Conditioned- A Story in Five Parts- Part Three

Day One hundred and twenty-seven

I walk into my office. There is teenage girl sitting in the waiting room. She’s got a stroller with a young infant in it. She’s violently shoving a baby spoon into the infant’s mouth. The infant is screaming, crying. His eyes are red, his face blotchy and bloated. The teenage girl starts screaming at him to eat his food, curses at him. Part of me want to say something, do something. But instead I just keep walking, making my way to my office. I hear her smack the kid behind me, the sound echoes a little. I stop for a second, then keep walking.

In my office the phone is ringing. I don’t answer it. I just got in, I need two seconds to- my cell starts vibrating. I want to ignore it, but I answer. There’s an emergency at one of the houses. I drop everything, run back out to my car.

As I pass by the teenage mom and her toddler I see the teenaged girl is crying now, too. Crying louder than her kid as she keeps jamming the spoon into his mouth. The food is all over the kid’s shirt, spilling onto the floor. I run past them.