A Visit to the Doctor

16708 Green Dolphin Lane,

Cornelius, NC 28031

Cal Behrhardt sat cross-legged on the examination table with his back upright and his fingers white around his knees. He was on top of that awful parchment paper that doctors roll out to avoid sweat and tears and things like that spilling onto the cushion for the next patients.

Cal surprised the receptionist when he told her that he did not have an appointment but that he was in excruciating pain and he would very much like to see the doctor, except he said it with no pain in his voice and otherwise acted very deadpan as if nothing had been the matter at all. It was a slow day and it was a slow clinic so she told him very well and she went to tell the doctor who was having lunch that there was a man in the front who was in excruciating pain and that he would like to see him, the doctor.

The doctor told Myra, the receptionist, no, that he would not see a patient who would shake him down for opiates and waste his time, or worse, get his license suspended, and picked the sandwich back up from his wrapper and bit the tomato slice that was hanging out. Myra came out and Cal was holding the counter and she told him that the doctor was busy and that his best bet was to go to the emergency room.

"This is not an emergency, miss," Cal said. "I will wait for the doctor. But this is no emergency."

Myra did not think it would be very good of her to tell a man in excruciating pain to leave the doctor's office when the doctor was in, so she got up from the seat and returned to the break room where the doctor was.

"I do not think it would be very good of me to tell a man in excruciating pain to leave the doctor's office since the doctor is in," she told the doctor.

"Did you tell him to go to the emergency room?"

"Yes."

"What did he say?"

"He said he would not go because it was not an emergency."

"Did he look pained?"

"No. He looked normal."

"Did he look like a junkie?" The doctor took a bite of the sand-wich.

"No. He just looked normal."

The doctor grumbled. "I'm not going to prescribe him."

"I'll tell him room 2B."

Myra took Cal's name and pointed where to go. He thanked her and turned and walked to room 2B without any strangeness or urgency in his walk.

After a while, the doctor, a man who looked older than he was, came into the exam room. "Hello Cal," he said, facing away putting his gloves on.

"Hello doctor."

"How are you feeling, son?"

"Not well," Cal said. "I'm in excruciating pain."

"Oh my," the doctor said. "Where is it?"

"It is in my eyes, doctor. It's in my eyes and my chest."

"Is it like fire?" The doctor asked. "In your chest? Or is it like tightness?"

"Not either," Cal said. "It's more that I feel I am around my eyes and I am around my chest. Like I'm floating around me, or like they're behind me."

The doctor glared at him from the stool.

"I'm going to take some measurements," the doctor said. "Un-cross your legs."

He put his stethoscope on Cal's chest and listened to his heart. It was beating steadily like a metronome.

"Hmm," the doctor said. "Cough."

Cal coughed and it sounded to the doctor like a cough was supposed to sound.

"Did that hurt?" The doctor asked.

"No Doctor. It did not feel like much."

"What do you mean?"

"It felt like somebody else was coughing."

The doctor took the stethoscope from his ears and grabbed the small hammer from the bottom cabinet. He used it to tap Cal on the knee. The leg went up right away.

"Did you feel that?"

"No. It did not feel like much, sir."

The doctor looked puzzled at the boy. "Do you feel this?" He touched Cal on the cheek with his glove.

"No doctor."

He touched himself on his mustache with the glove. "Do you feel this?"

"No."

The doctor laughed. "Then how do you feel pain if you cannot feel anything?"

"I feel excruciating pain right around me, like it is floating there."

The doctor exhaled sharply. "Well," he said. "I can only help you. I cannot help the part around you."

"But I'm feeling it, doctor. I can feel it."

"Where?"

"I don't know. I don't know. Some of it is in the waiting room still. Some of it is at home. A little bit is here."

"Do you want me to go fix your home, then?"

"No, doctor, my home is fine."

"You're at the wrong kind of doctor," the doctor said. "I'm not writing you any prescription."

"So you can't help?"

"No. There's nothing wrong with you."

"Are you sure, doctor?"

"Yes, I'm sure. I'd like for you to go now."

"Ok then," Cal said, coming down from the table. The doctor watched him leave the room and pulled off his gloves.

"Thank you for the help," Cal said to Myra on his way out of the office.

"Sure," Myra said. "Come back any time." She felt stupid for saying that. It was something she couldn't shake from working at the restaurant for so long.

Myra came back into the doorway of the break room where the doctor was sitting.

"What was wrong with him?" she asked.

"Not a clue," the doctor said. He ate a chip and was crunching on it. "He was talking nonsense."

"Shouldn't you have helped him, then? Aren't there places for those types?"

"Not here," the doctor said.

Reilly McDowell