Tough

[I've put two hours of writing on my calendar every Friday. Today's the first time I've had to do it since I put it on my calendar. It's been 39 minutes and I've thought about quitting four times. I'm not very good with words coming out of my mouth, but I can be good with words written down, especially if they're coming from a character that's not me. But even the things we're good at can be hard to do sometimes. I've been writing in some capacity or another for over 20 years, which is a weird thing to now get to say. But having done it for so long, I've learned how to convince myself not to quit 39 minutes into the two hours a week of dedicated writing time: Give myself a flash fiction writing prompt. Today's was "Write about someone getting a bad diagnosis."]

Breathe.

That’s what the picture said, over a landscape shot of some river somewhere, doesn't really matter where.

Who makes these kinds of pictures? Logan thought. Is it a company? Does someone make enough money to buy some fancy house and fancy car and have a fancy family just from snapping a photo of a river and slapping a word over it?

He wanted to keep thinking about the photo, even when Dr. Horace came back into the room. He didn’t want to focus on Dr. Horace’s grim expression or the way he fumbled on purpose with the folder and his glasses, like he was doing anything to buy a little time.

He wanted to keep thinking about who makes these kinds of pictures, who puts on a slimy salesman smile and comes to a hospital with a trunk full of these, ready to make the big bucks.

“Well. Here we are. I have the results, Logan.”

He wanted to think about this same salesman whose expression changes the minute he leaves the hospital and begins the drive home to his family, ten pictures lighter. Walking into his house at the end of a long day and smelling freshly cooked bread that his wife just took out of the oven. Picking up his twin girls as they come running to meet him at the door.

“Are you here alone? This, this might be a conversation you’d rather have with someone here with you. People usually do.”

His house doesn’t have any of these stupid pictures in it. His walls are covered with framed drawings from his girls, and musings by his artistic wife, and family portraits where they’re laughing and kissing and happy and always healthy.

“Logan? Logan.”

Logan blinked and forced his eyes away from the walls. “I’m here.”

Dr. Horace cleared his throat awkwardly. “Is your wife here with you? She just getting coffee downstairs?”

“My wife.” Logan looked back at the picture before saying anything else. “My wife, she’s tough in a lot of ways. In all ways, honestly. But. I didn’t want her to have to be tough unless she had to be. Unless it was time to be tough.”

“Logan,” Dr. Horace began slowly, “I’m afraid it’s time to be tough.”