I was meeting with my shrink in a huge huge auditorium size office.
"Do you have a copy of ...[some paper, a form for health care or something]?"
"Not with me, but it's in my employee file in Jane's office."
"You stay here and relax; I'll go get it," and he was out the door.
I sat in the chair my cheek atop a pillow that I was hugging. I dozed off. His secretary came in, looked around for him. I opened my eyes and said , "He'll be right back."
"Pardon me?"
I raised my voice as much as I could while half asleep: "He'll be back in a few minutes."
She left.
An official of Small Pond opened a side door and came into the auditorium/office. He greeted me with his faux bonhomie, stood looking around at the space for a minute and left. Other people came and went and eventually gathered as if for a meeting, a presentation of some kind, judging from the way they sat facing one wall.
The doctor came back, and strode the twenty feet from the door to my chair, leaned over and spoke softly to me. He's asking for [something] from your file, and what he's trying to do is completely illegal. Take this paper and go straight to the legal department."
I left the office and found myself in the big state office building where I used to work. I knew my office and the legal department were on a different floor but I couldn't remember if it was the fifth or sixth floor. I kept getting off the elevator and wandering around, getting lost in nooks and cul-de-sacs. I found the legal office and the attorney said to me, "Do nothing until you know what he's going to do. Do nothing until you have a piece of paper from him stating what the issue is." That made a great deal of sense to me, and I was relieved.
Then my sister was there, all in a righteous huff about what "they're trying to do to you." I wanted to concentrate on what I had to do and she kept asking questions and being angry and I hardly spoke to her, but just let her rant. I found another office and explained to the secretary what I needed to do to head off the threat (I think it was a threat of retirement on disability) before the official had gotten well started on his action. She handed me a black plastic object with labels on it. It was oblong, shaped like a shirt cardboard. "Write me a 'Joseph Lieber' letter and put it in an envelope and stick it right here." She pointed to the labeled spot in the middle of the object. "...and bring it back to me."
"I don't know what a 'Joseph Lieber' letter is," I told her.
She smiled and said, "I think I can remember..." She clasped her hands at her waist, tipped her head back and rolled her eyes up to the ceiling. "It's fifty-eight purely factual sentences, stating your case."
My sister and I rode up and down on the elevator for a while, she inanely chitchatting at people who wondered what in the world she was talking about. It was a Friday afternoon and they just wanted to get home. The elevator doors would open and I'd get out and she'd be in the middle of some monologue and miss the doors, so I would have to wait for her to realize that and come back. We finally got to the first floor and the exit doors and walked out. "No, this isn't right," she said, and turned to get back on the elevator.
"C, it is right. There are the doors right there."
Shrugging and giggling: "Oh."
She had come to give me a ride home. She couldn't remember where she had parked her car but knew it was in front of a real estate office. She stood still, gazing over a big parking lot full of vehicles. I looked over my shoulder, saw a realtor's sign on the building and asked if that was the one. "That's the one!" she said, and instantly saw her car.
We got out on the road. I was thanking my lucky stars that I would soon be home where I could mull over the day's developments.
"How about this! I'll treat you to a leg massage before we go home! Wouldn't that be nice? We can stop at the salon on the way and you can get all relaxed..." She wore her bright, tense, I'm being determinedly cheerful to take your mind off things face. Always, with her, the extra length added to any excursion.
"I don't think so. Not today. I have a headache and I want to get home."
And then I woke up. I did, in fact, have a headache, and needed a cup of coffee.
I Googled Joseph Lieber. I don't know anyone by that name and wondered where I had come up with it.
And "Joseph Lieber letter" brought me this: Swallowed Up in Space. It's only six sentences.
