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“Oh Jesus look at Megan’s face!” Jack pointed across the assembly hall area to a girl who was being propped into a chair. “Wow, I never thought she’d be one to go all blotchy like that! Look, look!” He nudged Lindsey and Blake, still pointing across to the girl, whose blonde hair was straggling down the side of her face and was crying noisily. “What an actual wuss!”
“Stop being such a wanker Jack!” Lindsey shoved the hand that he was pointing with down to his side, aware that the others from their class around them were following the line of where he was indicating.
“What?!” Jack chuckled rather maliciously as he watched yet another girl, whose name he didn’t know, being helped out of a cubicle and into the quiet seated area near Megan. “It’s just an injection… It’s not like they’ve had their arm cut off or anything!”
“Be nice,” Blake muttered, fumbling with the slip of paper in his hand over to confirm his identity.
“Oh don’t tell me you’re gonna freak out about this…” Jack turned to look at Blake.
“No!” Blake refuted a little too quickly, but he looked a little nervous at the same time.
“Really?” Jack had raised an eyebrows at his best mate, and his gaze was so intense that Blake had to look away.
“Shut up…” He mumbled, tapping his fingers on his knees repetitively. “It’s just the thought isn’t it?”
“What thought?” Jack asked obliviously, with a small snort.
“It doesn’t matter…” Blake said, shrugging his shoulders.
“At least we get to miss German though, eh?” Lindsey interrupted, clearly trying to change the topic, but Jack had resumed his staring back down at Megan and the other girl who were being plied with water by the nurse looking after them.
“That’s true…” Jack wiggled around on his chair, his eyes still focused on the girls in the corner. “You would have thought they’d be better organised though! Like our whole class has been here since the start of this period, but only twelve of us have been called!”
“They’re doing their best…” Blake mumbled, his leg beginning to jiggle up and down like he was resting it on a nerve.
They were interrupted by one of the nurses calling the next batch of names, one of them was Lindsey. She rose swiftly and said: “I’ll see you in a bit.”
They watched as she descended the stairs from the tiered seats, down to where the individual makeshift cubicles had been set up. Blake was still clutching at the slip of paper in his hand.
“You sure you’re not gonna freak out?” Jack repeated, a slightly wicked grin on his face.
“I’ll be fine,” Blake replied curtly. “I’m just annoyed cause I could be practicing. This is a total waste of time.”
“There’s a piano over there,” Jack pointed across to the grand piano in the corner of the hall. “You could serenade us all if you wanted?”
“No thanks…” Blake replied dryly. “I just wish they’d hurry up!”
“Well the longer we’re here the more classes we miss!” Jack had about turned, and was now not complaining about the wait. He watched again as Megan was helped out of her chair by the nurse, her face had resumed its normal colour. He was so busy watching her that he didn’t notice anything else until Blake nudged him hard in the side. When he looked around Blake was on his feet, staring down at him.
“Come on,” he said impatiently. “We’ve been called…”
“Oh!” Jack got to his feet behind Blake and followed him down the stairs and was directed towards one of the cubicles.
As he rounded the curtain of the cubicle he had to go to, he came face to face with an attractive young red head, who held her hand out for the crumpled slip that he’d shoved into his pocket. She took it with a disapproving look on her face, spreading it out onto her table and then indicated the seat.
“Grab a seat,” she scribbled something onto Jack’s bit of paper, then stamped it with a date stamp. “Right Jack, so you just need the 3-in-1, so that’s Diptheria, Polio and Tetanus, you don’t need the Rubella…” She was rummaging in a cool bag clearly obtaining the vaccine.
“Hey wait – why not?” Jack shot, folding his arms across his chest and leaning back lazily in the chair.
“Well, Rubella is given only to girls,” she had withdrawn a box and was pulling on a pair of gloves before she prepared the needle.
“That’s sexist!” Jack exclaimed, and the nurse shot him an exasperated glance; clearly dealing with a whole year of teenagers in one day had been trying to her patience. A wicked thrill of pleasure ran through Jack as she started to prep the needle with a little more vigour than was probably necessary. It occurred to Jack that it probably wasn’t wise to antagonise a person who was about to stab him with a needle, but he couldn’t help him.
“Well Jack, we give Rubella to girls because it can be very dangerous if you’re pregnant,” she said dryly, “so unless you’re intending to get pregnant soon, I’m pretty sure you won’t need it.”
“Ah,” Jack grinned widely as she turned to look at him, “I’ll be sure to practice safe sex and not get up the duff then!”
“Now we’ve got that sorted out, what arm am I using?” She asked, holding the needle up.
“Does it have to be my arm? Sure there’s no where else that you can stick it?” The words had left Jack’s mouth before he was consciously aware of even thinking.
“I’ll stick it in your mouth if you don’t stop being lippy!” She threatened, putting her hand on her hip and staring at him. “So – which arm am I using?” Her voice was firmer as she repeated this.
“Fine – my right,” Jack sighed overdramatically, and began to unbutton his shirt to give her access; he paused as she stood waiting and put on his most scandalised voice: "Aren’t you going to give me some privacy?”
She make a sound like a sucking of her teeth as she turned her back, rolling her eyes and Jack could tell that she was honestly considering whether it’d be acceptable to hit a pupil. Thinking he’d probably annoyed her enough, he slid his right sleeve from his shoulder.
“Okay!” He said cheerily, and she turned round still looking like she might shove the needle up his nose.
“You might want to look the other way,” she advised, her voice still hard as she bent next to his exposed upper arm, but Jack let out a derisive snort. “Sharp scratch coming.”
Jack felt the needle enter his skin and he had to fight against a reactive jerk from his body. He swore he could feel the cold liquid in the syringe entering his arm, and then spread through the rest of his body rapidly. Almost instantly his heart had begun to pound inside his chest, and a sudden buzzing began in his ears.
“Right,” the nurse said, dropping the used needle into a yellow sharps box on the desk and removed her gloves. “That’s you all done,” she picked up her pen and began to scrawl something onto the slip of paper that bore his name, “you need to sit in the seats for ten minutes until you’re told you can leave.”
As she advised this, the cold sensation had engulfed all of Jack’s body and brought with it a cold sweat that he could feel on his trembling fingers as he tried to button his shirt back up. He found himself taking a slow deep breaths, and trying extra hard to get rid of the fuzzy buzzing inside his head.
“Jack?” He heard the nurse’s voice from what sounded like very far away, and he looked up at her; she was frowning at him. “Are you not feeling well?”
“I…” Jack tried to reply, but his voice seemed to have died in his throat, all traces of his sassy self gone. He regretted opening his mouth as his stomach had given an almighty lurch, and his mouth was filled with very watery saliva. Breathing through his nose and swallowing rapidly, he leant back against the chair.
“Jack? Tell me how you’re feeling?” She was asking, her voice sharper now, and he felt her hand on his shoulder suddenly. Trying to wipe his forehead with his shaking hand so as to remove the damp sticky feeling, he could feel his stomach still churning and lurching inside him and he pressed his lips further together. Sure this feeling would soon pass, he was determined to ride it out.
But a sudden heave sent his body barrelling forward and he placed his hands on his knees, taking shaky breaths.
“H’gkkkuuuuuuuuuuuurrrrghhh!” Jack’s stomach squeezed suddenly and before he knew it a fountain of sick had poured from his mouth, splattering his trousers, shoes and across the floor. He inhaled shakily, his mouth sour and still dripping with saliva; he felt another fierce convulsion roll up from his gut, and a further mouthful of vomit joined that already on the school trousers.
“Jack?”
Someone was talking to him, but his head was swirling as he closed his eyes so as not to look at the puddle of puke. He felt hot all over now, like the cold had been ignited to fire, but he knew he was still shivering. He felt weak, and his head was pounding now the residual buzzing faded in and out and then, suddenly, stopped.
“Jack? Jack?” It was a different voice than it had been before, a male voice. Jack felt like he’d been wrung like a sponge, exhaustion swept through him, but with a jolt he realised that he was already lying down. Very, very slowly, Jack forced himself to open his eyes; and saw Blake and Lindsey peering down at him, looking worried. He was lying on a trolley with his legs elevated slightly.
“Urgh…” Jack let out a low groan but made no attempt to sit up.
“Take it easy Jack,” Blake told him, resting his hand gently onto Jack’s shoulder, “you fainted…”
“I – what?” He murmured, feeling his cheeks burn with embarrassment as he closed his eyes again.
“The nurses said it’s really common, don’t worry,” Lindsey said, and even with his eyes shut he could tell she had her ‘I told you so’ face on. “They’ve called your folks, one of them is coming to get you, you need to be watched for the next couple of hours.”
“I’d be better staying here then…” He mumbled opening his eyes once more. He knew that whoever it was that came and got him would take him home settle him on the sofa, and then go back to work.
“At least you get the rest of the day off…” Lindsey tried to inject a tone of cheeriness, but Jack simply glared up at her.
“This is awful…” Jack admitted honestly.
“Cheer up,” Blake patted Jack gently on the arm, a wry smile on his face. “It was only an injection, remember?”