The ambulance pulled up slowly without lights flashing or sirens blaring. A kind looking young gentleman in an EMT uniform stepped down from the driver’s seat and shut the door of the cab, sighing.
Inside the house, the old woman died. There was a 911 call in a calm and iridescent voice, floating through telephone wires on grumbly vibrations to alert the world of its weight loss. Twenty-one grams lighter, the body felt like a thousand pounds as the EMT picked up her stone cold stiffness. Her eyes remained open like black sea-shell marbles. Her chest was still wet with her husband’s tears as he watched from the corner of the yellowed living room with his elbow connecting to a hand hovering over his eyes. He wept.
They were married for forty-one years and never had a baby. Their house was a grandfather clock in the neighborhood as they exited and entered the garage in a blue 1984 Cadillac Seville. They would return with groceries in brown paper bags, silently lifting them with spindly arms. He opened the knob, she went through the door, and it clicked shut behind them. They wouldn’t come out again until the clock donged next.
She left the house for the last time on squeaky wheels under a white sheet. The Seville hovered closely behind her as they went soundlessly in the direction of the hospital. And the neighborhood was five minutes late forever after.
Inside the house, the old woman died. There was a 911 call in a calm and iridescent voice, floating through telephone wires on grumbly vibrations to alert the world of its weight loss. Twenty-one grams lighter, the body felt like a thousand pounds as the EMT picked up her stone cold stiffness. Her eyes remained open like black sea-shell marbles. Her chest was still wet with her husband’s tears as he watched from the corner of the yellowed living room with his elbow connecting to a hand hovering over his eyes. He wept.
They were married for forty-one years and never had a baby. Their house was a grandfather clock in the neighborhood as they exited and entered the garage in a blue 1984 Cadillac Seville. They would return with groceries in brown paper bags, silently lifting them with spindly arms. He opened the knob, she went through the door, and it clicked shut behind them. They wouldn’t come out again until the clock donged next.
She left the house for the last time on squeaky wheels under a white sheet. The Seville hovered closely behind her as they went soundlessly in the direction of the hospital. And the neighborhood was five minutes late forever after.
