Foultongue

Norbert

20

Foultongue

The two hour overlap between shifts when more people are on duty covers the busy period when most of the GP work arrives. Between 10pm and 8am the next morning, one of the staff on the late shift remains on duty throughout the night to cover any emergencies. They get the next day off in return. It isn’t classed as a night shift but as on-call, because not everyone stays in the lab overnight. If you live within three miles and own a car you are allowed to do it from home. If a House Dog (junior doctor) wants an urgent test or some blood crossmatching, they contact you through the hospital switchboard, either at home by phone or by bleep if you are within the hospital.

There is a famous story about GT. He lives five miles away and has to use the lab on-call bedroom.

On this particular occasion he was on for the whole weekend, from 10pm Friday till 8am Monday. No one would normally dream of doing a marathon stretch like that without going home at some point, but GT needed the money and lieu time for an intimate weekend somewhere down the coast with Isabel Wringing-Lowd. (He told me that at the time Isabel was still working her way through the ranks and hadn’t yet reached the pinnacle of head concubine in his harem. The weekend treat was her reward for consistently good blowjobs, which I believe is a game you play with a straw and a ping-pong ball.)

He didn’t bring any food or money. The only thing he found to eat in the tearoom was a full packet of Coco Pops. There was plenty of milk, so every meal was cereal. (It is the job of the milk monitor to ensure the fridge is well stocked prior to the weekend. I was extremely honoured to be appointed to this exalted position, believing they had realised I was reliable and efficient, but evidently it is the compulsory job of the newest minionshit member of staff.)

He set off for home on his motorbike at just after eight on Monday morning, and had only travelled a mile when the vibrations from the powerful engine induced the need to defecate. Having eaten nothing but Coco Pops for nearly three days, the urge became so acute he knew he had no chance of reaching home in time. He was in a built-up area in the middle of the rush hour, seconds away from soiling himself.

It suddenly occurred to him he was only two streets away from Isabel’s house, and because she was on late shift, would almost certainly be at home. He was no stranger in her house, either. That’s why her father didn’t like him.

He revved up the engine, turned into her road, slew sideways into the drive and left the bike on its side with the engine running. (Reckless motorcyclists like GT are what the staff in A&E calls donors.) He hammered on the front door, but got no reply. He knew from previous visits the spare key was beneath the mulch in a plant pot beside the door. He scraped it out and let himself in.

‘Anyone home?’ he called. Getting no reply, he raced up the stairs to the bathroom. The door was locked.

‘Let me in,’ he screamed. ‘Let me in, it’s GT. I can’t wait. You have to let me in.’

No one answered. He raced down the stairs, sphincter at bursting point, the only solution to evacuate in the bushes in the secluded back garden. He dashed into the kitchen and yanked the back door handle. It was locked and there was no key. Seeing a cat litter beside the cooker, he yanked down his leathers, his trousers and underpants and squatted over the tray. A huge pile of wet poo (way off even the Macarbrough Stool Form Scale) burst out of him and lay steaming on the litter. GT groaned in ecstasy and looked up. Standing in the kitchen doorway with wet hair and wearing nothing but a towel was Isabel’s mother. On such occasions are legends born.

‘Remember, the bleep must never leave your side. And never stray far from a phone,’ Warnetires-Skidmore reminds me on his way out.

During the day, the bleep is clipped to the tray we place request forms in on the authorization bench. It hangs there, silent and menacing, waiting to come to life at night like an evil toy in a horror film. If it goes off during the day, it’s either someone not familiar with the proper routine or a cardiac arrest on the wards. If it’s the latter, Enid screeches “cardiac arrest, cardiac arrest”, and gives the location. Any medic within 200 metres not doing anything important is obliged to run like hell to assist. At times, it looks like the patient is in the middle of a rugby scrum.

I receive an outside call just after five from social services saying they can fit us in at 11.00 in the morning. I immediately dial my room in the Nurses Home to tell Nunky the good news.

He picks up and says: ‘Pizza Hut.’

‘Don’t be silly. We’ve got an appointment at eleven in the morning.’

‘I’m sorry, but we don’t start deliveries until seven-thirty.’

‘Nunky, what are you talking about?’

‘Pizza delivery.’

‘Why are you pretending to be Pizza Hut?’

‘I’m not supposed to be here, am I, mi babby?’

‘I’ll see you in the morning.’

At exactly 10pm, everyone downs tools and rushes off home, leaving me on my own with nothing but that menacing little black gadget for company. If it hadn’t been for Nunky, I would have taken the bleep to the Nurse’s Home, but clearly there would be no erotic bath time fantasies. And knowing my luck, I would have dropped the grannytickler in the tub anyway. I sit looking at it for five minutes before retiring to the tearoom with a mug of coffee, a vending machine sandwich and hiccups. I rest the bleep on the arm of the chair and stare at it transfixed, even though Barry Pigwart-Potter and the Chamber Pot of Secretions is open on my lap. My chest is covered in crumbs and twice I hiccup coffee down my front.

‘You must be Norbie, the new minionshit?’

I jump. ‘What?’

I look up and see the domestics. (A team of three work evenings and cover all the labs, not just Haematology. I’d seen them pass through emptying bins and occasionally sweeping or buffing the floors. They were friendly with the other staff, especially GT, but apart from appraising looks they had never spoken to me.)

The speaker has a cigarette in her mouth and a mop in her hand. She is the oldest by a distance and looks disconcertingly like Auntie when she’s in one of her moods. She nods over her left shoulder, causing ash to fall onto her bosom and hence to the carpet. ‘She’s Potty Dotty.’ She nods over her right shoulder. ‘She’s Randy Mandy, and I’m Foultongue. This is the first chance we’ve had to talk.’

Randy Mandy has badly dyed hair, a patchy fake tan, a lot of bling and an overall several sizes too small. Her ample loolybells are straining the material to bursting point, and she isn’t wearing a bra. I can see a lot of leg and equally as much cellulite. Huge dangly earrings rest on her shoulders.

Potty Dotty is at least six feet three and built like an Amazon. Her hair is pulled back severely into a ponytail. She has a pleasant moon face and vacant eyes – clearly a no-ball short of a maiden over.

‘Yes. This is my first … hic … night on-call. I thought you finished at ten?’

‘We do, but seeing as this is your first time we thought we’d stay behind a few minutes to make you feel welcome.’

‘That is very kind of you, Mrs … hic … Did you say Foultongue?’

‘Shut the fart up and come with us, you toady-faced, stunted nobwit.’

‘Why?’

‘Because if you don’t I’ll rip your scrotum off and fill out your cheeks with them.’

The sudden change in tone has me worried. They are a fearsome looking bunch.

‘Sorry, but I can’t leave my … hic … bleep.’

Foultongue looks at Potty Dotty. ‘Fetch.’

She lifts me out of the chair, tosses me effortlessly over her shoulder and carries me into the main lab. I am deposited on my back on a cleared area of bench. Randy Mandy steps forward and expands her considerable chest. Four press studs ping open and her loolybells pop out. It looks like a dead heat in a zeppelin race. She expertly pulls off my belt, unzips my trousers and pulls them down to my ankles. Terror instantly cures the hiccups.

(I know you are expecting a clinically detailed and lurid account of what happens next, but I am afraid it is too shocking to describe. All I can remember is that it involves [in order] a washing line, a jelly mould and a spray can of double-whipped cream. The rest is a blur.)

Thankfully, I have only a few urgent blood counts and clotting screens, no emergencies and no blood to prepare. I spend most of the night in bed, staring at the ceiling in the dark, holding the covers tight against my throat and shivering with uncontrollable shock.

GT is first in that morning. He is usually the last to arrive.

He isn’t smiling, he’s leering. ‘Enjoy your initiation, did you?’

‘Did you pay them?’

‘No need to, drone. They enjoy it too much. I bet you can’t wait for your next on-call?’