My distended bladder cried for relief. Lying in bed, I could feel the pressure building up but dreaded going to the toilet which was just a few steps away. Nausea fluttered sickeningly in my abdomen as I got up. Cold sweat started breaking out on my ashen face and body. I tried to fend off the waves of involuntary spasm in my stomach but the yellowish acidic liquid spurted from my mouth and splashed into the toilet bowl. My vertigo and nausea abated a bit as my stomach was relieved of the gastric juice and a few morsels of undigested food. I had to lie down again before the room start spinning around.
The double deck spring bed creaked as I eased my back on the thin mattress. After a while, I occupied my mind visualizing the shapes and colors of my cubicle. With closed eyes, I can see the low white ceiling, dirty-white walls, gray cement floor, frosty jalousie window panes, overhead fluorescent lamp and the two plywood flush doors painted dirty-white – one opens the room, the other opens the toilet. A plate with cold rice and fried fish, an overripe banana, a half-filled water pitcher and an empty glass cluttered the small table set against the wall over my head. Tucked under the bed was my blue-green suitcase. A yellow towel and two plastic clothes hangers, one bearing a red-and-white checkered long-sleeve shirt, adorned the dextrose stand. In my mind’s eye, I can trace the matting of flat metal strips of my bed’s upper deck.
The lone university physician, accompanied by the lone university midwife, came to see his lone patient. The midwife who doubled as a nurse took my pulse, blood pressure and temperature. After shooting a few questions, Dr. Justo Samalio, Sr. prescribed more anti-acid and left. As the white-clad figures disappeared through the closing door, I braced myself for another long, lonely day. It was still past ten in the morning. I closed my eyes, hoping to ensnare the elusive sleep.
I had just completed all my final exams when I contracted mumps. Due to an abnormality in my optic nerves, a rare complication of mumps, what was an ordinary viral infection resulted in my admission in the university infirmary after the parotitis was gone. The university physician assured me that the condition was temporary but I could not make out how temporary was temporary. I had practically eaten nothing for the past two weeks and whatever food I was able to ingest was vomited every time I had to stand up to go to the comfort room.
I lost my appetite and barely ate the food that my brother Silvestre brought in from the university cafeteria where he washed dishes to earn free meals. He was a freshman enrolled in the College of Engineering. He kept watch at night, sleeping at the upper deck of the spring bed.
My cottage mates at the Aggie Village, who regularly came to visit, would cheer me up with ribald jokes and tall tales. They entreated and cajoled me to get well soon, in time for the latest James Bond movie, Thunderball, to be shown in one of the flea-infested theaters downtown.
