McGowan v Authority, 2.
My sores and ulcers will drink them up, like fine wine
Actually, the second run-in wasn’t at the library, but at the Ear Nose and Throat Hospital, where I went to pick up my massively complex allergy prescription. The pharmacist was one of those stern, unyielding people, of the kind that always bring out my mildly flirtatious side. Initially, she said that hospital pharmacies could only hand out emergency prescriptions, so I’d have to go back to my GP. I clowned around, feigning emergency-type allergy symptoms. I flashed my best smile, followed it up with a look of yearning and vulnerability. Never fails. Or never failed when I was 23. Now the success rate is lower. Closer to zero, if truth be told. But you have to keep trying, don’t you.
The other one - the assistant pharmacist - giggled a bit, and the stern one threw her a look, which shut her up. But I managed to persuade her to let me have it. Then she kindly advised me that it would be cheaper to get a three month prescription pass thing - it would more than pay for itself even on this one trip. So I filled it out online, while she sternly went about assembling my pills and emulsions and drops.
When I came back to the counter the main pharmacist seemed to have softened a little. She handed the stuff over in a brown paper bag, of the kind you get in sandwich shops.
“All your prescriptions are free for the next three months,’ she said.
“Great! I, er, hope I get really ill!” I said
She looked at me, her face utterly blank.
“You know, for the free prescriptions. Be good to have some, er, ailments. Not having to pay ... Be a shame if nothing goes wrong with me ... waste of ... I don’t mean cancer, just, you know ...”
Nothing from the pharmacist. The assistant wouldn’t meet my eye. She looked down at the floor. She’d already risked too much for me.
On the way out I tried to sniff up some of the germs floating around the place. I ran my fingers along the wall, and under the bannister on the stairs. Poked them in my eyes and ears. That’ll show em. Get some good diseases, oh yes. The hard stuff. Staffilo-whatsit. Streptocockles and mussels alive alive o. And I won’t have to pay a penny. Not. A. Penny. All the creams and potions and unguents I want. I’ll lie in a giant bed of them. My sores and ulcers will drink them up, like fine wine.
Back in the main reception, I saw there was a wall-mounted hand-sanitiser. I had a squirt. No point biting your runny nose off to spite your face.
I suspect a runny nose is too viscid to permit a satisfactory bite . Let the consolation of a safety net for the next three months be recompense enough , without falling ill that would become a self fulfilling prophecy. This sliver of an elbow room, paid for and undertaken with painstaking bureaucratic assiduity, is the silver lining for the zeitgeist. By the way you must send that stern pharmacist a link to your substack. your sardonic sheepishness and wit has all the yearning , tremulousness and impressiveness one requires to melt. :)