Reconnaissance
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We were sitting in a busy waiting room as nurses and other medical type people zipped past us. Other couples filled out the seating bays, their faces etched with an altogether familiar combination of bewilderment and uncertainty. Well, the males anyway.
I watched the couple sitting not quite opposite us. The wife was thumbing through a three month old copy of Woman's Day, while the husband fidgeted nervously with his shirt button. Occasionally, he glanced up at me, his eyes loaded with questions. As I had no answers, all I could do was avert my gaze, in the hope that my eyes wouldn't betray me. I doubted the success of this.
A fridge of a nurse, ensconced in sensible shoes and a cardigan that accentuated all the wrong bits, emerged from a hidey hole and barked out a pair of names. The couple opposite rose to their feet, the wife leading the way, her face beaming expectantly in the unnatural flouro lighting, the husband shuffling obediently behind. I watched him trail her pitifully, his fingers still working at the button as if sticking that little bit of moulded plastic through a hole would extricate him from his plight. Fat chance buddy! I swear to this day, that as they disappeared in front of the nurse's swollen body, I could hear the faint whimpering of his soul being crushed.
As the door slammed shut, I noticed my excited wife's talons slowly mashing my phalanges into paste, the accumulated pain working its way up my arm. Somehow, I wrangled my hand free and massaging the blood flow back into it, asked her again, why we were waiting.
"You know why," she hissed, soft enough to not rouse suspicious glances from the other couples huddled together, but loud enough to make me feel like I was five years again and wet the bed. "We need to know that everything is alright. With both of us. Now we've made the decision, I don't want to take any risks." Decision? We? That was all your doing mate, I played no part in it!
"Right, I just think that..."
"Don't. We've been through it before and I want the tests done. We need to know!" she countered emphatically. I wasn't convinced that we did need to know. I'd given this a lot of thought and was pretty sure that there are some things in life that you really would prefer to be completely ignorant about. You know, like the existence of ghosts, the prospect of your parents doing it and well, whether your plumbing had a blockage or not.
"What if my boys aren't, you know, swimming?" I ventured, hoping that she'd see my emotional distress. She didn't.
"Then we'll deal with it, won't we."
Deal with it? What the hell did that mean? And how exactly would we deal with it? Before I could get an answer, or even pose the question aloud, the Kelvinator Nurse stormed out into the waiting room, looked me squarely in the eye, pointed accusingly and read out our names. Incorrectly of course. Sighing and gulping simultaneously, which is a difficult and really painful thing to do, I closed my eyes and with a not so gentle tug, was spirited away beyond the enclave of plastic seats and tortured husbands, to a fate that I was not prepared for.
I watched the couple sitting not quite opposite us. The wife was thumbing through a three month old copy of Woman's Day, while the husband fidgeted nervously with his shirt button. Occasionally, he glanced up at me, his eyes loaded with questions. As I had no answers, all I could do was avert my gaze, in the hope that my eyes wouldn't betray me. I doubted the success of this.
A fridge of a nurse, ensconced in sensible shoes and a cardigan that accentuated all the wrong bits, emerged from a hidey hole and barked out a pair of names. The couple opposite rose to their feet, the wife leading the way, her face beaming expectantly in the unnatural flouro lighting, the husband shuffling obediently behind. I watched him trail her pitifully, his fingers still working at the button as if sticking that little bit of moulded plastic through a hole would extricate him from his plight. Fat chance buddy! I swear to this day, that as they disappeared in front of the nurse's swollen body, I could hear the faint whimpering of his soul being crushed.
As the door slammed shut, I noticed my excited wife's talons slowly mashing my phalanges into paste, the accumulated pain working its way up my arm. Somehow, I wrangled my hand free and massaging the blood flow back into it, asked her again, why we were waiting.
"You know why," she hissed, soft enough to not rouse suspicious glances from the other couples huddled together, but loud enough to make me feel like I was five years again and wet the bed. "We need to know that everything is alright. With both of us. Now we've made the decision, I don't want to take any risks." Decision? We? That was all your doing mate, I played no part in it!
"Right, I just think that..."
"Don't. We've been through it before and I want the tests done. We need to know!" she countered emphatically. I wasn't convinced that we did need to know. I'd given this a lot of thought and was pretty sure that there are some things in life that you really would prefer to be completely ignorant about. You know, like the existence of ghosts, the prospect of your parents doing it and well, whether your plumbing had a blockage or not.
"What if my boys aren't, you know, swimming?" I ventured, hoping that she'd see my emotional distress. She didn't.
"Then we'll deal with it, won't we."
Deal with it? What the hell did that mean? And how exactly would we deal with it? Before I could get an answer, or even pose the question aloud, the Kelvinator Nurse stormed out into the waiting room, looked me squarely in the eye, pointed accusingly and read out our names. Incorrectly of course. Sighing and gulping simultaneously, which is a difficult and really painful thing to do, I closed my eyes and with a not so gentle tug, was spirited away beyond the enclave of plastic seats and tortured husbands, to a fate that I was not prepared for.