Bingo

‘Agnes,’

‘Yes Bridie,’

‘Would you like to come down with me to the bingo to see what it’s all about?’ Bridie said in her thick Louth accent.

‘Ah here Bridie,’ Agnes rolled her eyes, ‘please tell me you’re not thinkin of going?’

‘Well there’s a group of them from the ward there who are goin down and I was thinking of joining them! Would you like to come?’

Agnes rolled her eyes again and went to put her slippers on. ‘Ah sure, there’s feck all else to be doin!’

‘Good woman yourshelf!’

‘Where is it?’ Agnes asked as she had to think would she bring her stick or her walker.

‘Its in the lecture hall downshtairs!’

‘Right so…frame it is!’

‘Good woman Agnes. Sure the walk will get the circulation goin anyways!’

‘If you say so,’ Agnes said derisively.

Slippers on, frame at the ready, the two owld ones walked down the corridor to the lift.

‘Were we suppose to have told them where we’d be?’ Agnes asked.

‘Sure if they want us, they’ll come find us!’ Bridie answered as the lift doors opened and the pair got in.

‘What number do I press here Bridie?’

‘Wan!’

Agnes reached for her glasses that hung from her neck with a lovely chain made from beads that she had done herself in the craft room earlier in the week.

‘Ah here!’ Bridie got impatient and pressed the button that was furthest down in the selection, and off they went.

When they eventually managed to get out of the lift, one of the rubber bits on Agnes’s frame got stuck in the gap between the lift and the ground. A nice man in cargo shorts and flip flops came over to rescue them and untangled the mess.

‘Thank you so much, ah youre a great stapping young lad, a gentleman, a real gentleman!’ Agnes sang his praises as he walked off. Then Bridie turned around, ‘the state of him! We’re here in a hospital, not the feckin mediteranian!’

Agnes gently slapped the top of Bridies arm. ‘Would you whisht or you’ll get us into trouble! Now come on!’

Bridie had to nearly pull poor Agnes towards the lecture hall as she stopped to admire all of the photographs of peoples pets in one corner of the corridor, then it was the artwork in the next, then the shop in the next.

‘By Jasus woman, if we’re late, they’re not going to call the feckin numbers a second time!’ Bridie exploded.

They made it to the main reception when Agnes piped up, ‘are we nearly there yet? My bunions are killing me!’

‘To hell with you and your feckin bunions, it’s just through this door!’ Bridie pointed to the door where droves of other patients were queueing up in an orderly fashion and waiting their turn to get into the hall.

Bridie just pushed by them all, Agnes mortified, ‘her bunions are at her!’ she said as she dragged Agnes to the first in the queue.

‘Ah howaya Agnes and Bridie?’ Jess, one of the health care assistants, welcomed them into the hall.

Bridie rolled her eyes and mouthed ‘her bunions!’ very dramatically….’Jasus!’ she mouthed putting her hand to her head.

‘Ah well yesar here now an iave jus the place for yis! If ye wanna sit here in theas VIP seats an I’ll give both of yisa board to lean on!’ and winked at Bridie who winked back.

Agnes, glad to be able to take the weight off her feet sat back into the office chair and said, ‘aaahhh, that’s better!’ before taking off her slippers and resting her bare feet on top of them.

‘What in the name of Jasus are you doing woman?’ Bridie chastised.

‘Im relaxin!’ Agnes said with such resolve that Bridie started to make a comeback on multiple occasions but stopped after making a couple of noises and dramatically waved her hand, defeated, in Agnes’s direction and buried half of her face in her other hand mortified.

There they lay, Agnes’s bunions, out and proud, and most of all they were getting some air.

Bridie had the attention span of a newt and looked around the lecture hall as it quickly reached capacity. She hit Agnes on the upper arm gently again because she saw the HCA’s turning people away.

‘Why arnt they lettin them ones in?’

‘Its because of covid Bridie!’

‘What?’ Bridie sat up straight, ‘all those people have covid?’

‘No, they just can only sit in certain seats because of covid!’

‘But look,’ Bridie gesticulated, ‘there are rows that have no one in em!’

Agnes rolled her eyes, ‘here Bridie, Jess has the board for ya!’

Bridie turned around plastering on a smile, ‘ah you are a pet!’

Agnes giggled.

‘Whats up with you?’ Bridie wanted in on the action, but Agnes swatted her away as the numbers were starting to be called.

‘Good evenin ladies and gentlemen an welcome to saurday nights bingo! Does everone know howta play?’ Jess asked.

‘If we didn’t know, we wouldn’t be here!’ Bridie piped up and the whole hall laughed…including Jess.

‘Righ so, yiser firs number ou is five and tree, fifty tree.’

Bridie went down the fifties column and found it easy enough to find. Agnes on the other hand was wrestling with her glasses. They had gotten tangled up with her fake pearl necklace, which she also made in the craft room last week.

Jess got up and helped her untangle them.

‘Typical you, holding us all up!’ Bridie shook her head. There were some snickers around the hall.

With the glasses untangled and fifty three marked, Jess continued.

‘Seven and foar, seventy foar. Six an eigh, sixty eigh’

‘Sorry jess was that fifty eight or sixty eight?’ someone in the hall asked.

‘Here we go!’ Bridie started rustling in her seat. It was Agnes’s turn to slap her on the upper arm, ‘behave!’ she warned with her bingo dabber raised. Bridie just rolled her eyes.

As the numbers were called, the highly strung Bridie was stressing poor Agnes out, but she was enjoying the bingo…especially when she was the first to win. She was able to pick her prize at the end of the first game when the balls were being put back into the drum. Dee, another HCA, brought the one liner prizes over to Agnes on a trolley. She had the pick of either chocolate or things like soap, lip balm, face masks…in the end, the green eyed monster in Bridie arose and she shouted, ‘just pick something already!’ so Agnes chose a bag of chocolate M&M’s and was as pleased as punch.

There were four games of bingo played that night but after game two, when the same guy came down from the rafters for his prize four times in a row, Bridie called bullshit.

‘And can we see those two lines in the same panel?’ she shouted back to him when he quickly called out the two lines that qualified him for yet another prize.

As the HCA’s thought he was taking the piss also, Mark went up and took a look at this yokes two lines and they were in fact in different boxes.

‘You’ve uncovered a scam!’ Agnes said loudly so that the whole room could hear her.

From that game on it was the HCA’s who went up to the lucky winner to call back the ‘winning’ numbers. That whole section of the hall was silent the rest of the night, none of them winning anything further.

On the last game of the night, the stakes were high…Bridie needed the number four to win a full house. Out came seventeen, thirty two…..and finally, the number four!

‘BINGO!!!!’ Bridie shouted at the top of her lungs making Agnes and Jess jump out of their seats from fright.

‘Make sure you check it to see if its righ!!’ that little git who was cheating shouted down and, as they had been doing since the discovery of the cheating, Mark checked Bridies numbers with Jess, and to her relief they were correct….she had indeed won the last prize of the night in bingo.

As with Agnes, they wheeled the prize trolley over to Bridie, but her prize trolley was much more glamorous than that shite Agnes got to pick from. There were body lotions and bigger bars of chocolate. Bridie looked at everything and, eventually, picked the Toblerone. She decided a Toblerone would beat a measly packet of M&M’s any day…so she chose the Toblerone.

The pair of owld dears waited until everyone was out of the hall before they even stood up. Bridie yawned widely and looked up at the clock…it was 19:45, almost time for a sandwich and a cup of tea.

Jess came over to the pair and helped Agnes put her bunions away.

‘Are they hurtin you Agnes?’ she asked.

‘Ah she’ll be fine!’ Bridie answered for her.

Agnes found her voice and objected, ‘actually Jess, they are hurting a great deal!’

Bridie couldn’t roll her eyes any louder.

‘All righ love, sure I’ll geh yis a wheelchair to geh back to the ward, ok?’ Jess smiled at Agnes.

‘You can think again if you think I’m goin to wheel this one up in a wheelchair!’ Bridie piped up.

‘Nah, I’ll do it. Jus give me a minute ta puh away the bingo machean!’

 

Once they were back on the ward safe and sound, Agnes resting her bunions and Bridie having her tea and a sandwich Bridie turned to Agnes and asked, ‘so are you glad you came now?’

‘Ah yea, sure it passed an hour!’

‘Yeah! It did!’

 

 

 

 

picture from pixabay