[ WP ] Man with an emotional disorder sees everything as flat and lifeless

There is a man dressed in white sitting on a chair. A steel table separates him from a woman dressed casually. A doctor stands near the door. Walls windowless and blank. Some expressions tense, some like the walls. 
 
 Woman, shying away smiles, forming tears in her eyes: 
 
 I remember when we first met. Do you remember? 
 
 ( silence ) 
 
 I remember, when you grabbed me in between classes, and I had no idea who you were, and you just started bumbling nonsense. I couldn ’ t understand a word you said and Annie was standing next to me, and we were exchanging looks when you kept going on and on, some incoherent gibberish – we didn ’ t even think you were speaking English – and then you took out a crumpled piece of paper, and you tried to thrust it into one of my shirt pockets but I thought you were trying to grab my boob. Do you remember? I started screaming and you just ran away, just dropped the paper on the floor. My curiosity got the best of me. I grabbed it while Annie wasn ’ t looking and we went off to class. Go out with me – is what the note said, along with your phone number. When I read it in class I couldn ’ t stop laughing aloud, I almost got kicked out. I don ’ t know why I didn ’ t feel weird about you. I just thought it was, so cute. You were – 
 
 Man in white, expression unmoved: 
 
 Excuse me Miss? Doctor, line please. Line. 
 
 Woman, apprehensive, turning towards the stoic doctor: 
 
 Miss? He talks now? You told me – 
 
 Doctor: 
 
 His condition is improving, yes. But – 
 
 I ’ m terribly sorry but I can not meet eye to eye with you. Interrupted Man in white, keeping his eyes on the woman in front of him. 
 
 Woman, turning towards him, crying more desperately: 
 
 Listen to me Michael, please! I love you! Please just know that, please! You proposed to me at the park next to my house. Remember? It was the park where we had our first kiss? The park where, where we laid on the grass and looked at the stars until the sun came up, remember? And, and it was the park that is right by that army base – so there was that time when a tank drove by us on the other side of the fence in the middle of the night – wasn ’ t that crazy? Don ’ t you remember? Please remember, I ’ ve been visiting you every week and, and I just want to tell you that my answer is yes! I swear, it ’ s yes! Yes! I know I was hesitant then and I didn ’ t know what the right answer was, and I ’ m so so sorry that I fucked up and hesitated, but I want you to know that my answer is a full on yes! Yes I want to marry you! I love you! Do you remember me now? Look at me in the eyes Michael, please! Please, doctor. 
 
 She looks back and forth from doctor to man, frantic but hopeful, her eyes gleaming with uncertainty. 
 
 The doctor looks towards the man in white with the blank expression, who is fidgeting in his seat. The man takes both hands from his sides, fast at start but slow as he raises them, like unsticking them from his sides as if they were glued there. He slowly folds his hands together as if in prayer, nestled neatly and symmetrically on the table. 
 
 The man opens his mouth to speak, after the long pause: 
 
 I literally can not see eye to eye with you because you are literally a talking vertical line. 
 
 The doctor starts to snicker in the corner. 
 
 The woman: 
 
 What? 
 
 The man, trudging his words, using his finger to draw a diagram in the air: 
 
 You are a vertical line, sticking out of a slightly larger horizontal line, and then everything around you is just, line-like, as well – Doctor! Line please. Line. I see another talking line! 
 
 The doctor takes a pen out of his medical coat pocket and starts to jot down crude notes on the back of his hand, all the while his snickers forte, and the woman stares at the man in front of her with utter defeat and confusion. 
 
 Doctor: 
 
 Would you say it to be lifeless? Flat? 
 
 Man: 
 
 Yes, one of those, get it away from me, it ’ s wiggling around. It scares me. 
 
 The doctor ceases his snickering. The woman, wide eyed. The man ’ s expression remains blank, lifeless and flat. 

