn’t muster the energy, the will to go out even to buy groceries.
He ate ketchup sandwiches three meals a day that weekend.
Friday evening had dragged into Saturday morning and Arthur, unable to sleep, dragged himself from bed to the kitchen to make a ketchup sandwich and drink a glass of whole milk.
The sandwich remained there uneaten and the milk undrunk until the bread began to grow stale and the milk stopped sweating, the beads of perspiration puddling on the table before ceasing to run at all.
Saturday stretched into Sunday. Monday couldn’t come soon enough.
Arthur, expectant, terrified, sat waiting at his computer.
A call came in, from some local doctor in New York with dark veins purpling his nose. Arthur scoffed, did his job, and hung up.
Another call, another doctor that wasn’t Fiona.
Monday melted into Tuesday into Wednesday.
Thursday came and went.
That evening, having run out of bread and ketchup and milk, Arthur was forced to go to the store.
He locked his front door and proceeded down the hall, utterly preoccupied by thoughts of Dr. Pelley, utterly unconcerned with the doors of the other tenants which he previously worried might disgorge terrifying and assaulting members of his species.
The street outside his apartment building was mercifully quiet and sparsely populated, but then, the people who were there didn’t really bother Arthur. Fiona was still all that was on his mind.
It was warm, finally cooling from the day’s extreme heat, although the street still radiated warmth. On the air was the heady mix of car exhaust, the smell of the pavement, the warm asphalt wafting up to his nose. Smoke from a nearby cigarette. The light scent of flowers emanating from a nearby stall and the ever present warm bathwater smell of a hot dog vendor’s goods.
Arthur turned left down the street, mostly looking at his feet as he walked, not really paying attention to who or what was in his way. He let them break around him like waves on a craggy shore, his mind totally occupied with thoughts of Dr. Pelley.
He had seen her, heard her voice but now he wondered what she smelled like, how soft her skin was. And since that was all he could think of he didn’t have time or the capacity to be afraid of anything, not like before.
At the corner he crossed the street, not waiting for the light. A black suburban had to slam on its brakes to avoid hitting him as he crossed. Arthur hardly noticed the mortal threat to his slender frame.
Across the street there was a park. Acres of oak trees and maples, a playground full of children and in the distance wide green fields where a few dogs ran off leash. It was not a place where Arthur would have ever gone. He still didn't engage with anyone—he didn't meet their eyes, didn't smile at them but he didn't avoid them either, perhaps only because he hardly noticed them because Fiona was all he could think about.
Maybe he didn't have to be afraid.
A dog barked nearby and Arthur looked up.
There was a woman walking toward him. She had mountains of thick dark hair, full lips, almond eyes, and a full figure. She wore a tan dress and heels. She looked like something out of a Roman dream, as if she had just stepped from the Piazza Navona at sunset, the most beautiful person from the most beautiful city at the most beautiful time.
Or so Arthur thought. He had never been to Rome.
He stared. It couldn’t be Dr. Pelley.
He stopped, forcing himself to close his mouth.
She drew closer and the dreamlike quality stretched and faded. She was quite beautiful, but she wasn’t Fiona. The hair was the wrong shade. The eyes were too round. The chin too sharp.
As soon as the dream broke, Arthur averted his gaze, suddenly self-conscious and ashamed, his heart struggling to return to its proper place from where it had leapt into his mouth.
He tried not to look at her as she passed. A glimpse of her shoes as he stared at the ground made him want to reach out and ask her if she was Fiona Pelley, but then she was gone and the moment passed.
He snuck a shame-faced glance over his shoulder, terrified that she might turn around and look at him, meeting his gaze accusingly.
But she didn’t turn and soon she disappeared out of sight.
Then, all at once, Arthur was afraid again. Of everything.
The failing light, the screams of the children playing, the dogs barking, the looming trees, the fresh air, the people everywhere by the dozens walking and sitting and reading and watching.
He turned and fled back the way he had come and didn’t stop running except to wait for the stoplight at the corner. Then he ran home the whole way from the light.
He leapt up the three flights of stairs and slammed the apartment door shut behind him. Sinking to the floor, he gasped for air.
Only then did Arthur realize that he hadn’t gone to the store.
He decided that he could do without food, that he’d probably never eat again, and crawled to bed.
Arthur awoke feeling like he hadn’t slept at all and dreading everything. He felt afraid and deflated. It was all he could do to shower and drag himself to his computer. Money, needing to keep his job and his apartment was all that was motivating him.
He opened the browser on the computer and signed into his work portal.
He was one minute late logging on and the flashing indicator in the top right corner told him there was a call waiting for him.
He selected the call.
It was from MedRite Clinic.
It had to be Dr. Pelley. She was the only female doctor at the clinic and the old ladies, thus the old Polish ladies, preferred her.
With trembling hands Arthur put on his headset and clicked ‘Accept’.
Dr. Pelley appeared on the screen.
“Hi, Arthur,” she said.
Arthur beamed at her. “Hi,” he said weakly as relief cascaded over him. It felt like years since he had seen her. She was still there, still perfect, not some phony like he had seen in the park.
“How are you?”
He was so busy enjoying hearing her say his name that he almost didn’t realize a response was required.
“I’m fine, Dr. Pelley. How are you?”
“Not too bad.” A shy grin spread across her face. “No jokes today?”
Arthur froze. He had forgotten to think of a joke.
What was the joke from last week that I didn’t get to tell her?
He stalled. “Uh, um…I’ve got one. Just a sec.”
Think, think!
Had he read any lately? What about that book of jokes? Where was it?
The book.
The book!
“Uh, oh, yes. I went to the library to get a book on abdominal pain but somebody had ripped the appendix out.”
Her laughter tinkled over the tinny speakers. Smiling, she said, “Thanks, Arthur. I needed that.”
Feeling lucky Arthur said, “One more?”
“Sure.”
“You know, one thing they don’t tell you is it really takes guts to be an organ donor.”
Arthur basked in the glow of her grin.
“Hi, Mrs. Oleksy,” Dr. Pelley said to the patient off screen.
After the appointment was over, Arthur did his best to try to extend the time with Fiona, to add little observations and questions to think of more jokes and quips but she said she had to go and after a hurried goodbye she ended the call.
Arthur sat back, not wanting to do anything but enjoy the sensation that was now rapidly wearing off, the joy of just seeing and talking to Fiona Pelley.
But as the warm feeling slowly evaporated, it was replaced by a new sensation: fear.
Arthur knew fear well, was intimately acquainted with fear in all aspects of his limited life. But to experience fear in relation to Fiona was new. Not nerves and butterflies in anticipation of seeing her or at the prospect of saying the wrong thing but true dreadful fear.
He feared needing her. And he feared losing her.
He didn’t really ‘have’ her to begin with but what he had, whatever it was, he was afraid of losing. He was afraid of never seeing her again.
He worked the rest of the day in a kind of daze, trying not to think of Fiona, a new exercise for him and at the end of the day he wandered down the street to the little grocery store on the corner, not entirely unafraid but not quite bothered by anyone or anything as he used to be.
The store was cool inside, better than the humid heat still lingering in the evening air, full of the heady scent of ripe fruit, bananas especially. Arthur grabbed a basket and moved about the store, focused on the next item, the next task, lulled by the constant humming of the refrigerator units.
He smiled mechanically at the girl at the register as he put the eggs, milk, bread, bananas, green so they would last, and coffee on the conveyor and nodded and smiled when she asked him if he had found everything okay.
He avoided her gaze as if interacting with someone, anyone else would break the spell Fiona had cast over him, something he had no desire to do although her looks and her smile and her confidence and her amazing career intimidated him, repelled him as much as they attracted and enchanted him.
Arthur slept fitfully that night, shifting between half-awake moments when he stared at the shadows on the ceiling through heavily lidded eyes and moments of terrifying dreams in which he struggled against some unseen enemy that lurked just out of sight no matter how fast he twisted and turned and tried to face it.
Arthur’s mother called while he was eating his breakfast—two eggs, two slices of toast, and black coffee.
“What are you eating? Are you eating enough? I know you never eat enough, why you wanted to move to the city by yourself is beyond me. I really can’t understand it. Why are you yawning? Did you get enough sleep? I still sleep great. I take one melatonin just to make sure but I’m out and your father’s snoring doesn’t even wake me up. You should try melatonin. I was telling Carol the other day that I take a melatonin and it does wonders. She’s always complaining about her sleep and Bill’s snoring and I keep telling her about it but she’s a hypochondriac and she won’t take anything that isn’t prescribed by a doctor; so I said, why don’t you go to your doctor and tell him you’re not sleeping well? And she doesn’t want to go—
“Mom, if she doesn’t want to go to the doctor then she’s not a hypochon—”
“—your father’s here. Do you want to say hi? Gerald! Jerry! Come say hi to Arthur. To Arthur! Your son. Take the headphones off and you’ll be able to hear me. He’s gone. He just ignores me most of the time. I really wish he’d go back to work. I don’t know why he retired. He really gets on my nerves—that sounds bad—he’s always going around the house and in my way—that sounds bad too—I love him but oy vey, he’s always underfoot and I’m always picking up after him. Are you sure you’re eating enough? What are you doing these days? Are you getting out? You’re not still afraid to go outside, are you? You used to throw the biggest fits when we’d go out anywhere—the park, the store, you just lost it. Tell me you’re doing something other than working.”
“I’m not scared, Mom. It’s a real—never mind. Yes, I’m eating enough. Ma, what can I say, I work a lot.” He paused. “I kinda met someone but I don’t think it’ll work out. We’re too far apart.”
Arthur pulled the phone away from his ear as his mother screamed with delight. “Who is she? Does she like you? I mean, how could she not. Don’t screw it up, Arthur. It’s hard to find a good woman. Ask your father how long it took him to find me, let me tell you. Too far apart, nothing! Everybody has differences. You get to know each other. Even if you’re in different places in your lives, just mix and mingle and hook up—”
“Mom!”
“What? It’s what young people do, isn’t it?”
“Not me—”
“Hang on, Arthur. Margie is calling. Don’t let her get away!”
Relieved, Arthur put the phone down and resumed eating his breakfast.
Why had he told his mom about Fiona? They weren’t together. They weren’t anything. She was his obsession.
Just an obsession. Nothing would come of it.
She was gorgeous and nice to him and that was it.
Was that all it took? Good looks and being polite?
He felt deflated again, hollow, and he dreaded seeing Fiona.
Why? Why was he afraid of her now?
Am I afraid of her? This is insane. I’m staring at my eggs obsessing over a woman I don’t know. But I do know her, sort of. She likes my jokes.
She doesn’t like my jokes, she just laughs to be nice, to move things along until we can get on with the appointment. She doesn’t like me. She pities me.
Arthur shoved the plate away in disgust. Noticing the time, he took his coffee with him to the other room and turned on his computer.
He signed in to work and waited.
He waited some more.
It felt like an eternity, like he was on a train that had entered a tunnel and, not knowing how long the tunnel was, it seemed like it could and would go on forever with no end in sight.
The indicator flashed like sunlight bursting around him as he exited the tunnel.
It wasn’t MedRite. It wasn’t Fiona.
He took the call.
It was some fat fucking GP in Who Cares, Iowa. Lots of Poles in Iowa? Apparently.
He did his job and hung up.
Tuesday.
Wednesday.
Thursday.
Grocery store again. Yes, he found everything okay.
Friday.
One week. Two.
No Fiona.
Three weeks. Nothing.
He felt like Tantalus, nearly drowning in water he couldn’t drink and a juicy apricot hanging overhead that was just out of reach.
Except there was no water and there was no apricot. There was just a desert where a mirage of Dr. Fiona Pelley shimmered in the distance. He could see it out of the corner of his eye but if he looked at it, if he ran towards it, she disappeared and all that was left was wind and sand mocking him.
He’d have to tell his mom that he let her get away. He was afraid of that too.
Monday morning of the fourth week a call came in from MedRite.
Arthur’s heart repeated its nearly forgotten exercise of bouncing around his midsection.
A shaking hand, hardly capable of being called his own anymore, clicked the call.
“Where’s Dr. Pelley?”
The man on the screen raised an eyebrow.
“Dr. Pelley sold her practice. I’m Dr. Transom.” He was in his mid-thirties, with short cropped hair and a devilish, arrogant, elitist face. “My patient is here so if you could start translating, that’d be great.” He finished with a smarmy simper that said he thought he was better than Arthur.
Arthur felt like he was probably right.
Dr. Transom spent the entire call clarifying and re-clarifying Arthur’s translations and checking his watch. In the end, the doctor hung up without saying anything more to Arthur.
Arthur felt crushed, as if the whole ocean was on top of him and he was failing miserably to shoulder the burden.
Fiona gone. Replaced by not even a decent person.
As if she could be replaced.
The computer dinged, indicating there was a message.
Arthur could see by the sender that it was from his boss.
Great. Now Dr. Fuckface went and complained about me.
He was surprised to find that his boss was relaying a message from a client, a Dr. Fiona Pelley, who had asked them to pass along a message from her.
Arthur read:
Dear Arthur,
I sold my practice, though you probably noticed. I don’t know what I’m going to do next but after the divorce is over I might travel. Thanks for making me laugh all those times. I sensed that you liked talking to me so I thought you might like to know that I enjoyed our conversations too. You’re good at your job so keep it up.
All the best,
Fiona
Arthur felt—he didn’t know what.
As he sat back in his chair he felt a mixture of relief and self-pity and anger and gratitude and lust and sympathy.
Maybe a pretty face and a little kindness was the greatest good after all.
That day after work Arthur went out, a little less afraid of everything and everyone because one of those people was Fiona Pelley and maybe, just maybe, there were more people like her.
He thought he might start at the grocery store.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction, strictly a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance, perceived resemblance, or similarity to any other fictional works, to actual events or persons, living or dead, and any perceived slights of people, places, or organizations are products of the reader’s imagination. This fiction is the result of a partnership between a human writer and the character(s) he accessed with his creative subconscious as he raced through the story with them. No AI of any kind, generative or otherwise, was used in any way to write this story.