Health-center horrors

This weekend I had the sickies.\nAs I stared down my throat in the bathroom like my parents used to do, I was struck by two equally perturbing questions. First, what the hell am I supposed to be looking for? Second, does this mean I’ll have to go to the IU Health Center?\nAfter one horrible trip to that unholy building freshman year, I have pretty much adopted the theory that if I’m not sick enough to go to the emergency room, I need to just deal with it.\nMy terrible experience at the health center started with a cough, but this wasn’t just any cough. This was one of those intense, rib-bruising coughs, which is so loud at night that you’re pretty sure your roommate is going to put you out of your misery so he can get some sleep.\nI finally decided after a week of this that maybe I should seek some kind of professional advice. Not knowing where else to turn, I decided on the health center, having at least walked by it enough times to be lulled into a sense of security.\nAfter checking in, I took a seat in the waiting room, surrounded by sneezing, coughing, puking students who looked closer to death than I felt comfortable with. I scanned the room and found a secluded spot in the back corner as far as possible from everyone else.\nAfter awhile, a guy came in and scanned the room in the same way I did. He then started walking toward me, having presumably decided that he would rather die of my horrible cough than whatever the guy curled up in the fetal position had. \nI can’t blame him.\nHe sat down and asked me what was wrong with me. I coughed at him and he nodded a little bit. I was too afraid to ask him what his ailment was, and quite frankly, I couldn’t have cared less. He volunteered, though, that he was here because of a rash.\nI guess he didn’t interpret my frightened look correctly because he then proceeded to point to his crotch, telling me exactly what kind of rash he was dealing with.\nI uncomfortably scooted as far away as possible.\nAfter a while, we were both called in to our respective doctors, and after receiving a prescription for the wrong type of medication (of course, I didn’t know it at the time), I ran into the same guy while checking out.\nHe gave me a huge smile and told me, “Man, that was a close call.” Then he held out his hand as if to give me a high-five.\nNeedless to say, I left him hanging on that one. It just seems wrong to celebrate a rash, no matter how noncontagious it is.\nAnyway, from that moment on, I decided that a return trip to the health center was out of the question.\nI’m also curious what happened to that guy and if anyone was dumb enough to give him a high-five.\nI sure hope not.