I call a new ENT practice to make an appointment. I’ve been swimming and keep trapping water in my ears. I can barely hear whenever that happens. Earplugs make me stone-deaf. Getting help feels urgent.
I reach a receptionist named Blanca. After conveying why I’m calling, I tell her, “I once knew a Blanca but lost touch.”
Blanca says, “Maybe you’ll find her again.”
I say, “That was long ago.”
***
“Hey, you want a ride?” are the first words I hear from Blanca’s lips. I’m standing north of Calvert Street on Connecticut Avenue, trying to hitch to New York. I spin around at the sound of her voice and run toward the blue Pinto halfway up the block. Blanca is riding shotgun, her long black hair hanging halfway down the outside of the door. I jump into the back. It’s the first April of Richard Nixon’s second term.
After introductions, I ask, “Where you goin’?”
The driver, Kathy, cranes her neck. “Where you wanna go?”
“I’m trying to get to Long Island,” I say.
“Who’s there?” Blanca asks.
“Baby brother’s performing in his high school’s production of Hello Dolly!.”
“Who’s he playin’?” asks Blanca.
“Cornelius Hackl,” I say. “Horace Vandergelder’s chief clerk.”
Kathy says, “We can at least get you into the city.”
“And maybe we can do even more,” says Blanca.
“Fantastic,” I say. “I can catch a train from there out to Long Island.”
In Delaware, we make a pit stop. Blanca takes over driving. After we reach Jersey, Kathy takes a paper bag out of her purse and lights up a joint. She and Blanca pass it between them a few times before offering me a hit. Not wanting to look less than cool, I take a slow drag. Thereafter, I’m included in every pass. Soon they light up a second joint, and then another.
I say, “We’re riding on fumes.” Evidently, we all think that sounds hysterical.
Blanca’s driving in the left-hand lane, meant for passing only. I comment that the gray car ahead of the black car ahead of us keeps bouncing off the metal safety barrier.
“At least he’s not getting stuck to it,” says Kathy.
“You’d think he’d realize he’s doin’ what he’s doing and stop,” says Blanca.
“You think he’s stoned?” Kathy laughs.
At that, the gray car slams the barrier hard, its wheels shriek, and it starts spinning. The black car immediately ahead of us floors it and leaves us all in the dust. Blanca turns her wheel to the right to avoid the spinning car, jams on the brakes, and loses control. We go into a spin. In the pit of my stomach, it feels like my most hated childhood ride, the Whip, which used to send everyone’s lunch flying.
After a full 360-degree spin, counterclockwise, followed by another spin of 270 degrees, the rear of the Pinto slams into the metal barrier. We ricochet off it and, still counterclockwise, spin another 180 degrees. The nose of the Pinto glides to a stop in an opening in the barrier between north- and southbound traffic. Nobody speaks a word. We all know that, with a little more propulsion, we wouldn’t be alive, and would’ve taken oncoming traffic with us.
I feel like I’ve drawn closer to Blanca. My head and hers nearly share the same body. But why is the back seat nearly in the front?
“My leg’s stuck under the handle. I can’t feel my leg,” Blanca says.
“I’m afraid,” says Kathy. “My father will kill me.”
I look around me and realize that when the rear of the Pinto struck the barrier, the back seat was thrown forward. If it were an accordion, the back seat would now be in the closed position.
Traffic has halted, in both directions. An ambulance sidles up alongside us. Blanca says to Kathy, “Don’t leave the weed in the car.”
Blanca plays up the pain in her left leg and is carried to the ambulance on a stretcher. Kathy earns a stretcher of her own. The ambulance driver gives me a “come along” head motion. I ride in the back with them.
Blanca tells Kathy, “You’ve gotta dump the weed before the police find it.”
As Kathy is being rolled through the tiny waiting room, she gets up and disappears behind a bathroom door. We hear the flush.
Blanca and I share a quiet yet desperate laugh. She sighs. I sigh.
Kathy exits the bathroom and reboards her gurney. The two women are taken to the treatment area behind a curtain for evaluation.
A cop comes in and walks back there to determine how severely the two women were injured. He comes out and asks me, “Are you alright?”
By letting the i sound in “alright” take control, I hear the cop say, “Are you high?”
I tell myself I have to stay rational. I can’t admit that I heard him ask what I heard. I’ve got to act as if he asked, “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, I think so,” I say. “Nothing broken. Sure am hungry, though.”
The cop fronts me a dime to buy some Lance peanut butter crackers from a machine. It’s out of Nekot, so I settle for Toast Chee.
“Give me your address, I’ll pay you back,” I say.
“That’s okay,” says the cop. “Glad nothing’s broken.”
I hear, “Glad no one’s smokin’,” but tell myself it would be better if I heard, “Glad nothing’s broken.”
“No blood gushing either,” I say. “But they oughta shut down those amusement park rides on the turnpike.”
The cop laughs, says “I’ll make that my mission,” salutes, and exits.
Pretty soon Kathy’s father shows up, yells at the receptionist that she should know who he is, and is accompanied to the treatment area. I follow.
“Who’s he?” the father asks, as if to blame me for the present circumstances and all moments of unhappiness experienced thus far in the lives of his family members.
“That’s Jim,” says Kathy, “He’s our new friend. You need to drop him off at Grand Central.”
Penn Station would have been better, I think, but I’ll gladly accept Grand Central.
The ER releases Kathy and Blanca, who limp to Kathy’s father’s car. He stays angry all the way to New York. I’m gladder to get out of his car than the one wrecked on the turnpike. When we reach Grand Central, Blanca takes my hand and slips me a phone number.
A week later, back in DC, I give Blanca a call. She gives me her work address. I live north of Dupont, on Connecticut. Blanca works south of Dupont, off Connecticut. Less than a ten-minute walk. I stop by her work, where she’s the receptionist at a doctor’s office. The waiting room is empty and nobody calls. We can talk without interruption. I keep stopping by without warning. The waiting room is always empty. Blanca invites me to a party thrown by some of her high school friends, not Kathy. I go. She comes with a guy who she says isn’t her boyfriend. I feel out of place. I stop stopping by.
***
Blanca searches to find me an appointment. “A cancellation just came in for nine thirty Friday. You want it?”
I snap it up. Then I investigate the doctor. He has near-perfect ratings. He did undergrad at Emory as a music performance major. He then went to Emory’s medical school. He still performs jazz throughout the DC metro area. He’s published three articles on “thoracic esophageal puncture.” I imagine he performs the procedure allegro con brio. I look forward to talking with him about the importance of arts for med students and doctors.
A day later, near the practice’s closing time, I get a call from Blanca. I was prepared for a reminder call, but by a machine, not Blanca.
She begins, “You know that appointment I scheduled for you for nine thirty tomorrow?”
“Yes?” I say, sensing something is awry.
“My colleague was scheduling an appointment for that exact time with the same doctor and she put it into the system just before I did,” she says.
“It’s interesting you’re just getting around to telling me this now,” I say. “What really happened?”
“Well, this other person is an established patient,” says Blanca.
“In other words,” I say, “she outranks me.”
“Yes, that’s the truth,” Blanca says. “But I have another appointment for you at two. With a different doctor in a different office. Is that okay? I mean, really, is it okay?”
What if I say it isn’t?
I say, “Sure, I understand. It’s okay, really. That’s how the world works.” I don’t want Blanca to feel bad. I’m disappointed, though. I may have to make another appointment to meet the jazz musician who masquerades as an ENT. And to see if Blanca has streaming black hair.
