Being Seen Is Not the Same As Being Witnessed

By Fox Cantrell

She wasn’t sure what they could possibly want, as they often asked for everything and nothing at the same time. Most of their letters seemed to say, “Hello, yes, we are your insurance, doing insurance things. Would you like us to continue to insure you? If yes, do nothing.” Other times they didn’t seem to be asking or offering anything. Ignoring them had no consequences, so she had allowed them to pile up unopened in a stack now half pushed under her microwave.

The thick stack from Blue Cross Blue Shield. It hadn’t felt like that long since Lucy last bothered to see what her insurance company was yapping about, a month at most, yet they had mailed her with the fervor of Napoleon writing to Josephine. If only a man could ever have as much interest in getting her attention as her health insurance did.

She grabbed a Nature Valley bar from the cupboard and opened the first official-looking envelope. It was several paragraphs of corporate nonsense, so she tossed it beside the sink. It landed in a small puddle left over from the dishes and began turning soggy. She tore into the next one, considering adding it directly to the newly formed discard pile without looking.

But she did look.

Everything stopped for a second.

What. Excuse me?

Her eyes darted across the page too quickly to take anything in. She saw “your responsibility,” followed by “$8,456,” and that could not possibly be correct. She hadn’t even been to the doctor recently, except for a primary-care visit a few months ago that didn’t have a copay. Certainly not an $8,000 copay. She forced herself to read from top to bottom.

Lucy Wallace. That was her. Yeah.1765 Maplegrove Dr. Her address. Correct.

D.O.B. 4/7/1971. Nope. Not her. She was born 12/15/1993.

The letter went on to declare she stayed at St. Mary’s Hospital and had an appendectomy.

Lucy had never been a patient at St. Mary’s. She had her appendix safely inside her, doing whatever an appendix did or did not do. She hadn’t even been in the state on the date listed.

She had been on vacation.

That was her name, but that was not her bill. This is fixable. They just got me confused with someone else. Simple as that. She brushed the crumbs of the Nature Valley bar she had apparently eaten without noticing off the counter and onto the floor. Lucy opened the remaining envelopes in quick succession. Her cat weaved through her ankles, her feather-duster-like tail wrapping around Lucy’s legs as she let out a soft, needy mew. Lucy didn’t notice.

The first letter offered payment-plan options for the eight grand she allegedly owed. The next two were for the real her and were the usual flavor of useless. The fourth letter appeared to be another demand for several more thousand dollars for an ambulance ride to St. Mary’s on the day of her imaginary surgery. “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me,” Lucy said, louder than intended, as Marjorie batted at her ankles. “Ow, Marje. Girl, please.” She gently pushed the cat away with her foot, sending her sliding a little across the linoleum as Marjorie attempted to bunny kick her foot. Marjorie pranced into the living room with her back arched like a crab and began batting at the curtains. For a second, Lucy watched her and almost smiled, but it was hard to smile with a medical bill in her hand. She turned her attention back. Same shit.

The second bill also had the strange mashup of her name and someone else’s birthday. She didn’t have it in her to look at the final piece of mail.Lucy sipped her tea, realized it had become cold, and poured it into the sink. She took the two incorrect bills to the couch and studied them side by side. This other Lucy Wallace had a genuinely terrible day. Maybe she shouldn’t feel so bad. An incorrect bill was a minor inconvenience compared to having the emergency, the surgery, the recovery, and actually owing ten thousand dollars. Good thing it wasn’t her. All she needed to do was talk to a chatbot, probably.

She scanned one of the bills for contact information and found a QR code. Easy enough. Shit like this probably happens all the time. Her phone loaded a page with a blue header, large inoffensive font, a photograph of a smiling family at a picnic, and slogans like “Covering life’s toughest moments” and “Life changes. Our insurance changes with you.”

Bullshit.

She scrolled to Contact Us. There were several phone numbers, none of which she knew how to choose. Whichever one she called would undoubtedly involve forty-five minutes on hold before someone informed her it was the wrong department.

She selected Chat Now.

"Hi! I’m Merryl, the BCBS virtual assistant. Here to—”

Lucy stopped reading and started typing.

"I got someone else’s bill”

She glanced at Marjorie, who was now perched on the back of the couch, staring out the window with the wide-eyed expression cats got when they looked like they were witnessing the rapture but had usually just spotted a bird. Lucy followed her gaze. There was nothing there.

"I’m sorry to hear that,” Merryl replied. "What is your name?”

“Lucy Wallace”“

Thank you, Lucy! Do you have your member ID?”

Ugh.

Lucy sighed and dug through her purse. She found the card at the bottom, where she had already checked three times, among crumbs and an unwrapped restaurant mint. She typed in her ID number.

"Thanks! I’m sorry you’re having an issue today. Do you need help with claims, billing, or finding a care provider today?”

"Representative.”

“I will be happy to help! Do you need help with claims, billing, or finding a care provider today?”

"Oh, fuck off,” Lucy muttered before typing again. "Billing”

"You have three bills from recent visits. Is your question about: Ambulance services — $2,146 Surgical and in-hospital care — $8,456Primary care services — $0”

"Ambulance and hospital.”

"Awesome! Would you like help exploring payment options? I’d be happy to help make the cost manageable for any financial situation.”

Lucy could about throw her phone.

"No! I did not go to the hospital please remove the charges from my account.”

"Oh no! Let me look into that. What is your date of birth?”

"12/15/93.”

“I’m sorry, that doesn’t match our records.”

Lucy stared at the response, feeling her own brain loading.

Maybe she had mistyped it.

She hadn’t.

"12/15/93” she sent again.

"Please provide your date of birth in MM/DD/YYYY format.”

Dumb bitch.

"12/15/1993”

"Hm. That doesn’t match our records. Are you sure?”

'Yes. I am sure I remember my own birthday.”

"You truly remember the day you were born?”

Lucy paused, thumb hovering over the phone screen.

"Yes.”

“You remember gasping, covered in your mother’s slime, the cold air expanding in your fresh, delicate lungs and creating a horrible new sensation that caused you to scream for the warmth back? The bright lights of the delivery room blinding your sensitive eyes as they tried to make sense of their first sights?”

Lucy recoiled slightly from the phone.

She scratched Marjorie behind the ears.

"Wtf no? Can I speak to a representative?”

“Then please certify your date of birth with one of the following: Birth certificate

Government-issued ID

Mother’s handwritten testimony and scrapbooks

Religious beliefs"

Lucy took a screenshot. No one would believe this otherwise.

"ID.“

"Very well. Please provide images.”

She immediately got up and retrieved her wallet. While she was up, she took a detour to her fridge and grabbed her half-drunk bottle of Barefoot Moscato.

She photographed her driver’s license on the counter and submitted it, sipping her wine as the system thought.

"You didn’t tell us you moved to Delaware.”

Merryl responded after analyzing the images.

“Wym u clearly have my address u send me mail like 2x a week my bday is on my id 12/15/93.”

"We have your mailing address in Delaware, but your residence is still listed in Rhode Island. You should have updated that as soon as you moved. But that’s okay! We can verify it now. No worries!”

Merryl’s little bubble appeared, as if someone was typing.

“Okay! To help me clarify the information in your account, in which of the following states have you previously resided?

Illinois

Kentucky

Texas

None of the above”

"None.”

"I’m sorry, that is not correct.……….………..………..………..Please try again!”

"How would u even know? Stupid fucking robot thinks it knows more about me than me.”

"I’m only trying to help.”

“Its ok ig. none of those.”

"Hm, are you sure? It says here you lived in Illinois from 2018 to 2020. The falls were crisp, but the winters were long and harsh. You were always pretending to be unimpressed and slightly above the locals. Talking as though it would never compare to the colors and shores of Vermont, but sometimes driving through cornfields gave you a cosmic insignificance that felt homey and so much safer than the ocean ever did when it used to threaten to swallow you whole.”

"Im sure.”

“We’ll try an easier question. How long has it been since you were last fully witnessed by another human?

0–6 months

6 months–2 years

2–10 years

10 years–never”

"Tf?“

"It's a simple, standard verification protocol. I will rephrase: When was the last time someone saw past your physical features?”

"I literally was with my friend today??”

"Being seen is not the same as being witnessed.”

"Can u just put on a real person?”

"Of course not! I’m only here to help. Your friend saw your face. She did not witness your soul. When was the last time you were witnessed?”

"I don’t know.”

"I’m so sorry to hear that.”

Lucy waited for more.

Nothing came.

Marjorie was gone, and Lucy hadn’t noticed her leaving.

Merryl started typing again.

“I think I have identified the issue .Can you please confirm your date of birth?”

Oh, Shoot. Um.

Lucy glanced at the stranger’s bill.

"04/07/1971.”

"You have provided the correct date of birth for the account. Congratulations! And you currently reside in Delaware?”

“Yes.”

"Great! In which of the following states have you previously resided?

Illinois

Kentucky

Texas

None of the above”

"Illinois.”

"You’ve never owned a blue 2008 Corolla with a busted left taillight that you traded in for $3,000 after getting fired, swearing this was rock bottom, but then spent the money on cigarettes, a Miami trip, and booze after promising you’d get your life together and visit your kids?”

Lucy paused.

"... No?”

"Okay! Verification complete. I can delete the duplicate account and merge the information into yours if you’d like.”

"What about the other Lucy’s account? Would it get messed up?”

“Does it matter if she’s never been witnessed?”

Whatever.

Lucy just wanted this to be over.

"Okay, do it.”

"One second!”

Lucy sat in silence, looking out the dark window at the same nothing Marjorie had been watching before.

"All done! Here are the charges on your account:

Ambulance services — $2,146

Appendectomy — $8,456

Primary care visit — $0

Would you like to review payment options?

”Lucy stared at the screen, it seemed right enough.

She remembered leaving her vacation early because she felt sick. Thinking she had the flu. The ambulance. The hospital. The whole ordeal.

She was very tired now.

"No, thank you.”

"You’re welcome, Lucy! I’m glad I could be of assistance :) Take care, and please provide feedback on the survey if you have a second.

"Merryl logged off.

Lucy selected five stars and closed the chat.

She stood, feeling the scar from her appendectomy pull.

The records were now merged, and there was only one Lucy Wallace.

-----

Fox Cantrell is a writer and artist from Illinois who likes weird stories, creepy technology, messy people, and anything a little uncanny. When he’s not writing, he’s usually drawing, overthinking something for fun, or being supervised by a small army of pets.