The Doctor Takes a Powder
~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp ~ 

Irene Murrell arrived for her appointment with Dr. Fritz Hackles on time. She gave her name to the inscrutable Asian nurse and took a seat in the dreary waiting room where everything was gray—gray walls, gray floor, gray chairs. She hated her visits to the doctor, always made worse by having to wait. She would rather dig through a mountain of rusty tin cans than sit and wait her turn.

Underneath the No Smoking sign on the wall opposite, somebody had written, in large block letters, the word PUSSY. Irene’s eyes traveled from the obscene word to the faces of the only other two people in the room, a man and a woman, obviously a married couple. The woman had red hair—a particular shade not found anywhere in nature—and the man had a long neck and a large head, not unlike a ventriloquist’s dummy.

When Irene realized that the red-haired woman had spotted her and was probably going to engage in conversation, she picked up a fishing magazine, in which she had no interest, and began thumbing through it.

“Finally we have some company,” the red-haired woman said. “We’ve been sitting here for almost two hours and you’re the first person we’ve seen.”

Irene looked at the woman and gave her a reluctant smile.

“I’m Mitzi Knickerbocker and this is my husband, Chester,” the red-haired woman said. “We’re from out of town.”

“How do you do,” Chester said, standing partway up. “Nice to meet you.”

“Mrs. Murrell,” Irene said tersely.

“We’ve been sitting here almost two hours,” Mitzi said, “and in all that time there hasn’t been a single person go in or come out. You have to wonder what in the holy hell those people are doing back there!”

“Doctors have busy lifestyles,” Chester said.

“Oh, they make me sick! They should only do one thing at a time! The people sitting here waiting should come first!”

“You need to be patient.”

“Patience is something I ran out of a long time ago.”

“You’re not even the one waiting to see the doctor. I am.”

“Oh, excuse the hell out of me! If you’re the one waiting to see the doctor, then why am I here?”

“You can go any time you’re ready.”

Mitzi looked at Irene and stuck the tip of her tongue out and made a comical face. “Isn’t that just like a man?” she said. “He won’t go to the doctor unless I take him. You’d think he was five years old and I was his mommy!”

“Oh, shut up, you old hag! Nobody said any such a thing!”

“Do you want me to split your head wide open? Calling me an old hag in front of this nice lady!”

“She’s got eyes, don’t she? She can see you’re an old hag!”

“You can see plainly he’s not right in the head,” Mitzi said confidentially to Irene. “He’s like an adult-sized baby. I have to watch him every second the same as if he was three years old.”

“Oh, you’re a liar!” Chester said.

“A while back he started having blackout spells. The first time he did it we were having dinner and he pitched over in his chair onto the floor. He pulled half the dishes on the table down on top of his head. I thought he was trying to play a joke on me. I said ‘Get up from there, you big jackass! You’re not the least bit funny!’ Then when I saw his eyes were closed and he wasn’t moving, I thought he was dead.”

“I’m sure you wished I was,” the Man said.

“That was only the beginning,” Mitzi said. “Another time he blacked out in the grocery store. Can you imagine? He fell over into the meat counter and everybody thought he was dying.”

“I disappointed you again that time, too.”

“He can’t drive a car anymore or mow the lawn because he might have one of his spells at any time. I have to do everything myself!”

“That’s not true!”

“I even have to give him a bath because he might drown himself in the bathtub.”

“You’re full of it! You’ve never given me a bath in your life! I wouldn’t  allow it!”

“I’m thinking about putting him in a nursing home and washing my hands of the whole deal.”

“You just try putting me in a nursing home! I’ll have you committed! I’ll slap your ass into a mental institution, which is where you’ve belonged for as long as I’ve known you!”

“I think his problems started as a small child. His mother was a terrible drunk. I think she dropped him on his head regularly when he was a baby. He hasn’t been right since.”

“Oh, how could you know anything about when I was a baby? You weren’t even born yet!”

 Irene sighed and stood up and went over to the little sliding window to the receptionist’s area and rattled it to get the attention of the Dragon Lady on the other side.

“Yes?” the Dragon Lady said, sliding back the glass, obviously annoyed at being bothered.

“Where is Dr. Hackles?” Irene asked.

“He busy. What you think?”

“He’s been keeping me waiting for a long time.”

“Just sit and wait turn. He be with you before you say Jack Robinson.”

“I’ll only wait five more minutes and then I’m leaving and I’ll be finding myself another doctor.”

“Okay, lady! Don’t get panties in a bunch! Doctor be right with you!”

“These people sitting here are annoying me,” Irene said in a low voice meant only for the Dragon Lady. “I need to get away from them.”

The Dragon Lady craned her neck around to see who Irene was talking about. “They not bother,” she said. “Tell them no bother.”

“What did the Dragon Lady say?” Chester asked Irene when she sat back down.

“Nothing that helps.”

“Honestly!” Mitzi said. “I feel like sending them a bill for all the time they’ve wasted! My time is just as valuable as theirs!”

“I’m just on the verge of walking out the door and telling them to kiss my nether parts!” Chester said.

“We’ve waited this long,” Mitzi said. “Let’s give it a few more minutes.”

“Let’s set this place on fire!” Chester said.

“You can’t do that!” the Mitzi said. “There’s nothing here to burn.”

“There are plenty of old magazines!”

“And how long do you think it’d be before Dragon Lady calls the police and they come and take you away in handcuffs?”

“I’ll be gone by then.”

“See how crazy he is?” Mitzi said to Irene. “He thinks he can go around setting fires whenever he feels like it.”

“They need to be taught a lesson,” Chester said.

“Well, that’s not the way to do it!”

The man began gathering up the old magazines and piling them on the floor in the middle of the room. Some he ripped apart and others he opened up and tossed upside down so they would burn better. When he had a knee-high pile of magazines, he took out his cigarette lighter and set fire to them.

The fire was just beginning to burn efficiently when the Dragon Lady opened a door and stepped out into the waiting room.

“What going on here?” she said sternly. “No fire allow inside waiting room!”

“Just having a little fun!” Chester said, stomping out the flames. “Nothing to get excited about!”

“I have announcement about doctor,” the Dragon Lady said.

“Better spill it,” Chester said.

“Doctor leave! Big hurry! Terry-bull emergency at hospital! He go to hospital in big hurry to help those in distress!”

“Well, how do you like that?” Mitzi said. “We didn’t see him leave. Is he invisible?”

“Private entrance back of building.”

“I don’t think he was even here,” Chester said. “I think you’ve just been screwing with us.”

“Tell the doctor he’ll be getting a bill from me for all the time of mine he’s wasted today,” Mitzi said.

“Doctor say to please call again next week for reschedule appointment,” the Dragon Lady said. “Have nice day! Bye-bye!”

“Well, how do you like that?” Mitzi said. “We’ve been sitting here all this time and we never even laid eyes on the son of a bitch.”

“He needs to be taught some manners!” Chester said.

“Not by setting another fire!” Mitzi said. “That was a terrible idea!”

Irene wasted no time in getting out of the building, before Mitzi and Chester had a chance to speak to her again. She had a feeling all day long, ever since she woke up that morning, that everything would go wrong that day. She never cared for Dr. Hackles anyway. It was absolutely the last time she would ever go to him.

She was just getting into her car when Mitzi came up behind her suddenly, startling her.

“I wonder,” Mitzi said, “if you would give us a ride? Our car broke down and we’re just stuck here.”

“Where are you going?”

“Burkhardt.”

“I’m not going to Burkhardt,” Irene said. “That’s fifty miles the other way.”

“I know, but I just thought, since you seem like such a nice lady and you have  such a new-looking car, that you wouldn’t mind taking us.”

“Can’t you call a taxi?”

“Do you know how much that would cost?”

“No, and I don’t care. I’m sorry for your troubles but we all have them.”

“Now, that just isn’t very nice at all,” Mitzi said.

Irene put her purse on the seat and started to get in when Mitzi grabbed her by the wrist and pointed a gun in her face.

“I’m sorry to do this,” Mitzi said, “but we’re taking your car.”

“You’re what?”

“I said we’re taking your car.”

“You’re stealing my car?”

“That’s what I said, bitch!”

“You’re not taking my car! How long do you think it’ll be before I call the police?”

“You’re not calling anybody, lady!”

Chester grabbed Irene by the arm and pulled her back and forth until she lost her balance and fell to the ground. When she tried to get up, Mitzi hit her in the head with the gun, stunning her. She was barely aware of what was happening when Mitzi and Chester both got into her car and drove away with a screech of tires.

As she fell back onto the blacktop, she felt that something inside her head was broken. She was too dizzy to stand up. She vomited, unable to turn her head to the side. After she vomited a second time, she lost consciousness.

Awaking to rain on her face, she swiveled her head as far as she could, trying to remember where she was and how she got there. She thought about trying to get to her car, but then she remembered something bad had happened to her car. Somebody took it, but who? Oh, yes, there was a woman with red hair and also a man.

Pulling herself to a sitting position, she was then able to stand up without falling over. She took a few tentative steps, stopped, leaned forward, hands on knees, and vomited again.

She began walking along the narrow shoulder of the highway. Off to the right she saw lights far away; if she walked long enough, she’d find somebody to help her. People honked because she was staggering and they thought she was drunk. One car swerved and narrowly avoided hitting her. Teenagers passed by in a pickup truck and screamed and laughed at her.

A police car came along, red lights blazing. The car stopped, barely off the road. A uniformed officer got out of the car and approached her.

“Have you been drinking, ma’am?” the officer asked.

“No, I don’t think so,” she said.

“Your head is bleeding. Did you have an accident?”

“I don’t know. I don’t seem to be able to remember.”

“Do you have any ID?”

“ID?”

“Identification.”

“No, I…”

He opened the back door of the police car and gestured for her to get in.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked.

“Just get in.”

The sudden jerk of the car gave her the feeling of being on a rocket ship propelled into space. Star-lights burst on the edge of her vision. She leaned forward and vomited on the floor between her feet.

The officer drove to the nearest hospital, stopped the car and went inside. In a few minutes, some people in white came out and removed Irene from the car and took her inside.

They left her alone in a tiny white room, reclining on a cot. She lay on her back with her eyes closed, hands folded across her chest. In a couple of minutes a nurse and a doctor came in. The nurse patted her on the shoulder, took her blood pressure and told her to open her eyes. The doctor held his finger in front of her face and told her to follow it with his eyes. It was then that she knew she had seen the doctor before. He had a long neck and a large head, not unlike a ventriloquist’s dummy.

When the nurse approached with a syringe and smiled at her, Irene knew she had also seen her before. She had flaming-red hair. A shade of red not seen anywhere in nature.

“What is this?” Irene said. “What’s going on here? I’m not going to let you touch me!”

“Take it easy,” the nurse said. “You just need to calm yourself down, honey. We’re only trying to help you.”

“You hit me in the head with a gun and left me lying on a parking lot in the rain.”

“Clearly delusional,” the doctor said pleasantly.

The nurse laughed a scoffing laugh and tied Irene’s wrists to the cot. The doctor sat down, his fleshy lips two inches from Irene’s mouth. She could see far into his mouth, all the way to his back teeth and his uvula.

“Now, then!” the doctor said, blowing out his foul breath, “suppose you tell me everything that happened. Start at the beginning and just take your time.”

Copyright © 2023 by Allen Kopp