In the Sight of God
Precious waits. There are five women in front of her in the queue for the self-service checkout machines. Two are wearing headphones, swaying to private melodies. One is reading a glossy magazine. She casts through pages of fashion tips and candid photographs of startled celebrities. Two are looking at their phones, eyes drawn by bright lights and moving images. There has been a mass shooting in America and one of the women is checking a live news feed. There are embedded videos of weeping parents and a blank-looking NRA spokesman.
Precious is holding a shopping basket laden with toothbrushes, toothpaste, soaps and fizzy bath bombs. It is her day off. She is running errands—first this, then a visit to the GP, then some downtime. Later, there will be a demonstration on the street outside the walk-up, and after that she is meeting a photojournalist who got in touch. It is the second protest they’ve staged, and the culmination of months of campaigning. Precious has doubts about the effectiveness of such activities, but they have to do something.
A group of teenagers loiters nearby. They are telling lewd jokes competitively. One of the teenagers is clearly uncomfortable with the behavior of his peers, and shuffles nervously. He throws anxious glances at Precious, as if concerned she will immediately telephone his mother. She must look like the type of person to be easily offended.
The queue progresses and Precious makes her way to a self-service machine. She scans her items one by one and places them to the side while the self-service machine calculates how much money she owes. She decides there are too many disparate items to carry safely so takes a plastic bag. The machine asks for £7.28. Precious shoves a handful of loose change into the slot without counting it, and the machine spits out the overpayment.
Outside, a cool wind skips along the street. It kicks up litter and tips out pools of the night’s rainfall from shopfront awnings. Precious unties the arms of her thin sweatshirt from around her waist and puts it on. She draws the fabric close around her body and hunches her shoulders. Summer wore itself out.
The clinic is on the next street. Precious has an appointment to see the nurse for a routine mammogram. It’s a task she resents more than she can explain, but she’s at that age, apparently. She’ll be 42 in December.
The waiting room is full, and there is a shortage of chairs. Precious has one at first then gives it to an elderly man and goes to lean against a wall next to a noticeboard displaying images of common ailments. The old man now sitting in her chair winks at her. He has spilled part of his breakfast down his shirt. Precious can see a crust of milk and dried porridge oats. He winks again. She looks the other way.
There are women with children. One young mother is trying to distract her toddler from his stomach ache with a set of wooden farmyard creatures. The cow and the sheep provide no help. The pig does a little better but the boy soon tires of the creature’s curly tail and toothy grin and his wailing resumes.
Precious recognizes a woman in the corner, but can’t place her. Her clothes are understated and elegant. She is wearing a neat, natural linen dress and a number of diamonds are positioned on her fingers, on one of her wrists, and around her neck. They are cut roughly, in the way that is currently fashionable, as if they are not diamonds at all but pieces of weathered glass found on the beach and sold at auction for thousands of pounds.
Precious is called in to see the nurse. Her name sounds rusty through the tannoy. The P pops and the “shus” rustles. Her surname is swallowed. She makes her way to the end of the waiting room and pushes through a set of heavy swing doors then follows a narrow corridor illuminated by murky skylights. The door Precious needs is the last on the right. She knocks gently then enters.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning.”
The nurse reads Precious’s full name from her computer screen.
“Yep, that’s me.”
The room is both musty and caustic: a mixture of cleaning detergent and whatever odor the detergent was meant to expel. It smells like a wet swimming costume left overnight in a sports bag.
Precious takes off her sweatshirt, her T-shirt, her bra, and folds them on the chair. The nurse conducts the examination. Her hands are cold. She prods methodically then guides Precious toward the mammogram machine and helps her place her breasts into the opening. The process is awkward and uncomfortable.
The nurse is short with her and refuses to make eye contact. She must have read Precious’s records and made some inferences, most of which are probably accurate. There is a small, silver crucifix around her neck.
Precious used to be a Christian. She was raised within a church that was strictly evangelical, led by her stepfather, though Precious was obliged to refer to him as “Pastor.” He drove a Rolls Royce and owned a collection of Rolex watches. When Precious was little she confused the names of these luxury brands and referred to the man’s shiny gold car as a Rolex Royce. For Pastor, luxury was next to godliness. It was the rich who would inherit the earth, and entrance to heaven was something to be bought and sold. He encouraged his congregation to take as great an interest in worldly advancement as they did in matters of the immortal soul, and he promised aid in exchange for substantial donations to the church. As Precious grew up she slowly became disillusioned, although the rest of her family were well and truly duped. They fell out about it.
When the procedure is over, Precious puts her clothes back on and
