Stingers Cocked and Ready

When the Docta was nine years old he watched a National Geographic episode about Killer Bees that had him shaking in his sheets all night long. Go ahead have a good giggle at the sight of this boy of a boy, with scraped up knees and wild, river hair, sweating in his bed convinced that a band of bees from Africa had already GPS'ed his ass and were on their way, stingers cocked and ready.

Nightmares do come true my friends.

Last night on his bike ride home, the Docta caught a big fat one in his mouth and the merciless SOB stung him hard.

I found him at home, frantic, pointing to his tongue that was blowing up like a balloon with every beating second.

"I got thtung. Call the nursth," he garbled as though he were sucking on a Kielbasa.

Who do I call? shit shit. I scanned the fridge for a clue and then suddenly realized that we are all dialed up for any child emergency, a plethora of CPR diagrams and phone numbers for every pediatric care giver in Seattle are plastered everywhere but clearly the Docta and I must think we are invincible. We DO NOT HAVE a regular doctor. The only doctor we could have called at this hour was my OBGYN and I'm sure she is not particularly well versed on adult bee stings.

So we had to Google the closest hospital.

I handed the Docta some ice-cubes while I began talking to the nurse. I'm thinking she's going to tell me it's no big deal and just wait for the swelling to go down. But what is it with these nurse lines? It's like all of sudden she starts amping me up on adrenaline with questions and commands like,

"Go now to the ER. I will call ahead for you. You have to go now. No you can't go to the Children's Hospital. How many miles away are you? Do you have oral Benadryl? YOU DON'T? His throat could close and he could stop breathing. Get in the car."

Thanks, thanks for the calm voice of reason to soothe my fears 'cause now I'm gonna drive like a crazy crack addict to the nearest ER, running lights and hopping over curbs and I'm gonna be looking at the Docta at every stop light wondering if the next time he coughs he'll start grabbing for his throat and turn blue.

"Are you o.k.? Are you o.k.?"

"yesthh would you thstop asthking me that?"

The funny thing is that after all that panic and NASCAR driving, I ended up just leaving him at the ER. The Docta convinced me, that since it was the one night my parents had agreed to watch the G man so we could go to my friend's birthday bash, I should not miss out on some good German beer and home-made grub.

"Are you sure?"

"Yesthhh. I'm fine."

After a couple of hours of ER excitement, a shot of steroids and some antihistamines, the Docta arrived to the party just in time to raise his glass in a toast to the birthday girl.

It took 'em 25 years but those damn Bees finally found him!

The Docta's tongue on 'roids