by G M Eppers
“What’s the whatnot?”
“More inoculations. We travel a lot, you know.”
He set the clipboard and pen on the table behind me. I heard the paper crinkle. Then he began to feel me up. Well, he was checking my lymph nodes and such and apparently the degree to which I was ticklish. He put the earpieces of his stethoscope into his ears and listened to my heart and lungs from the front and then the back, instructing me to breathe deeply from time to time. From another pocket, he extracted an otoscope and peered into each of my ears, replaced that with an ophthalmoscope and looked into my eyes, shining the nice extra bright light until I could see phantom images and not much else. He stopped to mark down some things on the clipboard, and moved on to the blood pressure cuff, pumping the armband up to tourniquet mode. I tried to consciously relax, closing my eyes to watch the bright light residue play on my eyelids for a while. Then Nitro took my temperature and marked that on the clipboard, too.
He pulled the curtain around the entire area. It didn’t matter that we were the only ones in the room. Nitro knew that it was somehow more comforting to do certain parts of an exam in an enclosed space. I won’t tell you the details about what happened inside the curtain. If you’re a woman you already know and if you’re a man you don’t need to know, and if you’re a med student there are much better places to learn about it. Be assured that I was submitted to a battery of highly sensitive, intrusive, and unnerving female related tests and procedures, including the mammogram. For my part, I stared at the ceiling through most of it, noticing a moisture stain that looked like JFK’s famous silhouette. I used to be a history teacher. I can see historical figures in a mud puddle. But I’ve never seen the face of Jesus Christ in anything. My mother said she once saw Jesus in a scoop of potato salad, but was too nervous to take a clear picture. It was just like Nitro to get this embarrassing stuff out of the way early. It seemed to relax people a bit. I was finally given permission to dress and he stepped out to prepare the next station. When I was ready, I pushed the curtain all the way open and moved on.
The next station was easy. I stepped onto a physician’s scale and Nitro played with the little weights on the abacus like tool until he was satisfied. “Up a couple pounds, Helena. Nothing to worry about,” he said. Then he stood me up next to graduated markings on the wall so he could measure my height. He marked it down, and flipped to another page on his clipboard and back again. “Hmmmm.”
“Hmmmmm?”
“You appear to have lost a quarter of an inch. Also nothing to worry about. It’s common as –“
“Don’t say it.”
“—you get older,” he finished against my express wishes.
“Are you sure?” I’m only five foot two to begin with, or was. I wasn’t ready to give up even a quarter of an inch. And I didn’t really consider mid-forties to be ‘getting older’ per se. I went back against the wall, squishing myself up tight against it and inhaling as if that would make me taller. “Check again.” He humored me, but he wouldn’t lie. He confirmed his original finding.
“I suggest some calcium supplements. And focus more on weight bearing exercise. You know, more jogging, less climbing.”
“Sure, Nitro. I can do that.” I didn’t let it show, but I felt grumpy. I’d let myself grump about it properly later, in private.
Next, he tested my grip strength in both hands and lung capacity, doing each test three times to get an average. We moved to the far side of the room where there was a small soundproof booth. “Okay, time to test your hearing,” he said, opening the door. Inside there was a seat, a set of headphones and a handheld button at the end of a long cord.
“What?” I asked, holding a hand to my ear.
“Yeah, that gets funnier every year, especially with seven more people to say it,” he responded unenthusiastically. “Get in the booth.”
After that I read an eye chart twice while covering alternating eyes. I have no idea if I did well. CURDS doesn’t publish their benchmarks, so not even Nitro really knows what is good or bad. He sends his results in to Washington and we find out the next day if anyone failed. This way, Nitro could even do his own tests and still send in the results. Sure, he knew medically what things should be, but you never knew which areas CURDS would consider important in a particular year. Like I said, they try to test your response to the unknown and unexpected and letting people figure out what to expect kind of defeated the purpose.
After all those came my least favorite part of the exam, a test that has never been omitted the entire eight years I’ve been getting physicals through CURDS. I’d literally prefer to go back behind the curtain than get on that treadmill. Yep, stress test. Nitro hooked up sensors to various inconvenient body parts, and told me to get on the treadmill. He turned it on, slowly at first, at a flat level, but I knew that was going to change. I jogged easily for a time while Nitro went about the room cleaning up the previous stations. After a few minutes he came back and adjusted the speed up or the incline up or sometimes both, then disappeared again. I could hear him moving things around elsewhere in the room but couldn’t turn my head to look without dislodging wires or possibly losing my balance. I’d been running a solid fifteen minutes by the time I was at sprint speed with an incline of about twenty degrees. I was panting and sweating, my hair had gone limp and was getting in my eyes, and I could feel my pulse in my hair follicles. “C’mon, Nitro, isn’t this enough?” I gasped when he came over to raise the incline another two degrees.
“Nope, not yet.”
“But I’m stressed. I swear to God, I’m stressed.”
“Helena, I know you. You were stressed at the opening interview. Keep running.” And he disappeared from my view again. After an eon or three he finally came back and began reducing the incline and speed allowing me to cool down before stopping completely. He removed the sensors and helped me off the treadmill. My legs felt like rubber. And not that thick sturdy rubber they make tires out of, but more like a nice flimsy rubber band that will break if you look at it. I was bathed in sweat, my breath catching in my throat as if I couldn’t suck in oxygen fast enough.
“I think I’m hyperventilating,” I gasped.
“You’re not hyperventilating,” Nitro said, throwing me a cool, moist towel and a bottle of water and pushing a chair my way. I sat down and rested for several minutes, sipping the water. I thought the worst was over. I was wrong.
After I was cooled down, during which Nitro circled the room double checking and rearranging the equipment at the various stages, he approached carrying a small circular tray. On the tray stood two cups, one clear, one opaque, with twist-on caps, and a pair of latex gloves. In the next corner of the room was a small alcove with a toilet and sink. The opening was crossed by a metal bar holding up a plastic curtain. “Two cups?” I asked.
“New request from the top. One each.” He saw the look on my face and gave me an apologetic one in return. “Do the best you can.”
“I don’t think I –“ I started to say. That’s when I finally figured out what the chalky, milky liquid had been that Nitro had given me earlier. I grabbed the tray and went into the alcove. I barely got the gloves on in time. As instructed, I did the best I could, then peeled off the gloves so they were inside out (I think that’s the only way you CAN take off latex gloves) and left them on the tray with the two somewhat suspect sealed cups. I went to the sink and washed my hands liberally with the antibacterial soap, then brought Nitro the samples. He pulled out his pen and marked the top of each container and set it aside. I felt better. It had to be over now. All that was left was picking the next victim out of the bedpan by the door and I was free for another year.
I headed for the door. As I reached for the bedpan holding the names of the rest of the team, the lights suddenly went out and I was in complete darkness. “Nitro?” I called. There was no answer, but in the next instant there was blinding white light, which then flashed off to be replaced by blue light, and red light and yellow, on and o
n randomly through the spectrum strobing like a disco ball. It lasted for at least a full minute, then went to full dark again before gradually returning to normal lighting. I stood in place the entire time, afraid to move for fear I would bump into something.
“No epilepsy,” Nitro noted out loud as he presumably wrote the same thing on the clipboard.
“Did you think I had epilepsy?”
“No. Just a random test I picked out. I’m allowed a couple of electives every year. And I won’t necessarily do it on everyone. I’d like to test Sylvia, though, because of her eye injury.”
“You know about that?” I was surprised. Sylvia is our strategic analyst. She joined about seven months ago, wearing an eye patch. It turned out to be a ruse to test our observational skills and our team communication, set up by Director Chiff. At convenient times, she would switch the eye patch to the opposite side to see if anyone was paying attention. Unfortunately, on a mission in Paris she suffered an eye injury when a cleaning solution was splashed in her face, and the exposed eye, her left, had been ruined. A serious tragedy since she had the most startling pair of emerald green eyes I’d ever seen. I thought I was the only one who knew about the incident. She had sworn me to secrecy in the hospital, though the statute of limitations was due to end when it came time for her physical.
“Well,” Nitro admitted slyly, “until now I only suspected. She stopped moving the eye patch about a month ago, I think. We were, where? Either Paris or London, I think. You want to tell me about it?”
“Sorry, Nitro. I’m sworn to secrecy. But that was going to end very soon. Today, in fact. Would you care to take a break and come into the living room? I think it’s time for a team meeting.”
He picked up the bedpan and held it out. “Pick the next patient and give me 5 minutes.” Appropriately, I picked Sylvia.
It was ten minutes before Nitro joined us in the living room of the group home we called HQ. The medical lab that housed all that equipment was a detached garage in the northeast corner of our lot. He had left his white coat and stethoscope in the lab, appearing as plain, ordinary Nitro, five and a half feet of pale, twitchy, ambiguous maleness. He sat in the open space on one of the three couches in the room, while I had planted myself in the wheeled office chair stolen from the writing desk. Wheeled chairs give one authority, and when you’re five foot two, or five foot one and three quarters, anything that can give you authority is a good thing. Sylvia, Roxy, and Badger were sitting on one couch, and Billings and the Nicely twins were on the second couch, leaving Sir Haughty to share the third couch with Nitro. I could have fit on the third couch easily, but I needed to separate myself from the team. I was going to be addressing them as their coordinator, not as one of the gang. “You’re probably all wondering why I called you here today,” I started, because I’d always wanted to say that.
I watched my team trade glances among themselves. “You didn’t call us here,” said Billings. As my son, he showed very little reluctance to contradict me. “It’s physicals. We were already required to be here. All you did was tell everyone to stay put.”
“Never mind. We have something to discuss and I need everyone here.”
“What is it, Helena?” Roxy asked. “Is it something official? Should I be recording this?” Roxy is our legal advisor, but she’s also darn good in the field, despite her habit of wearing evening gowns and high heels. Today she was pretty casual, wearing a knee length bright yellow dress and matching stilettos, with her bright red hair cascading down her back. Her long legs were crossed at the ankles and tilted to the right.
“Should I be taking minutes?” asked Badger, our communications guy. He spoke several languages and often acted as translator. He was also lightning fast on his smart phone when research needed to be done. You never knew what little tidbit of trivia he would come up with or find quickly on his phone.
Sylvia, who I’m sure suspected she was at least part of the issues, said nothing.
“No. This doesn’t have to be on the record.” I noticed Sylvia relax a little. The rest sat up straight, curious. Little did they know.
“We’ve been a team now for several months,” I began. “Some of us, for years. I’ve gotten to know you all pretty well, and I’m proud of the fact that such a disparate group works together in tight, often tense situations. We’ve never had a major bust up, none of you have been arrested, and injuries have been minimal.” I think Sylvia expected me to segue into her adventure in Paris, but I had a bigger point to make first. “But there is something going on that I feel should be . . . adjusted a bit. I’ll be blunt. The big issue here is secrets. I’m flattered that you all feel comfortable enough to confide in me, but I think it’s also important, as a team, to be able to confide in each other. I can’t force anyone to make a confession here. If you guys want to keep going the way we are, I’m okay with that. I just think we need a clear opportunity to establish some meaningful communication. We have each other’s backs in the field, which is great, but we should have each other’s backs here, too.
“I’ll get the ball rolling and offer up myself. What do you guys want to know about me? Ask me anything. I’ll answer truthfully and I won’t hedge. Anyone?”
As expected, there was silence for a bit as everyone looked at each other. All except for Sylvia, who didn’t look at anyone. They seemed to be waiting for me to dismiss them. There was the sound of the leatherette cushions squeaking as people nervously shifted position. They probably all felt like guilty children being grilled by their parents, similar to how I felt sitting on Nitro’s exam table. I noticed Billings, holding hands with Avis. I couldn’t tell if he was holding her hand or she was holding his, but no one else was even touching thighs. This was no good. I remembered better camaraderie in the past. When had that stopped? When and why had they become separate people sharing a house rather than an off duty team? At least they didn’t fight. They got along fine, but they didn’t really get along. It was all superficial. Hello, how are you, have a nice day, exchanging curt nods like strangers passing on a deserted street as if to say ‘I see you. I know you’re there. Don’t try anything funny.’ The more I observed them, the more I knew I had to do something. “No one is at all curious about any aspect of my life? C’mon people. Talk to me. Anyone want to share something? We’re all friends here. No fear.”
Billings stood up, his hand separating from Avis and dropping to his side. “Mom?”
“Yes, Billings.” I gave him my full attention, thankful for some feedback.
“I’d like to . . . ,” he hesitated, then stood up straighter, breathing in confidence, and said, “Why did you really divorce Dad? Was it just the Uber thing or was he . . . you know, unfaithful?”
“You mean did he have an affair? No, not that I’m aware of.” That part was easy. “But it wasn’t just the Uber thing.” Billings was ten when his grandfather, my Dad, had died in the OOPS. It was before they knew what it was. It was just an intestinal blockage at the time. And no one really knew what caused it. It hit the world so quickly and so viciously that it was months before science got a handle on it. But when Dad was in the hospital, my husband at the time, Butte, had made the whole thing seem like an imposition on his precious time. “It was the last in a long line of straws,” I said. “It’s cliché, but we just grew apart. I’ll always have feelings for him, Billings. I want you to know that.” For several moments, the rest of the room disappeared and I saw only Billings. “We did have twelve beautiful years before the divorce, you know. But after Uber came into the picture, it just wasn’t clear anymore how he felt about me. He gave my father the cheese that killed him and never even bothered to apologize for it.”
“Dad gave Grandpa the cheese?” Billings was shocked. “You never told me that.”
I could see his disdain for his father growing. “He didn’t know it was Uber, Billings. No one did. It was a mistake. I can forgive him for that. I do forgive him for that. But I could never forgive him for not admitting it later on, after
Uber was identified, for not showing the least bit of remorse.” My mind was thrust back a decade all at once and I started to choke. I swallowed it. “You can probably figure out why I never told you the details.”
Billings sank back into his seat and Avis grabbed his hand back. He accepted it without any apparent thought. “Yes, I suppose so,” he said, his mind a fair distance away from the present. “I have enough baggage about Dad. And I guess that would have turned my carry-on into a steamer trunk. Wow.”
Agnes, Avis’ conjoined twin, reached across her sister’s body to also clasp Billings’ hand. She nodded at him, as if urging him on. “Go ahead. Tell them.”
His eyes cleared. “Are you sure?” he asked the twins. They both nodded.
Without standing up this time, he said, “I don’t know if it’s as much of a secret as I thought it was, but I guess all of you should know. Avis and I are . . . “ he searched for the right word, finally settling on something close, “dating.”
Before I could respond, Nitro spoke up. “You and Avis?” He asked. “What about Agnes?” The twins were joined at the waist, identical in every way, each with her own set of arms and legs. It was hard to conceive of Billings dating one without the other.
“I’m okay with it,” Agnes responded. “Really. We’ve dealt with this kind of thing before, you know. It goes with the territory of being conjoined.”
“Have you ever considered being separated?” Nitro asked. As a physician and surgeon, he was naturally curious about this. It probably came up every year at their physicals, but this was the first time the subject was broached in front of us.
“Our parents had no insurance when we were born,” contributed Avis. “They couldn’t afford to pay for it. And by the time they could, we were old enough to object.”
Agnes continued, “No. We have no interest in it. We love being unique. It’s a pity everyone doesn’t have a twin connected to them.”
Nitro persisted. “But wouldn’t you two rather be alone?” he asked, motioning to include Billings and Avis together.
