Iris

by Elana Cohen

Iris sat in the café sipping her earl grey tea. The marble table on which she rested her cup of tea on felt cold against her skin and she pulled her sweater farther down her arm, creating a barrier between her skin and the table’s cool surface. The double doors to the small café flung open as another customer walked in and a gust of wind billowed in. Iris breathed in the cool air as the sound of traffic slowly died out as the doors closed again. She smiled to herself slightly; the retired life was going quite well. After working in the intensive care unit for 30 years, Iris was done. She sat there reveling at how simple life could be. There was no more blood, no more unruly patients who didn’t want this or weren’t getting that, no more wounds or puss or needles, but most of all, there was no more hacking. Iris wasn’t unreasonable, she understood that people had to cough from time to time and that it wasn’t something you could control, but there was a very particular cough, or hack really, that was unforgettably the deteriorating and decaying state of someone who was suffering from lung cancer. Iris would sometimes wake up in the middle of the night with a start as her dreams surrounded her by cigarettes, pipes and cigars as they would one by one grow mouths and start hacking at her. Now, however, as Iris was retired and didn’t have to deal with any of those things, she could relax, just as she was doing right then.

She looked up to see a young man ordering from the counter towards the door. He was tall and thin and had a large book tucked under his left arm. He paid the man at the cash register and made his way to one of the tables. He found one in the back corner next to the window. It was Iris’s favorite spot in the café, but it had been occupied when she first arrived. She felt silly getting up once the occupant had left, so she had stayed put, content enough with her table in the middle of the room. This boy looked hard at work, marking up his large book with highlighters and pens. She was happy to give him the space to excel in his studies. She smiled to herself, knowing that there were still dedicated intelligent young people around to make the world a better place.

As the last sips of tea drained from Iris’s cup, she looked up at the clock and decided it was time to head back home. The walk from the café to Iris’s house took about 15 minutes if one was walking with purpose. Iris never had anywhere to be (except for Tuesdays when she got together with the girls to play bridge). She would take her time and meander home slowly, smelling the flowers and watching the schoolchildren flood out of the doors and courtyards the as the final bell of the day rang.

Iris took a deep breath filling her lungs with the sweet spring- smoke? Iris looked around and saw two kids, children really, maybe 15 or 16 leaning up against the wall, cigarettes in hand.

“Excuse me,” Iris exclaimed, crossing the street to talk to them. “Excuse me boys, do you understand what you’re doing right now?”

The boys exchanged an uncomfortably glance. “Standing?” One of them replied, obviously thinking that Iris was a crazy person.

Iris laughed sarcastically, “Yes, I suppose you are. Good thing these death sticks aren’t destroying your mind, only turning you lungs into black goop.”

One of the boys laughed nervously not sure how to respond.

“Oh, it’s no joke. Trust me, I know. I know more about these expensive little wads of cancer than you would ever want to know.” Iris took a deep breath trying to make herself seem a little more sane. “Where do you get these things anyways? You can’t be old enough to buy them yourselves.”

“We know someone,” one of the boys stated, provoking a quiet response from his friend’s elbow into his ribs. “Ouch! What the- I mean…”

“Dear lord. I have half a mind to… just… where are your parents?” she stammered out unsuccessfully. “Do you know what those death sticks do to you? It’s like taking ice cream scoops out of your lungs. Tar coats your insides until you can’t breath anymore and you need to be in a sterilized room for the rest of your life with a machine that breathes for you.”

The boys stood there in silence, their cigarettes hanging loosely from their limp hands.

“Children these days don’t know the sanctity of their own lives,” Iris mumbled more to herself than anyone else as she held out her hand, demanding the half burnt cigarettes. She turned on her tan shoes and walk away.

As she rounded the corner onto her quaint street, a slight scowl was still perched on her lightly wrinkled face. “Gees, someone needs to teach those boys a lesson.” She sighed, taking the first steps into her light blue stucco bungalow.

“Hey there Iris.” She looked up to see her next-door neighbor smiling as he lifted his mail out of the mailbox. “Beautiful day, isn’t?”

Iris smiled and nodded before heading inside. Once the door was closed behind her, she sighed. “Or at least it was…”

That night, Iris couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned in her bed as the clock slowly ticked on. Her dreams consisted of giant cigarettes with baby faces chasing her down long dark corridors. She would wake with a start, sweat forming on her brow line. After checking the clock, she would attempt to fall back asleep as her mind filled with images of black lungs, decaying before her.

After a night of restless sleep, Iris awoke her eyes puffy and head throbbing. She shuffled her way from her bedroom to her bathroom where she washed her face and took three Advil.

“Those kids…” She said looking into the mirror. “They need to understand what they’re risking.”

That day, Iris dressed in a pair of loose green velour pants and a purple turtleneck that she accented with a chunky amber necklace. She walked to the café swiftly, her legs moving at a quick rhythm. Once there, she ordered her usual earl grey tea, sat down at her usual table to the far right of the entrance, and took out a notebook and a pen.

Iris sat for hours meticulously writing and scratching out sentences and ideas she didn’t like. Her hands worked at a steady pace and before long, she had filled up pages with diagrams and notes. She smiled to herself and she drained the last of her tea. She was going to be the one to set things right and she had a plan.

She rose from her table and placed the notebook under her. She strode down the street with a look of satisfied determination.

It was late when Iris got home that night. Her day had been quite full and she welcomed her warm bed as she dressed in a flannel nightgown and crawled in between her soft cotton sheets. Her lilac down comforter felt heavy against her tired body. Iris sighed as she quickly drifted off to sleep.

In the morning, Iris woke up early feeling rested. She sang to herself as she dressed in a pale pink skirt and blue t-shirt. Looking outside the window, Iris could see the sun shining.

On her way to the café, she picked up a newspaper and tucked it under her arm as she walked the rest of the way there. She got her tea, added the perfect amount of milk and sugar and sat down. Iris opened up her folded newspaper and looked at the headline of the front page. Teenage Boys Found Dead Outside of Tobacco Store.

Another patron of the café leaned over looking at Iris’s paper. “That’s terrible!” the woman to Iris's right exclaimed at the bold headline.

“Awful,” Iris replied.