DOKITA

EPISODE 7

Clinic this afternoon was dull, Fola noted.

Today was a public holiday and whilst others stayed late in bed, or had nice moments with family members, Fola was on call. Well, he’d day-dreamt of having breakfast in bed. But now that couldn’t happen, could it?

Yes, he understood why the emergency room had to be open on public holidays.

But clinics? Fola feigned ignorance of its importance and instead thought up a thousand-and-one reasons why clinics on public holidays should be scrapped.

Especially the paediatric clinic.

He would look into that when he became the chief medical director of an institution.

A woman in a red blouse and brown pleated skirt walked in, in her tow a little girl who wouldn’t stop frowning.

‘Good afternoon, doctor’

‘Good afternoon madam’

Thank God! She speaks English, Fola thought and almost said out loud.

‘How are you, madam? What is wrong with this cutie?’

He tried to play with the child, but she shunned him

‘Fine girl, how are you now?’

She put her head on her mother’s laps and defiantly refused to raise it up.

‘She’s shy…and also scared of injections!’ Her mother said, admist laughter.

A brief admittance into Janet’s mind would have heralded no trace of fear. Only repulsion at being dragged to the hospital despite being riveted by the chicken and chips others were eating at home. It was only when she remembered the man in white that any trace of injection-fear pierced the protective coverings of her heart.

‘Janet, greet the doctor now’

She declined with a sharp motion of her head sideways

‘She started coughing 2 days ago. Today, I noticed that she had temperature.’

Temperature. Fola smiled. ‘Who doesn’t have temperature?’ He thought again.

‘Oh, she has a fever?’ Fola brought his right hand towards her neck.

Checked her case note for the temperature recorded by the nurse before the patient’s entrance into the consulting room. 37.4ᵒ, it read.

He made a mental note to use a thermometer to check it again once he was done clerking.

Is that all?

‘And catarrh too’

Coryza.

‘I’ll examine her, then prescribe drugs for her and she should be good to go. She’d be fine in no time’. Fola said.

‘Ok, thank you Doctor.’ said the beaming mother.

Fola whistled. So far, so good.

He opened his phone and began to browse.

 ‘All these people that are always posting pictures on instagram sha!’ He soliloquized once more.

Bunmi came to his thought again. He had seen her this morning rushing towards the East Wing and they exchanged pleasantries, howbeit awkwardly, after which she gave him an invitation card to her wedding.

Her wedding. It should have been their wedding.

He really was working hard at not caring about her anymore, but the wound was still very fresh. This letter only added salt to it.

Maybe he should work on trying to hate her instead. Maybe that would work.

His senior colleague, Dr. Ehis, had recommended another girlfriend for him. But it had seemed rude to him and he deemed it unnecessary. He’d told Dr. Ehis that much.

The fella had hissed.

‘No be she break up? You just dey dull sha, guy give yourself brain o. Wake up! I no even know why you dey carry this babe for head. Na babe o, common babe! I trust myself sha…’

Fola didn’t reply. If only he knew.

Bunmi wasn’t just any girl.

He made an attempt to stand up from the chair he was sitting on and suddenly felt a bulge in his back pocket.

The invitation card.

He smiled sadly, brought it out and sat down once again.

Might as well get it over with.

Travis Greene’s ‘All things are working for my good’ popped up in his head and he hummed along.

He felt the edges of the envelope which housed the card.

Serrated edges. Nice.

Who was she getting married to? Must be a resident doctor or something.

He knew about most of the guys who used to disturb her, they’d laughed at most of the propositions together. He had even gotten into trouble more than once on account of being her boyfriend while they were in school.

And it might be someone completely different. He thought again.

His hands were trembling.

‘Fola calm down, all things will work together for your good. Take a deep breath.’ He lectured himself.

He placed the envelope on the table.

What greeted him next was a stunner.

He re-read the name of the groom.

 Why? What had he done to deserve this?

‘We the Phillips and Amao families cordially invite you to the solemnization of our children;

Bunmi Camelia Phillips

            And

Kehinde James Amao’

And if not because he knew Kenny’s middle name, he would have completely dispelled the thought of him being the groom. I mean, what were the chances?

He would wait to confirm the authenticity of these imagined thoughts.

And if he was right, he would know for certain, that he had just being proved wrong.

There was no way this could work in any way for his good.

It was all bull-shit!

*******************************************************************

Linda had studied that night.

Way harder than she had in weeks, she observed.

Besides a little drama from one of the patients, the ward hadn’t been such a bad place to read in.

Who knew that thoughts of Mama and Papa discovering that she had failed could petrify her so much?

‘Tufiakwa! No child of mine would be a failure.’ He’d said when her younger brother had taken the 8^th position in a class of 30.

‘I was a school principal before I retired, and I know the number of doctors, lawyers, businessmen and women that I have churned out. Even politicians! Wasn’t Rufus a student of mine? And he’s now on posters everywhere as a senatorial gubernatorial candidate.’

And then papa would grumble about how bad the economy was, forcing him to take up farming.

He’d not been paid his pension for the past 5years. And proud man that he was, he’d taken to farming to ensure that he could fend for his family, no matter how poorly.

She dared not face her father with news of failure.

Mama’s was another story entirely. Linda had no iota of doubt that Mama would cry her entire eyeballs out.

Have you seen Mama crying before?

She chuckled a little. It was indeed a funny sight to behold, with her big mouth wide open.

Not that she would make jest of Mama or anything.

In Mama’s voice:

‘You this tiny thing. I carried you in my womb for 9 months. You even do extra time sef!’

When Linda was younger, she’d wondered if the womb had fallen out of Mama’s sagged abdomen and maybe that was why no other child was born after Chukwuma.

So she had studied hard. Hard and long.

Encouragingly, the topics in Chemical Pathology had seemed interesting and her reading flowed seamlessly.

‘God, let this translate to good marks o!’ She had muttered a half-hearted prayer.

Felix had brought past questions for her to practice.

She picked up one on Chemical Pathology and began answering, confident that she would do well.

50 minutes later, depression was having a field day. She had scored less than half.

She went through her notes and textbook again. Most of the questions she’d missed were on account of ‘except’!

Like ‘The following are not true of alkaline phosphatase except-------------------’

‘I have to be careful of double negatives.’

She looked through again.

‘Mtcheew!’ she hissed. So the negatives cancelled each other out?

She picked up another past question and began to answer with renewed vigor.

There was absolutely no time to be slack.

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