Page 122 of Out for Blood
“Good morning, Cassidy.”
“Good morning, Helen. Is he in the cold room?”
Her smile softens, “Yes dear, I’m not sure if he knows there are other rooms in the building.”
Her smile is gentle, tinged with pity. It’s the same expression everyone here wears when they look at me. They remember who I was two years ago, grief-stricken, desperate and falling apart at the seams.
I peer down the hallway and shake my head.
“Some habits are harder to break than others.”
I understand better than most. If you give something enough years of your life, it stops becoming a routine. It becomes an obsession.
I head to the back of the building, past administrative offices, storage rooms, and doors I’ve pushed through more times than I can count. The hallway feels strangely familiar now. Safe. A place suspended outside of time. Nothing ever changes here, waiting for me each Wednesday when I return.
The sound of footsteps echoes ahead, and a voice I’ve come to know calls out.
“You’re seven minutes late.”
The sight of him coaxes a genuine smile from me.
“Good morning to you too.”
Mr. Higgs appears around the corner carrying a clipboard in one hand and a coffee mug in the other.
His silver hair is somewhat disheveled.
Reading glasses rest on the end of his nose.
Time seems to leave him untouched. He looks exactly as he did the first Wednesday I met him two years ago.
“Seven minutes,” he repeats.
“I know.”
“You’ve become unreliable.”
I laugh.
“You saw me six days ago.”
“Ancient history.”
“You’re dramatic.”
“Occupational hazard.”
The corners of his mouth twitch.
Mr. Higgs rarely smiles openly.
When he does, it feels earned.
“Coffee?” he asks.
“Please.”
“Already made one.”
