November 11, 2009
Fiction
Member Patient Satisfaction
I hate doctors’ offices. They make me tense and nervous but not in a good way. Not in a late- night- wired- on- coffee- and- good- ideas way like when the dialogue is just pouring onto the page and I know I’ll have to cut it way down later but I can’t wait to see what happens next. I’m an aspiring screenwriter and being nervous comes naturally to me. There’s also a way I get twitchy in hospitals and hotels when the impermanence of thousands of souls passing through starts to pull on my insides. That’s the spit- in- the- face- of- death- by- humping- your- girlfriend- in- a- supply- closet way. My husband says I should write a book called 216 Kinds of Nervous. I’m Jewish, so sue me.
No, I don’t like doctors’ offices because I used to be a doctor. I remember the brutal system and the increasing pressure and the patients who died. I quit six years ago but I still have the dreams sometimes. But there’s no escape from the almighty HMO and I have to find a new goddamn doctor again, so here I am. I don’t say any of this to Dr. Anjalee as she reads through my questionnaire. Thank God I don’t say everything I think.
When I picked Dr. Anjalee’s name out of the book, I was imagining a compassionate down-to-earth myopic little woman. But Jesus she turns out to be a whole different kind of goddess. A big broad shouldered peasant with melanin and dark eyes with brows so thick you could suck on them if you wanted to. And she has these stylish low-heeled black boots that go all the way up to her white coat, which is pretty high. I fidget on the exam table and the wax paper crunches under my butt. I feel like an expensive cookie on display in a bakery window only not ready for my close-up.
What’s my chief complaint. Besides the asthma and the Republican Party I have these muscle spasms in my legs that tense up and won’t let go. And of course that makes sex more difficult although lucky for me my husband is a flexible and creative masturbator. I find myself telling Dr. Anjalee all this and about being a doctor even though it’s not something she can help me with and it’s not even good drama. I even tell her about Thurber’s stream of nervousness and she seems to understand. I’m still wondering how far up her boots go and how she gets them on so tight. Her legs look strong as horses although she has a slight limp.
She wants to check my posture and breathing so I straighten up obediently and inch forward as she lays her hand on my back. Breathe deeply for me, she says.
I take a big breath for her and suddenly I’m hit by a scent of ginger and cardamom. I swear it’s coming from a few drops of sweat right between those magnificent tits I’m trying not to look at. I don’t know whether to report my new symptoms of dizziness and tachycardia.
She says, have you tried any alternative therapies? And by the way the boots go up to my perineum. I must have heard that wrong because she can’t possibly have said that sweetly but she is definitely undoing a few buttons of her coat for comfort. She dips into a desk drawer and pulls on a strangely bulky glove and snaps on a Purple Nitrile glove on top of that. She lifts up one leg to set her boot beside me in a friendly way and I see that her pubic hair is neatly trimmed like a hedge and the labia minora are glistening like the boots. That’s from the vestibular glands, I mumble, and may they flow on forever.
Studies suggest that tension can be very damaging and proper breathing is important, she says. She cradles my head in her soft cleavage and I am definitely breathing but not deeply. She slides her hand down to her crotch which is starting to become our collective crotch but I don’t know the plural of mons pubis. She cups her hand to make a barrier between us as the glove starts buzzing softly. She wraps around me and she is breathing too.
Doctor, I try to say, did you know that 19th-century housewives went to get their hysterical paroxysms from physicians with primitive vibrators? I think there could be a miniseries in that story and Susan Sarandon would definitely be interested. My husband doesn’t like vibrators very much because he’s the kind of Luddite who insists on making his own granola while reading the New Yorker on his PalmPilot. She just sighs and says, I’m afraid that regular treatments are not covered by your plan. Then I’m lost in her fingers and the strong wet smell of both of us which is better than chicken tikka masala.
Suddenly my goddess trembles and stops her lecture and this is very important so for both of us I say oh shit I’m coming we’re coming shit shit shit shhhhh. Then I apologize for my unprofessional language. She calmly peels off the glove and scribbles something on a piece of paper for me. I recognize the name of a San Francisco mail-order catalog that we hide from our cleaning lady.
Wait, I say, I never got to lick your eyebrows and also would it be ethical to refer my husband to you? But my time is up and she just says, the rest is up to you.
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is an occasionally published writer, an expert redhead, and a pretty competent soccer fullback. Further details at www.hewwolff.org.
