I Love Everybody (and Other Atrocious Lies) Read Online Free PDF Page B

People go to Emergency because they assess their situation to be rather critical, they’ve determined that whatever is going on is not something they can handle or fix themselves, so it’s about time to seek outside help. NOW. As in RIGHT NOW. Because honestly, the next level beyond “emergency” is a rather basic, no-frills drawer at the morgue with fabulous air-conditioning.
    But to the employees of this emergency waiting room, it was obvious that the word “emergency” had kind of lost its gloss, its zip, its emergency-ness, as doctors, nurses, and people in latex gloves just strolled about as if they were shopping for paper towels at Target. No one paid any attention to the “patients” who sat and waited, and waited, and waited, cradling their possibly severed arms and trying to prevent their eyeballs from springing out of their heads like Slinkies. In fact, it’s amazing to me that hospitals across the country haven’t even tried to cash in on the basic needs of their waiting room patients by renting out camping equipment.
    Because every seat in the waiting room was full, eventually someone plopped me into a wheelchair, but I hardly noticed. By this point, I was drifting in and out of consciousness in between my pitiful cries, like just after a night on the town in the good old days, except that then no one typically prodded me for my insurance card unless a spoilsport took signs of alcohol poisoning seriously and dialed 911.
    Now, the next time I woke up, I was at the admitting station and my husband was fumbling through my purse for my wallet. When I came around again, the admitting lady was forcing a clipboard and a form with all of my vital information on it into my dead, lifeless hands.
    “And please print clearly,” she added sharply.
    “Well, of course,” I truly wanted to reply. “Naturally, making your job easier is my first priority at this time when the skeleton hand of death is inside my body, wringing my vital and tender organs out like a sponge.”
    Then she made me sign more papers than I did when I bought my house, to which I just started scribbling blindly all over. “And that one,” she informed me as I scrawled over the last line, “gives your husband power of attorney.”
    “Dear God, do not plug me into anything,” I managed to squeeze out as I shook my pen at her. “Don’t even get me near an outlet! He’s been waiting for an opportunity just like this since the day we got married.”
    I did the best I could under the circumstances, but honestly, that form looked like I had filled in the blanks with either my feet or a monkey proxy. Even I couldn’t read my own writing, but as I tried to hand back the clipboard, a robust, full-throated moan was emitted from the waiting area, and I turned just in time to see the half-shirt girl—who had been clutching her head moments before—stand up, bellow again, and then crumple promptly to the floor. It was a maneuver straight out of a death scene in an eighth-grade play; the way her hand flew to her thrown-back head, the way her knees gave way first, the way she lay melodramatically on the floor, her hand still thoughtfully draped across her head as if she were a twelve-year-old Ophelia. Well, except for the part where a package of GPC menthol lights shot from her body, skidding across the floor, and her cropped top flew up, exposing one whole braless knocker that sported a rather large and confusing tattoo of either a unicorn or a donkey wearing a dunce cap.
    Even though I felt unconsciousness creeping up on me again as agony was sinking its teeth deeper into my side, I knew this show was too good to miss. Suddenly, the emergency waiting room came to life, as if finally, FINALLY, they had a worthwhile emergency on their hands, a patient worth their training, as they gathered around the unicorn boob girl like ants around a bread crumb. Within moments, she was slid onto a flat board and a brace was looped around her neck, although I