to the doctor’s appointment anyway. Maybe I could get a note that I could submit to the disability benefits office.
In the car, my cell phone rang. It was Pickle.
“Hey,” I said.
“It’s me,” he said.
“I know it’s you.”
“What’s up?”
“I’m driving,” I said. “How’s it going?”
I passed the park district. All the little summer campers were returning to the rec center from the playground, eachchild tied to the next with a rope. In their yellow t-shirts they looked like a baby duck chain gang.
“I know what I’m gonna do now!” Pickle said, picking up a previous conversation we had never begun.
“I’m gonna be a fireman!”
“You don’t mean a man who puts out fires, do you?”
“Yeah!”
Pickle, with his baseball hats, his pierced ear, his Chuck Taylors, his Chinese dragon tattoo, his ’98 Honda civic with the bumper sticker that said, NEVER DO ANYTHING YOU WOULDN’T WANT TO EXPLAIN TO THE PARAMEDICS .
“Pick, that’s been your dream since you were six! Are they going to let you wear your red plastic fireman’s hat?”
“I’m serious!”
“I didn’t say you weren’t serious!”
“Whatever. Maybe I’ll invite you to my graduation from Fire Academy. Maybe I won’t.”
“Are you mad at me?” I said, but he had already hung up.
I ran a yellow light and got on 355 South. I didn’t have an I-PASS, but I didn’t want to stop and pay the toll, so I drove through the I-PASS lane and fiddled with my parents’ garage door opener, making a confused facial expression for the highway cameras, so they would think I had a malfunctioning device. When I turned on the radio I caught the last few bars of my favorite song and then for the next five minutes the station played commercials.After what had happened during the last semester of school, I should have still been in therapy, but once I graduated, I started skipping appointments. It was a long drive back up to the north shore, and when I’d told Dr. Libman I thought I was getting better, she’d looked at me with steel-colored eyes, frozen by Botox, and told me she didn’t think I was qualified to make that decision.
“What decisions
am
I qualified to make? Should I be operating heavy machinery? Do you think my outfit looks okay?”
I was still taking the antidepressant cornucopia she’d prescribed, but my anxiety was escalating, and the idea of seeing her again only made me more anxious. I had a days-of-the-week pill case just like my grandfather in Boca Raton, which organized my pink and blue tablets like characters from the board game LIFE. Every morning, I swallowed a bride and a groom with a glass of milk.
But they didn’t seem to be working like they used to, or maybe it was just that I was getting worse, so I wanted an MRI. I wanted to see a map of my brain and an arrow pointing to what was wrong with it.
I had ended up calling my mom’s doctor’s office and telling them I’d take an appointment with whoever had availability, which was probably not the best way to set up a mental health consultation, but I couldn’t imagine anyone worse than Dr. Libman. Unless I had an appointment with a flesh-eating zombie, or Neil Patrick Harris.
“Ms. Kohler? Esther Kohler?”
A very tall nurse in scrubs printed with scenes from Dr. Seuss books took my blood pressure and left. Before even introducing himself, the doctor looked at the readings, and when he saw that my blood pressure was 84 over 58 he told me that I was almost alive, which confirmed what I suspected: I had an inoperable brain tumor, and he wasn’t going to waste time with formalities because I wasn’t long for this earth.
“Would you say my blood pressure’s indicative of a fatal illness?”
“Young, thin women typically have low blood pressure,” he said. There was a compliment in there somewhere and I took it, and stored it somewhere I’d be able to access later.
“You can lie back on the table.”
I did as he said. Maybe my life
In the car, my cell phone rang. It was Pickle.
“Hey,” I said.
“It’s me,” he said.
“I know it’s you.”
“What’s up?”
“I’m driving,” I said. “How’s it going?”
I passed the park district. All the little summer campers were returning to the rec center from the playground, eachchild tied to the next with a rope. In their yellow t-shirts they looked like a baby duck chain gang.
“I know what I’m gonna do now!” Pickle said, picking up a previous conversation we had never begun.
“I’m gonna be a fireman!”
“You don’t mean a man who puts out fires, do you?”
“Yeah!”
Pickle, with his baseball hats, his pierced ear, his Chuck Taylors, his Chinese dragon tattoo, his ’98 Honda civic with the bumper sticker that said, NEVER DO ANYTHING YOU WOULDN’T WANT TO EXPLAIN TO THE PARAMEDICS .
“Pick, that’s been your dream since you were six! Are they going to let you wear your red plastic fireman’s hat?”
“I’m serious!”
“I didn’t say you weren’t serious!”
“Whatever. Maybe I’ll invite you to my graduation from Fire Academy. Maybe I won’t.”
“Are you mad at me?” I said, but he had already hung up.
I ran a yellow light and got on 355 South. I didn’t have an I-PASS, but I didn’t want to stop and pay the toll, so I drove through the I-PASS lane and fiddled with my parents’ garage door opener, making a confused facial expression for the highway cameras, so they would think I had a malfunctioning device. When I turned on the radio I caught the last few bars of my favorite song and then for the next five minutes the station played commercials.After what had happened during the last semester of school, I should have still been in therapy, but once I graduated, I started skipping appointments. It was a long drive back up to the north shore, and when I’d told Dr. Libman I thought I was getting better, she’d looked at me with steel-colored eyes, frozen by Botox, and told me she didn’t think I was qualified to make that decision.
“What decisions
am
I qualified to make? Should I be operating heavy machinery? Do you think my outfit looks okay?”
I was still taking the antidepressant cornucopia she’d prescribed, but my anxiety was escalating, and the idea of seeing her again only made me more anxious. I had a days-of-the-week pill case just like my grandfather in Boca Raton, which organized my pink and blue tablets like characters from the board game LIFE. Every morning, I swallowed a bride and a groom with a glass of milk.
But they didn’t seem to be working like they used to, or maybe it was just that I was getting worse, so I wanted an MRI. I wanted to see a map of my brain and an arrow pointing to what was wrong with it.
I had ended up calling my mom’s doctor’s office and telling them I’d take an appointment with whoever had availability, which was probably not the best way to set up a mental health consultation, but I couldn’t imagine anyone worse than Dr. Libman. Unless I had an appointment with a flesh-eating zombie, or Neil Patrick Harris.
“Ms. Kohler? Esther Kohler?”
A very tall nurse in scrubs printed with scenes from Dr. Seuss books took my blood pressure and left. Before even introducing himself, the doctor looked at the readings, and when he saw that my blood pressure was 84 over 58 he told me that I was almost alive, which confirmed what I suspected: I had an inoperable brain tumor, and he wasn’t going to waste time with formalities because I wasn’t long for this earth.
“Would you say my blood pressure’s indicative of a fatal illness?”
“Young, thin women typically have low blood pressure,” he said. There was a compliment in there somewhere and I took it, and stored it somewhere I’d be able to access later.
“You can lie back on the table.”
I did as he said. Maybe my life
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