He left, but now I had another problem. I didn’t know how to go to a
doctor. I called a friend from class and asked if she’d drive me. She
picked me up an hour later and I watched, perplexed, as she drove
right past the hospital a few blocks from my apartment. She took me to
a small building north of campus, which she called a “clinic.” I tried to
feign nonchalance, act as though I’d done this before, but as we
crossed the parking lot I felt as though Mother were watching me.
I didn’t know what to say to the receptionist. My friend attributed
my silence to my throat and explained my symptoms. We were told to
wait. Eventually a nurse led me to a small white room where she
weighed me, took my blood pressure, and swabbed my tongue. Sore
throats this severe were usually caused by strep bacteria or the mono
virus, she said. They would know in a few days.
When the results came back, I drove to the clinic alone. A balding
middle-aged doctor gave me the results. “Congratulations,” he said.
“You’re positive for strep and mono. Only person I’ve seen in a month
to get both.”
“Both?” I whispered. “How can I have both?”
“Very, very bad luck,” he said. “I can give you penicillin for the strep,
but there’s not much I can do for the mono. You’ll have to wait it out.
Still, once we’ve cleared out the strep, you should feel better.”
The doctor asked a nurse to bring some penicillin. “We should start
you on the antibiotics right away,” he said. I held the pills in my palm
and was reminded of that afternoon when Charles had given me
ibuprofen. I thought of Mother, and of the many times she’d told me
that antibiotics poison the body, that they cause infertility and birth
defects. That the spirit of the Lord cannot dwell in an unclean vessel,
and that no vessel is clean when it forsakes God and relies on man. Or
maybe Dad had said that last part.
I swallowed the pills. Perhaps it was desperation because I felt so
poorly, but I think the reason was more mundane: curiosity. There I
was, in the heart of the Medical Establishment, and I wanted to see, at
long last, what it was I had always been afraid of. Would my eyes
bleed? My tongue fall out? Surely something awful would happen. I
needed to know what.
I returned to my apartment and called Mother. I thought confessing
would alleviate my guilt. I told her I’d seen a doctor, and that I had