a ninety seventh story...'blindness'

The Doc shuffled into the room.  His blind eyes, white pebbles.  He carried a walking stick in his right hand.  ‘There’s a coffee table in front of you,’ I said.  ‘I know’, he said.  ‘And here’s where I can sit down?’, he said, tapping the settee with his stick, his blind eyes, white pebbles, same as the white-washed walls.  ‘You’ve a large living room’, he continued.  It was true. ‘Well’, I began, ‘It will do’. The Doc’s ears, from which sprouted tufts of silver hair, twitched when I spoke.

‘You have a television?’, Doc asked.  ‘Yes’, I said, ‘about six paces in front of you’.  The Doc had seated himself now, sat forward on the edge of his seat, both hands resting on his stick, head cocked in my direction, blind eyes, white pebbles, like two hard boiled eggs in the middle of his face.  ‘I sure do like television’, the Doc said.  Somehow this didn’t seem absurd.  ‘Would you like me to put it on?’, I said.  The Doc turned his head to look straight at me, blind eyes, white pebbles, hard boiled eggs, looking straight through me.  ‘No’, he said, ‘it would be good to get to know you first’. ‘Sure’, I said, ‘what would like to know?’.

The Doc’s tufty ears twitched again.  I could hear my wife clattering about in the kitchen presumably fixing us a drink.  It was a hot spring day, we had the bay windows open, the sun was warm on my back, splashing into the living room.  ‘I have a request, if I may’, the Doc said presently, his hands kneading the top of his stick, blind white eyes, white flints still looking at me, through me.  ‘Sure’, I said, ‘what can I do?’.  The Doc shifted his feet, thrust his jaw out: he had a neatly kept beard for a blind man.  ‘Can I touch your face?’, he asked.

‘I used to be a doctor’, The Doc said as I knelt before him so my face was on a level with his, sat there on the settee.  The Doc’s breath smelled of tobacco.  ‘I know’, I said, ‘my wife told me’.  The Doc grinned, showed his yellow-stained teeth.  ‘Your wife is a good lady’, he said, and his pink tongue momentarily shot out from between his lips, ‘she used to be patient of mine’.  And then he reached forward and with the backs of his hands gently stroked my cheeks, felt with the tips of his fingers around my cheekbones, under my eye sockets.  I winced.  I’ve always had this thing with eyes, I don’t like anything near them, why I don’t enjoy deer hunting, the cartridges shooting off right next to your line of vision. ‘Don’t worry’, said the Doc, sensing the tension in my facial muscles, ‘before I went blind I was a good doctor’.  ‘Sure’, I said, somewhat uncomfortable for the first time.  The Doc moved his fingers to my temples.  Again I winced, felt a little sweat break on my back.  It was a hot spring afternoon even with the bay windows open.  ‘You exercise much?’, the Doc asked, and he put his palms on my head.  ‘Not as much as I should, I guess’, I said.

The Doc stroked my bald pate for a while, and I looked up at his blind eyes, blind eyes that up close resembled oysters in their shells.  He was chewing on something invisible.  Maybe he was in need of some tobacco.  ‘Can I ask another pertinent question?’, the Doc said after a few seconds.  The living room had become very small.  ‘Yes, I suppose’, I said.  The Doc removed his hands from his head, and sat back, put his hands back on top of his stick.  ‘Do you’, and he hesitated, perhaps uncertain of himself, his pink tongue shooting out from between his lips once more. ‘Go on’, I said, intrigued at this strange man before me.  The Doc began kneading his hands again. ‘Can you still jerk off?’, he asked. 

And then my wife came in carrying a tray of gin and tonics.