Cursed - 1. Cursed

“Oye, you in there, open the fucking door. You ain’t got no right to be in there. I saws you creeping in. What you up to, eh? Drugs, probably. So, get the fuck out or I’m calling Security.”

If only this bully would go away for a few minutes Jack could escape out of the “Disabled Toilet” and try to get back on the Tube towards College. Hell, he had a tutorial with his best lecturer and needed to keep her sweet. What a nightmare of a morning, and it was only 10.30. He tried to calm down and breathe slowly and deeply, focussing on his breaths. The specialist had told him that this was a way to trick his colon into stopping its horrific spasms.

Now the brute was banging on the door, assuredly attracting the attention of those lacking an interest in life. Crouched down on the toilet seat he called out, “Please leave me alone. I’m not well and I can’t risk leaving. If I’m quiet for a bit longer my stomach should settle.” There was a moment’s silence and Jack began to hope, but in vain.

“I don’t believe you; you looked fine as I saws you nearly 20 minutes ago. Real people need this toilet. Get out while you can. I’m off for the Tube security guy and the key.”

Had it really been only 2o minutes. It felt like hours. He sank back on the uncomfortable raised toilet seat, grimaced as another spasm hit, and closed his eyes in despair. His mind went back a few months, when all alone he had waited in the crowded patients’ area for nearly three hours. He was 19, a first-year university student at King’s College, London. A man now, as his father constantly mentioned but he had felt like a scared little boy as he lay down on the examination couch and had looked in horror at the array of metal ‘things’ that he guessed were soon to be inserted into him.

“Well, it’s not internal haemorrhoids”, the consultant said sardonically, ridiculing by his tone of voice the referral signed by his local GP. You’ve got a bowel disease called Ulcerative Colitis. There is no cure. We will try to control the inflammation with steroids first, and then other medicine. As long as the flare ups aren’t too bad, the large amounts of blood you have been losing should disappear.” And so, it began, the life sentence, like a curse. On a good day he might need the loo only five or six times, but stress made things much worse; his record stood at 30. He’d looked at the reference books in the medical section. That just scared him shitless, as it were. The phrase “Too much information” certainly applied here. Diagrams of bowel resectioning, bags, percentage tables of cancer probabilities, etc. etc., kept him awake at night. He had opened a Pandora’s Box of horrors; would that Hope stuck around. He lied weekly to his parents insisting that the maintenance pills were doing their stuff, that he had gained weight, a lie, and that his friends were very supportive, another lie. He just felt utterly ashamed, embarrassed and useless. No-one in London knew what he was going through, although a few people had given him odd looks as he would career out of libraries, dining rooms, dashing for the nearest loo. Of course, he knew where every public toilet was between Chelsea and the Strand; he could write a guidebook and award stars, he thought ruefully. That could be his first, and probably last, publication.

But now he was in a real mess. Last night finishing his termly major paper in the Hall of Residence library a spasm had hit him out of the blue. He couldn’t believe that there was anything left in his colon. There was. Quite a lot of blood it turned out, as he was too late to make it to the nearby loo. And boy was he stressing out even more today. Only 25 minutes remained to get to the tutorial, and he was trapped in a loo in the King’s Road. He let out a silent scream and tried to focus.

Breathing more calmly now, he stood up, looked down to see if there was any more blood. Surprisingly no. Gingerly pulling up his underwear and jeans, he wiped the dried tears caused by a combination of pain and shame and washed his hands and face, trying not to look at the gaunt image in front of him. A deep breath, a grim smile painted on his face, he headed to the door and swung it open.

“There he is. That’s the little drug dealer or hooligan.”

He sighed. Only a few seconds more and he could have been back on the platform and heading off to King’s. It was not to be. The body behind the voice materialised accompanied not by one, but by two London Transport Policemen. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Now what? The two police officers looked huge as he almost subconsciously cowered. The toilet attendant seemed to grow with pride, “Gotcha, you little sod! Now you’re for it.”

From somewhere deep inside him, he began to find his voice. “Officers, this is all a huge misunderstanding. The cubicles in the Gents were all occupied, and I had an emergency and had to use the Disabled Toilet for once.” The attendant was having none of it. “He’s been in there nearly half an hour, and he doesn’t look disabled to me. He should have waited his turn.” He paused, looked at the student and continued, “and he’s been here before, I swear it. He’s up to no good."

For once, anger rather than shame grew within. He had had enough. Why did he always pretend he was okay when he wasn’t. He pulled out his wallet and gave them a piece of paper the size of a credit card. Standing upright he spoke with a stronger voice, “I have a medical condition, Ulcerative Colitis, and I’m having a bad flare up. This card was given to me to show in shops and other places to help me get access to toilets otherwise not available. I can’t believe that this attendant has been so aggressive, especially as if he cares to read over there", he pointed angrily at a noticeboard, "he could see information on diseases like Colitis and Crohn’s. I, and lots of others have the right to use this toilet. Just because I’m not in a wheelchair…” He stopped abruptly, unable to go on.

One of the officers just glared at the attendant and with his eyes indicated he should clear off. The other put a gentle hand on his arm. “Don’t worry about Ted. We’ll give him a clip around the ear later. But hey, aren’t you a King’s man? That’s their scarf you're wearing. What are you doing, a doctorate in Nuclear Physics?”

The boy summoned up a small smile. “Nothing so clever, I’m doing Medieval History and should be in a tutorial in a few minutes. I will be late but perhaps I should explain what really happened instead of lying like I usually do.”

“Son, you have nothing to be ashamed off. You have a physical illness which no one can see. You don’t have to face it on your own.”

With the officer’s words echoing in his ears he arrived, late of course, for his tutorial. His high-energy, intense tutor looked meaningfully at her watch. “I suppose you have just finished writing your masterpiece,” she said with an unusual dose of irony. "Well let’s look at it. It had better be more than excellent!”

He shivered and pushed himself back in his chair, his head hitting the concrete wall behind him. “Actually, first, I need to tell you something important that happened to me today.”

oO0