Wonder
Erin Fitzgerald
“Lets have a look,” my doctor sighs, opening her laptop. Shes in
her late fifties, and has a long black weave with burgundy highlighting. Its
shiny
and
lush, especially in this windowless, faded-aqua examining room. Shes
just returned from a trip to another country. Her brother is dying there, I overheard
her
telling a nurse. I sit on the examination table, and I want to brush
and braid her magnificent
weave while she summons my charts.
Some of my lab numbers are all right. Numbers that have nothing to
do with being fat are fine. Some of the numbers that have to do with
being
fat
are fine. Some
of those numbers are not.
“No wonder you have this problem, that problem,” my doctor says.
She shakes her head, and her not-hair fans wide against the back of her white
coat. “When
you came in last week, what was that? A bladder infection? That came
from eating sweets. You are a heart attack on legs.”
Two days later, my bladder infection turns out to be a burst appendix
that has left its confetti all over my large intestine. I almost repeat
my doctors
words
to the anesthesiologist while we wait for the operating room to be
ready.
One for the road,” he says, injecting a clear liquid into my IV bag.
He left a wedding to come here, I overheard him telling a nurse. He might be
back
before its over. My gurney rolls forward and I watch his hands. His bicep
peeks from under his scrub sleeve, and it is amazing.
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