Fiction: The Meeting

By Jose L Recio

On the first Thursday of last month, Raymond, a reporter for a local Los Angeles County newspaper and a freelance poet, arrived punctually for his monthly meeting with Leonor at her office in downtown Los Angeles. She is an editor for Echoes, a poetry magazine.  

“How have you been?”  she asked as they sat at a small table beside her desk, ready to work on his new poems. 

“Not too well.” 

They had met online six years ago. Raymond was looking for a writer’s coach for help because, although he was dedicated to his work, he was unsuccessful publishing. Leonor had a website where she offered such a service. After some time of working together, they became friends; their friendship was bound mainly to their literary interests.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” Leonor offered.

“A glass of water. Thanks.”

Leonor got up and took a few steps to a side table set against the wall, with a tea set on it. Beside this table was a small refrigerator from which she got out a bottle of Perrier. She placed the tea set and the bottle of water on a tray and took it to the working table. She helped Raymond with a glass of water and herself with a cup of tea without taking her eyes off him.

 Raymond, 42, is a widower. His wife, Elisabeth, died two years ago at 39 of ovarian cancer. She was a dedicated high school teacher in Riverside, a midsize Californian city, near Los Angeles, where both were born, raised, and went to school. They had been married for eight years with no children—they lost a baby a year after they married because of a miscarriage. As a married couple, they had maintained a conventional, rather anodyne lifestyle. 

“You don’t feel well?” Leonor said. Her tone of voice was indicative of concern. 

Raymond hesitated, got up from his chair, and slowly strolled through the room, his head bowed forward as if in continuous reverence, a habit that made him hunch and appear older than he was and of shorter height than his actual average stature.

 “I’ve been having chest pain,” he said.

Leonor stood up from her seat, tall, mildly overweight but retaining the kind of attractiveness seen in some mature people. Four years ago, she and her husband, also an editor, divorced after a short, childless marriage. She approached Raymond and softly grabbed his arm with a protective air like a female lion would protect its puppies. 

“Why didn’t you call me?” she said.

When Elisabeth got sick, Raymond was loving and caring. As her illness progressed and she became more and more debilitated and in pain, his dedication to her care intensified, but his fortitude weakened. After she died, three months after the diagnosis, many believed that Raymond would soon follow her to the grave, for he fell into apathy; such seemed to have been the impact that his wife’s death had on him. 

“The first day I felt pain I neglected it. At night, I took a warm bath and went to bed hoping the ache would disappear during my sleep.  However, I got up on the second day with chest pain.”

Leonor put a face of concern. 

“Won’t you sit down?” she said, lightly pulling Raymond’s arm and pointing to the empty chairs. He politely resisted the action and kept on pacing.

Leonor returned to her chair and sat down. Imaginative and skillful, she didn’t spare any effort after Elisabeth died in helping Raymond to find a spark of energy and write a few lines now and then until, under her guidance, he took refuge in his writing as a means of survival. He also developed a fondness for Leonor, whose external manifestations signaled that he secretly felt something for her that went beyond love for her work.

“I tried not to worry,” Raymond said. “I went to work as I did every morning but couldn’t concentrate.”

“I don’t see why you didn’t call for help.” 

Raymond paused his pacing. He stood behind the back of the chair, reached for the glass of water on the table beside the notebook, took a sip, and restarted moving back and forth. 

 “I thought of calling you—” 

“Why didn’t you?” 

“I didn’t want to bother you. I drove myself to the E. R.”

Raymond stopped talking but continued pacing nervously. Leonor’s eyes followed his moves. 

 “The ER doctor ruled out a heart attack,” he continued.

“That was good news.”

“Yes, and no.” 

A silence followed, which Raymond broke in the next moment: “The doctor suspected an aortic aneurysm.” Another brief silence, and then he said, “A bomb ready to blast.” 

“I can imagine your apprehension.” 

“They admitted me to the hospital for a workup. I thought about Elizabeth, her cancer, her dying… Suddenly, your image replaced that of Elisabeth in my mind. I thought about you, our work, our friendship—” 

“Were you confused?”

“I wanted to succeed as a writer for you.”

 “You probably were confused in the hospital.” Leonor leaned back on her chair, moving her head to follow Raymond’s steps. 

“I pretended to be calm.” 

“Were you scared being alone in a hospital room?”

“Alone with my thoughts, you mean. You were in my mind: I didn’t want to die. I wanted to live and be worthy of you.”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t quite see your point.”

“It’s hard to explain. A terrible thought took hold of me: I envisioned having a large aneurysm beyond surgical repair, and as I thought of it, I had nausea and stomach pain.”

“Oh, my! Did you think you were going to die?

“A few minutes later, the staff took me out for an echocardiogram and a CAT scan. Back in my room in the middle of the night, perspiring profusely and worrying about what was wrong, I started writing in my notebook. Can you imagine? I’m only 42. I feared I was going to die prematurely before I finished my book, and I was going to leave you stuck with it. I wrote desperately, one line after the other. I calculated I had still much to show you before dying.”  Raymond's speech became fast, pressured, and a bit angry.

“I can imagine your uncertainty, your anguish. But you owe me nothing. You’ve worked hard. I’m sure you’ll soon succeed. I simply have helped you to become a better writer,” Leonor said calmly.  “But you are here, thankfully!” she added triumphantly and took a deep breath. Then, she grabbed a pencil from the table and drew it to her lips, reflective, like someone leaving the market with the impression of missing an item from the list. “I wonder, what was wrong with you?” she said, raising her eyes to Raymond.

“I asked the night nurse that question. ‘Soon,’ she said as she gave me a sleeping pill and wished me a goodnight.”

“Were you able to sleep?”

“Yes, I fell asleep, finally.”

Raymond, still strolling through the room, went back to sit on the same chair he had occupied when he arrived. Leonor poured herself another cup of tea and refilled Raymond’s glass of water.

“A distressing story. But you haven’t said what was wrong,” she said.

“I woke up the following day to a voice calling my name. It was Dr. Johnson softly asked whether I still had chest pain, because—he said—the tests were normal. He then asked me to describe my pain, which I had done many times before, so I repeated that it felt like pinching needles, and my skin was very sensitive.” Raymond leaned back in his chair, glancing at the notebook on the table. “The next morning,” he continued, “a rash showed over the aching area, and the doctor diagnosed shingles and discharged me with antivirus pills.”

“What a relief!”

“I feel better,” he said. “But while in the hospital, I went through an inferno. I expected death.”

“Your courage, knowing you couldn’t change your fate, is admirable,” Leonor said.

“The experience has impacted me greatly, but it has also provided me with clarity of vision.”

Leonore gazed at him inquisitively. “What do you mean by clarity of vision?” 

Raymond picked up the notebook with his writing before him and visibly trembling held it in his hand. “Your image, which stuck in my mind despite my agitation, revealed I am in love with you, and loving you is my priority in life.”

Hearing these words, Leonore remained speechless for some time, staring at him. “I’m in shock,” she finally said. “I don't know what to say, except, maybe out of consideration for my feelings, could you calm down, please? I don’t know what to make of what you just said.”

“I understand. You see, my love for you was mysteriously revealed, not explained.” 

 “Revealed to you when you were going through a terrible situation in the hospital only a few days ago, Raymond. I’m sure it will pass.” 

“When?

“I don’t know. You need to temper your emotions.”

“Temper?” Raymond turned a page of his notebook and passionately started reading:

If one could

Say ‘no,’

Turn the chin aside,

Walk away

 

If one could

Appease the inner beast, 

Balance l’amour

Disclaim the call

 

If one could...

 

“But can we?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I’ve never been in the state of mind that you were when in the hospital, being afraid you were going to die prematurely.”

Raymond got up abruptly and started pacing again, nervously.

“If you don’t mind, please stop pacing. It gives me the jitters,” Leonor said.

“Can you at least tell me whether or not you feel something for me?”

“I’m sorry. I’m uncertain one way or another.”

Raymond’s breath accelerated and sweat bathed his forehead. His steps became unsteady, and he looked pale. Leonor got up quickly, went to his help, grabbed his hand, and led him back to sit on the chair. “Please, don’t get sick again.” She cried.

“I’m sorry,” Raymond said in a low voice. “Right now, I’m feeling weak. I’ve tingling in my fingertips and feel pressure in my chest.”

“I’ll call an ambulance, Raymond. You may be having a heart attack.”

Raymond remained sitting, flaccid, with his head leaning forward to almost touching the table. 

“If I survived, would you marry me?” he said feebly.

Leonor called an ambulance.

“I don’t know. Please, Raymond, do not ask.” 

She witnessed the paramedics attending Raymond who now appeared to be confused and sad, and then carrying him on a stretcher into the vehicle. She wiped away her tears with the back of her hand and, standing in the doorway, gazed at the scene with the expression of a hiker reaching the fork of a trail in the woods and not knowing which path was the right way.

José L Recio was born and raised in Spain, where he studied medicine. He came to the States young and practiced medicine in California for decades. He also developed a parallel interest in creative writing and has grown to become bicultural. In 2021, he published Transitions: Twenty-four Bilingual Short Stories, part of which is now in preparation for a second edition to be published by Anxiety Press. He has also written several short memoirs and essays. Currently, he and his wife live in Pasadena, Los Angeles. They enjoy hiking with their whippet and traveling.