doing shots with strangers

A little boy sits next to me, playing a game on a tablet while fervently sucking a lollypop. His feet swing back and forth, several inches above the ground.  Four other kids - all siblings - play outside on the small patch of lawn.  The youngest, a girl about six years old, comes in the waiting area, breathing loudly on the verge of tears.

She's literally "in a huff" because one of her big brothers did or said something mean to her.    Random children make frequent visits to the basket of free candy, while others play loudly with Lego bricks too large to swallow and the big wire toy.

Another day at the allergist.

I've gotten used to hanging out with my little shotmates two afternoons a week.  They make a mess of the place, but I don't mind since it's not my responsibility to clean it up.

The office I go to is only open two days a week.  Since the recommended shot frequency is twice a week, everyone has become a familiar face.  And it's not ALL little kids.  I count three actual adults in the hoard mess.  Three including me, but I don't really know them since we're three grownups in a sea of little kids.

Ray is, I'd guess, late 20's or early 30's.  He has long hair, often in a ponytail, and usually wears baggy jeans and fat-tongued skater shoes.  I can easily see him taking advantage of Colorado's  snowboarding and legal recreational marijuana.

Diane looks to be about mid-30's, with a pleasant and quiet personality.  She's typically casually dressed in crisp jeans and stylish but comfortable sneakers.  There's something about her that tells me she doesn't have any children.  Not that we've ever really spoken much, but she has an air of non-mom.

When I arrived today among the hoards of little people, sucking on free candy and playing with messy waiting room toys, there was one seat available.  So I took it, seating me on Ray's right.

We are "required" to remain at the shot office for 30 minutes after our injections to watch for any severe reactions.  Ray had gotten his shots just before me, and Diane and I were shot in parallel.

I came out for my 30-minute wait and retook my seat next to Ray as I had left my jacket in the chair.  At that point, many of the little people had cleared out.  Soon, the last of the littles were dismissed and it was just us three adults and several empty chairs in the quiet aftermath.

I suddenly felt that I was awkwardly close to Ray, and Diane was just a couple of seats to his left.

"Should I move to another seat?", I thought to myself.

Nah, that might seem rude or offensive to Ray.

Yet, staying there also felt, well, weird.  Here we had this whole waiting room, and suddenly I felt as if I was practically in Ray's lap, thus making Diane seem like a bit of an outcast in our strange threesome as she was a whole two chairs away.  And since we'd all gotten our shots at about the same time, we'd all be there in this awkward formation for the remainder of our waits.

Ray was playing a game on his phone while I pretended to read my Kindle as I pondered the situation.  Diane was also looking at and swiping her phone screen, but I think she was also pondering the situation.

"Somebody say something!", I inaudibly screamed.

Silence.

Where's a hoard of messy sugared-up little kids when you need them?

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Linking up with Mama Kat for the prompt:
5. Write a blog post inspired by the word: messy