Last week, the engineer got up at 4 a.m. to whiz & then wandered in, stark naked, as I sat staring at the computer, trying to bore myself to sleep. "What is that on your leg?" I squawked -- & then took a closer look & saw what looked like tiny blisters coming up on several large red patches.
"Oh, that's been there for a couple of days, & on my back too. I guess it'll go away."
Engineer is quite capable of believing that an invading army, if ignored long enough, will go away (granted, that might be true). I said, "Does it itch?"
"Well, no, it sort of hurts, actually."
OH NO.
The walls are thick here but the floors are not, & the neighbors mostly sleep at night, so I couldn't really air my views in full. What I was looking at, I was fairly sure, was shingles; & I have never had chickenpox, which is what an initial exposure to the virus produces. And chickenpox in an adult, much less a middle-aged & somewhat decrepit one, means disaster.
Engineer paid no attention, as usual, & ambled back to bed, & I spent the next three hours speculating on just how much brain damage I could have & still keep my job. When his alarm went off, I did too, & by the time he left he had agreed to see a doctor that day. And by lunchtime his doctor had confirmed it.
In the 1980s, when AIDS came along & everyone I knew seemed to have it, I had to make the occasional trip to the friendly doctor (there's a long-gone species) for a shot of zoster immune globulin after getting one of those 2 a.m. phone calls to "please please come over here & look at this." (People with crashed immune systems tend to get shingles; & for the first 72 hours, the virus can be air transmissible.) When the chickenpox vaccine came out but was not in general use, my doctor -- after checking & finding that yes, I really had never had it (hey, I was an antisocial kid & lived out in the woods in my early years) -- got hold of it by some sort of special dispensation. I had to rush to his office, where I was greeted by a styrofoam cooler holding a block of dry ice & one vial of vaccine. They duly shot me up with it & I went off to my job with the block of dry ice, which I gave to an associate who had gone to MIT as an undergraduate, figuring that he would appreciate it. (He called in later & was extremely annoyed that his wife wouldn't let him drop a chunk into the loo bowl & then let him watch her sit there. Some women just don't understand.)
Years later, when I was married to the Village Idiot & wanted to have children, my new doctor agreed to check that I was still immune -- no, not any more (if I had ever been). So we did two rounds that time. I never did manage to spawn, & no one ever checked to see if the vaccine had worked.
Air transmissibility was not an issue this time, of course -- engineer is an unsanitary sort who uses my towel, sleeps nude & flops all over my side of the bed, including when I am in it. My doctor, via his receptionist, whose first language is not English & who "forgets" to return phone calls, seemed to think there was no problem, until I reminded him that the vaccine hadn't worked the first time, that I still hadn't had chickenpox & that Mr. Poxy had been happily breaking out for two days while sharing a bed with me. Finally, after a few messages via the receptionist (who kept forgetting to deliver them), I gave up & called my pharmacist, who is more accessible & more sensible. He said that zoster immune globulin wasn't all that effective anyhow & that, basically, I should wait it out -- "yeah, you may be screwed, nothing to do." Fair enough.
On day three, doctor finally agreed to test me to make sure I was immune (more likely to shut me up). Receptionist called with the results -- not immune, what a surprise. Doctor shot me up with another dose of vaccine on day six or so.
Incubation period: 10-20 days. So for the last 10 days I have reminded the engineer (who is healing up nicely & no longer uses my towel b/c I have hidden it) to take his meds, & bathed him with various solutions, & waited.
Time bomb.
Bonus: engineer's doctor gave him naprosyn for pain. This wasn't going to do (he has a low pain threshold). When engineer said he'd "just go to the emergency room if he couldn't get the doctor" in case he needed something stronger, I had to explain that a holiday weekend was near & his doctor would not be, & that even a nice quiet emergency room (which this one isn't) gets plagued by addicts looking for narcotics, & he would find no joy there. His doctor promptly kicked out a prescription for Percocet, which he needed, once things got bad. But he's feeling better now, & I am laying claim to the leftovers, once he's well ... provided, of course, that I'm not full of the pox by then.
Tick tick tick.
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