Echoes In The Waiting Room

There were two things in life that Trevor Williams hated above all others, and Trevor was about to let the loud foreign girl at reception know about one of them.

The fluorescent lights overhead buzzed with the incessant hum of an indifferent institution. It was the kind of place where time moved in strange increments, where the days stretched, and nothing of consequence ever happened. Trevor hadn’t been here in years—decades, maybe—but the smell, the ambiance, it all remained unchanged. The heavy scent of bleach mingled with dust. It made his skin itch.

“Name?”

Her voice dragged Trevor out of his thoughts. The receptionist—Ola, according to her nametag—barely glanced at him, her fingers clacking at a keyboard, an indifferent tone wrapped in that thick Eastern European accent. Eastern block, he guessed. Polish, maybe? Trevor had never been good with accents. That wasn’t what had made him the best. But she had the look. Blonde. Stark features. The kind that people mistook for being cold, but Trevor knew better. He had seen those types of eyes a thousand times before. They weren’t cold. They were calculating.

He scribbled his name on the clipboard in a firm, jagged stroke, like he was signing off on a hit contract. In a way, he was. "Williams, Trevor."

“Sit,” she said, without bothering to look up.

Trevor’s fingers curled into fists for a brief second. He hated disrespect. But what he hated even more, what ate at him more than incompetence, was complacency. The kind of complacency that made you blind to the small details—the things that mattered.

He turned to look around the sterile waiting area. The chairs were arranged in neat rows, the dull hum of the security desk a low murmur in the background. A couple of inmates shuffled by in their faded orange jumpsuits. Trevor’s lip curled slightly. He knew this place too well, though in another life, he had always passed through the back door, not the front.

He sat, his back stiff, legs out at a precise angle. This was a man who had built his life around precision. A life in which mistakes were paid for in blood. And as he sat there, an old scar on his left forearm twinged—a reminder of a job gone sideways, once upon a time.

Ola glanced at him briefly again, her fingers still moving mechanically over the keys. She hadn’t even noticed the sweat gathering at the edge of his collar. Good. He liked it that way.

***

Five minutes. Then ten.

Something wasn’t right.

“Doctor Sinclair will be with you shortly,” Ola finally called, though her voice lacked the sort of conviction you’d expect from a professional.

Trevor’s gaze darted back to her. His muscles tensed ever so slightly. Something about her tone wasn’t sitting right. You learn to pick up on these things when you’ve lived long enough to recognize the difference between fear and deceit. This was neither. This was...boredom.

Trevor had worked his entire life to be invisible. To slip between the cracks of society. But in moments like these—moments where boredom crept in—it was easy to miss something dangerous. And Trevor had no intention of being overlooked, not today.

He stood, moving toward the desk with a practiced grace that defied his age. His voice low, controlled. "I'm not a fan of being kept waiting."

Ola looked up then, her eyes finally meeting his, and Trevor noted the faintest flicker of something. Amusement? Annoyance? It was hard to tell. She gave a small, tight smile, a kind of forced hospitality that belonged to someone who wanted to be anywhere else.

"It’s just a routine check-up, Mr. Williams. You’re not a priority.”

And there it was. The kind of insolence that made Trevor’s blood run cold.

“You know,” he said, voice icy, “There are two things in life I hate above all else. One of them is inefficiency.”

Ola’s fingers froze on the keyboard for just a second, the smile still plastered on her face, but this time, Trevor caught the shift in her eyes. He might have been old, but he wasn’t dead. And he could still see when someone realized they’d made a mistake.

“I’ll let Dr. Sinclair know you’re waiting,” she said, a little too quickly.

Trevor smirked to himself. That’s better.

By the time Dr. Sinclair finally stepped into the waiting room, Trevor’s patience was wearing thin. The young man looked uncomfortable, which was unusual. Sinclair had never been the type to show discomfort. He was methodical, a bureaucrat in every sense of the word. The man who held power by simply being the one to carry the clipboard and wear the white coat. But not today.

"Mr. Williams," Sinclair greeted him stiffly. “Please, follow me.”

Trevor didn’t respond, simply pushed himself up from the chair and followed. He felt the gaze of the receptionist, Ola, lingering on his back as they walked into the hallway, toward Sinclair’s office. Trevor could feel the tension in the air thickening, and that little twinge in his gut told him he was walking into something more than a simple check-up. He had walked into a trap before, too many times. This had that same smell.

They walked in silence down a long, stark corridor. Trevor could hear the hum of electricity overhead, the thrum of machinery somewhere deeper in the building. They reached the office. Sinclair opened the door for him, gesturing him in. Trevor stepped inside but didn’t sit immediately. His eyes swept the room, taking in the details. It was spartan—no personal photos, no decorations. A desk, a chair, and a file.

Sinclair closed the door behind them, and Trevor heard the subtle click of the lock.

"Is there something wrong with my file, Doctor?" Trevor asked, his voice cool, careful.

Sinclair hesitated. He moved toward the desk but didn’t sit either. Trevor caught the way his hands twitched, the subtle flick of his gaze toward the file on the desk. “There have been some... complications, Mr. Williams.”

Trevor narrowed his eyes. He had heard this song before, and it always ended in bloodshed.

***

"Complications?"

"Your test results... they’ve flagged certain irregularities.”

Trevor’s chest tightened, but not from fear—anger. He had spent his entire life controlling every variable. There were no loose ends, no irregularities. Every contract, every assignment, had been executed flawlessly. His health had been no different. He had maintained his strength, even into his later years. Kept fit. Sharp.

But this? This was something new.

"Speak plainly, Doctor."

Sinclair fidgeted, flipping open the file as though searching for the right words. "We found some discrepancies in your records. Blood work, scans... things that don't match up with what we have on file."

Trevor stared at him, coldly dissecting the man in front of him. "And what does that mean for me?"

Sinclair hesitated again, then glanced up at him with what Trevor now realized was more than just discomfort. It was fear. “We’ll need to run more tests. It could be nothing, but—”

“But it’s never nothing, is it?” Trevor interrupted, his voice cutting through the room like a knife.

Sinclair closed the file. "No. It’s never nothing."

The room fell into an uneasy silence. Trevor could feel his pulse in his ears, his thoughts racing. He had been meticulous, careful. He had outlived every threat he had ever faced. Was this how it ended? Not in a hail of bullets, not in a moment of glory—but in a quiet room with a man half his age telling him that his body had betrayed him?

He couldn’t accept that. He wouldn’t.

“Then fix it,” Trevor said quietly.

Sinclair looked at him with pity, which only fueled the fire in Trevor’s chest. Pity was for the weak.

“I’m afraid it’s not that simple—”

Trevor slammed his hand down on the desk, making Sinclair jump. “Make it simple.”

For a moment, Sinclair looked like he might argue, but then he sighed, defeated. “There’s... one other thing.”

Trevor raised an eyebrow.

“There’s a security issue with your records. We believe someone might have tampered with them. Or...” Sinclair hesitated, then finished, “Or someone wants you to believe something’s wrong.”

Trevor felt the weight of those words settle over him. Tampered? Someone was playing a game, and he didn’t know the rules. But he knew one thing: in his world, there were no coincidences.

And then it clicked. Ola.

His mind reeled as the pieces slid into place. That’s why she’d been watching him so closely. She wasn’t just a receptionist. She was more. Much more.

“Who is she?” Trevor asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

Sinclair blinked, confused. “Who?”

“The receptionist. The girl at the front desk. Who is she?”

Sinclair’s expression faltered. “You mean Ola? She’s... new.”

Trevor took a step toward the doctor, his voice dangerous now. “Tell me the truth, Doctor. Who is she?”

Sinclair opened his mouth to respond, but before he could, there was a sharp knock at the door. Both men turned to look, and for a moment, the tension in the room was palpable.

Then the door swung open, and there she was—Ola, standing in the doorway, her gaze fixed on Trevor with a knowing look. She stepped inside, closing the door behind her. She didn’t say anything, didn’t need to. The air in the room shifted.

Trevor’s instincts screamed at him. He had been right all along.

She wasn’t just a receptionist. She was the one pulling the strings.

The room stood still, heavy with the unspoken truth. Trevor knew, then and there, that nothing would ever be the same again.