Mary Sue
“Hi! My name is Mary Sue,” was what the simple woman standing across the check-in desk said. Her accent was intolerable to say the least. She had this sort of pristine southern bell attitude that just pissed me off. ‘Wait till you see your first dead body,’ I thought. ‘You'll be high-tailin’ it outta here with your country ass.’ I laughed. The woman, devoid of intelligent thought, almost seemed to not notice that I was laughing at her. Her blank, unblinking stare was beginning to creep me the f*** out. “Ma’am? Ma’am? Ma’am?!” “Oh heavens I’m sorry. Sometimes my eyes get fixated on something and my brain blocks everything out. This time it was that pimple right there.” She poked my face. “I asked what you were here for?” “I’m here to see my boo Jud Song. That’s J-u-d S-o-…” “224.” “I beg your pardon?” “Room 224. That’s where…Jud Song is.” ‘God what a jackknife name.’ “Thank you.” She walked away. I could still hear her lips smacking from across the hallway as she fletcherized a stick of non-existent gum. I knew she didn’t have any because her type would choke to death on it. I laughed again. As I watched this woman walk away, I could only think about how stupid she was. How she talked like someone who had been participating in beauty pageants since she was 4; how she could stare right at me and yet not hear a thing I said; how she perked her lips together like a duck; or how this dumb b**** really just walked into 220 when I clearly said 224. “EEEEEK! Oh heavens! Oh sweet baby Jesus!” She ran out screaming and asked, “I-Is that man in their dead?! Oh please tell me that wasn’t my Jud.” “No ma’am. That’s Mr. Sengupta and yes, he just died 15 minutes ago.” I lied. Mr. Sengupta had just had toe surgery and was hyped up on opium and pain killers. “Oh.” She took one last look into the room and then shook her head in a disapproving manner. “Could you guide me to room 224? I don’t think I can survive another surprise like that one. Lord knows my blood pressure’s already through the roof.” I paused for a moment. This was my life. This was my shitty life where I had to escort morons 4 rooms down lest they stumble onto another one of the sleeping dead. As I left my nice check-in counter and walked up to her, a devilish thought popped in my mind. I was going to have some fun with this idiot. When we approached the next room I turned to her and said, “This was where the first open heart surgery was performed by a one-eyed graduate student. He’s the guy the show House is based off of.” “Really? Oh my gosh I never knew that.” “Mhm. And over here was where Watson and Crick discovered that DNA was a double-helix. And in this room Morgan Freeman is lying down recovering from a knife wound he got from a knife fight with Jay Leno.” “Wow. This hospital is real famous.” I couldn’t believe it. This pudgy, blonde moron that looked like Honey Boo-boo’s mom actually believed me. No matter how ridiculous my story got she just believed everything I said. I was running out of ideas when room 224 was coming up. There were maybe 6 or 7 footsteps until we reached the room, yet Mary Sue somehow managed to fall flat on her face and give herself a bloody nose. If played in slow motion, her fall would be accompanied by exaggerated facial expressions of terror and overly epic music that would reach its climax upon her nadir. I laughed again but made no attempt to cover it up that time. “Oh dang-nabit. Now I’ve made myself look like a fool.” “No ma’am, not at all. Sometimes it can be difficult overlapping your left foot and right foot without causing a cataclysmic collision between the two. It happens to the best of us.” I’ve seen people in crutches with better walking ability than her. Maybe if she took off those hideously mismatching shoes she might perform the most basic function that even 2 year-olds master. “Oh you’re so sweet.”