You will arrive at six forty-five. The fluorescent panels will flicker in sequence, a rhythm you stopped noticing three years ago. Or five. Time moves differently here. The light is broken in a way that makes everything look already dead. The air tastes like ammonia and bleach and something underneath both. Something that’s been waiting.
You will sit at your station. Station Seven. The number is stamped on the desk in faded letters. The stamp holder sits at a forty-five degree angle, worn smooth where your palm has rested three thousand times. Or five thousand. Or more. You will not remember when you chose this number or if anyone asked. The chair is molded to your shape now. Your shape has become the chair’s shape. It holds the cold of the room like bone holds cold. You will adjust the stamp in the metal holder. The stamp will be heavy. Heavier than it should be for its size.
The line will begin forming at six fifty-two.
You will not look at their faces. This is protocol. Protocol exists to protect both parties. You have read the manual. The manual is laminated. You’ve touched it so many times the laminate is worn away in places, revealing the paper underneath, softening.
You will call the first number. A-347.
A woman will approach. She will have documents. The documents will be in order or they will not be in order. Either way, you will require additional documentation. Your hand is already reaching for Form 47-B. Your fingers know the motion. Your hand moves before your mind catches up. You will begin filling out the form. The form has seventeen fields. You have filled out Form 47-B approximately four thousand times. Your hand knows the motions without thought.
Her hand will shake as she places the folder on your desk. You will not acknowledge the tremor. You will open the folder. Inside, a photograph of her. Younger, smiling, a different person wearing her face. You will not ask about the smile. You will ask about the date. The date is incorrect. You check the manual. The manual provides no standard for correctness. The system does not require dates to satisfy any rule. It requires them to be submitted. Satisfaction is not the objective.
Your index finger will nick on the paper’s edge. Blood will bead under your fingernail. You will not stop writing.
The woman will ask how long this will take. You open your mouth. Nothing emerges. There is no answer. There is only the waiting.
You will stamp the form. The stamp will make a sound like a door closing.
The line will not move. Then your hand will reach for the next form. Your hand will move because your hand always moves. The clarity will dissolve. You will not think of it again.
You will call A-348.
A man will approach. His documents will be incomplete. They will remain incomplete. This is correct. You will not look up. You will not need to. Your hand will fill in the fields. The fields are never complete. You will stamp. You will call the next number.
Your fingers will move. The stamp will be heavy. The skin at your knuckle will have split. You will not remember when. Your face. You stopped looking for it.
You will call A-349.
A child will approach with an adult. The child’s form will be incomplete in a different way. Questions answered in pencil, in a hand too small for the boxes provided. You will require ink. You will require the adult to provide ink. The adult will not have ink. You will provide ink. The ink will cost nothing.
The child’s blood type will be written in the margin. You will not ask why it is there. You will ask for it to be entered in the correct field. The adult will make an error. You will require correction. The correction will require a new form. The new form will generate two more forms. You will stamp each one.
The stamp obscures the blood type. The child and the adult will leave.
You will call A-350. There is no A-350. You will call A-351.
The blood. There will be actual blood this time, a spot of it on the margin where the child’s finger punctured while pressing too hard with the pen. It will not disappear when you stamp. The stamp will be placed directly over it. Red will show through the ink like an eye opening underneath. You will not flinch.
You will call A-352.
The numbers will continue. The line will continue. You will continue. The fluorescent light will continue its broken rhythm, and you will move your hand and the stamp will fall and rise and fall and the forms will accumulate and the line will not shorten and your fingers will bleed and you will not stop and you will never leave and this will be the whole of eternity and you will call the next number and you will call the next number.
You will stamp.
The next applicant will approach.
The line will continue.
