Three weeks later I sat in front of the same doctor again. Without the eye drops I could finally see him clearly and I had been right - he was cute. This time it was me that wiggled on the chair and looked down. I didn't want to hear what he had to say, but at the same time I did. These past weeks of waiting had been a torture. He smiled and tried to be polite.
“How have you been?”.
Splendid, I might have had a stroke and I didn't even know, but I´m awesome. Seriously, what did he think? I was shocked by my own thoughts, when did I get this bitter? It must be the underlying stress of not knowing, and the back and forth visits to different hospitals that not only caused me worry but also time off work. I took a deep breath before I answered,
“Good”.
“Ok. Look, I'm not going to keep you waiting. We have looked at the scans from the MRI and we found a rather big shadow in the back of your head.”
“A shadow?” I sounded like a nervous parrot.
“Yes, we still don't know what it is though. I don't want to tell you something unless I´m sure, so I will send you to a specialist.”
“But..what do you believe it is?” I tried to keep a steady voice but I knew I didn't do a very good job.
He looked uncomfortable and kept on opening and closing his hands.
“As I said, I don't want to…”
I cut him off before the poor guy could finish.
“Could it be something serious?” I mean, could it be something worse than a stroke?”
He looked pained and did his best not to look me in the eyes.
“I will fax the scans to a private clinic and they will reach out to you regarding an appointment. It´s a bit far away so I would get someone to drive you.”
It was obvious that the conversation was over. I stood up and shook his hand.
“I wish you the best of luck”. Gosh, was he always talking to his patients like they were dying?
On the way out thousands of thoughts competed for my attention. Parts of me were annoyed, I did not have time for this, not with the big Online Media Conference coming up. Those parts wanted me to tell the doctor to fuck off, and stop wasting my time. Other parts kept reminding me of the IKEA incident a few days ago where I almost fainted inside the warehouse. That was a fact I couldn't deny and when those thoughts took a hold of me I got terrified. What if parts of my brain would never be the same? What would happen to my career? I had too many plans for this to get in my way. I bit my lip and called a cab, determined not to cry.