Small Talk

The door makes me hesitate; it stares at me, blank, unyielding, tells me you are not the first to come this way. She cannot help you. I ignore these thoughts that sound too much like my own, and knock. Inside, I feel stranded somewhere foreign, try to imagine myself somewhere familiar. The room is in a basement, I pretend it is my basement. I remember the hurricane, how we huddled in the basement, how I kept staring at the ceiling trying to see the wind. Now I catch the ceiling, not mine, the one in the office, staring back, laughing. I ask what’s so funny, the ceiling replies, 'you. All of you. The way you try to look right through me as if I am not even here.' I reply that I am sorry, but sometimes we can’t help it. The ceiling sneers back, 'Well, maybe you could if you tried. It’s not hard to see things that are actually there.' I apologize again. The ceiling laughs. I ask what’s so funny. It says 'you. All of you. How you come in here to talk about yourselves, acting like someone wants to listen. Do you think you’re special? Do you think anyone cares? Do you think'—"Now hold on a second! Who are you talking to?” The woman behind the desk is staring at me. I had forgotten she was there. I wonder if she’s been speaking, or waiting for me to say something. I wonder how long I’ve been talking out loud. I return to my conversation with the ceiling. I ask if it enjoys looking down on the world, it gets angry. Tells me, 'You’re only seeing one side of me. If you could see my better half, you wouldn’t be so quick to judge. It’s padded with carpets for you people to step on. Do you realize how easy it is to take advantage of good people without noticing what you’re doing?' Immediately, I apologize to the couch. The couch chuckles, says it doesn’t mind, says it likes feeling needed. The ceiling is still talking. 'You could be the most self-centered person to come. In case you’ve forgotten, when the hurricane came you didn’t even have a basement! You were in your neighbors’ house. Did you ever thank them? I doubt it, you’re too wrapped up in yourself to notice anything people do for you.' The plastic flowers on the windowsill speak up, 'Stop it! She was six, can you really expect her to remember?' The ceiling speaks louder, 'Why don’t you stop sticking up for her?' Other objects in the room start to speak up in defense of the flowers. The window protests that the flowers are right, the bookshelf agrees that the ceiling is being too harsh. The desk doesn’t like the fighting, asks everyone to please be quiet. The ceiling ignores them all, speaks louder. All these voices in my head competing for attention, so loud they ricochet off the ceiling, flowers, couch and somewhere in the din the woman behind the desk is saying something, her voice so small I can barely hear it.