Mark's Pages

January 15, 2004:

Customer service, laboratory division, major community hospital. Lanky man, graying temples, leans over the counter holding a specimen jar the size of a kerosene can.

"I brought you a present," he smiles.

Pretty nurse, white lab coat, id badge, mid-twenties, straight red-brown hair, strong Pinay features. Smiles, thinks about the joke for a second or two, frames her response.

"You shouldn't have!" she says, warming to the game.

Lanky man has his answer already prepared. "But," he says, feigning rejection. "I made it myself..."

Lanky man shakes his head privately as he walks toward the exit. Thinks to himself, not sure it was worth the commute; buttons his top buttons, steps into cold, and the smell of rain on asphalt.