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Undergoing medical tests is always a depressing experience and this time is no different. The difference this time, however, is that I didn't have to wait six months for each individual test. And I probably won't have to wait a further eight months for each, individual result either. And then I almost certainly won't have to sit in a waiting room for hours until someone finally comes over to admit they've lost my notes. All of this could be seen as 'the good thing'.
The bad thing is that the tests are being done by Dr Jean Gray, psychic extraordinaire. And she seems to be trying to do fifteen tests all at once! Where normally, you'd get fifteen tests over the course of about six or seven years, I'm getting them all in one sodding day! It really is more than a body ought to be asked to put up with. I mean, I don't really like doctors, at the best of times. They rate, in my opinion, only slightly above driving instructors in their over all responsibility for pain and suffering in the world. On top of this, as you have probably guessed, I don't respond real well to tests.
Anyway, as a consequence of all of this, I think you'll understand that this whole situation has been designed to bring out my worst side. Don't get me wrong, I'm trying. I really am. Because, rationally, I know that I do like Dr Gray. And I do not want to stab her in the eyes with one of her own cotton swabs. I don't. Really. Honest. But if she hits me with that damn hammer again, so help me God….
"Okay this is just going to show the brain activity function," she tells me, using doctor voice and tapping buttons. Does she think that's going to make me happy for crying out loud? She can read my mind and she is tracking my brain function. Sheesh.
"Marvellous," I tell her, caustically. My voice could be used to unblock drains.
Damn that beeping machine is annoying. I mean for crying out loud, yes, I have a pulse. What did you bloody think? That it was going to suddenly stop or something?
"It's okay to be upset, you know," she tells me, sympathetically.
"I'll bear that in mind."
"Can you feel that?" she asks, stroking my arm with a cotton swap.
"You tell me," I say.
She smiles, but it comes out more like a grimace. "Actually I'd rather you told me," she says. If you listen closely you can hear the gritted teeth. Maybe I'm not being the greatest patient here, but what can I tell you? Not two hours ago I was going to teach a maths lesson. Now I'm in a basement being prodded with things. I'm not feeling very bloody patient. Still, the gritted teeth do make me feel guilty.
"Yes I can feel that," I reply, promising myself that I'll try harder. Remember Pollyanna. Probably her doctors never grimaced, well, except when she gave them toothache by being to saccharine for words... I shall now emulate Pollyanna.
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Jean gritted her teeth and reminded herself for what felt like the thousandth time that she felt sorry for Ms Jacobson. She wasn't angry with her. Even if Amanda had abandoned the group while they were fighting for their lives back at the warehouse. Even though she had left the school in the lurch. Even though she had almost killed Kurt Wagner. Jean felt sorry for her. The poor girl had been through a lot. It wasn't her fault all this had happened. And Jean was absolutely in control of her emotions, just as always. A rustle from the paper sitting in the printer belied this assertion but Jean chose to ignore it.
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