The Black Sock

Drake folded his arms again. In fairness to the hospital, this is the first time he’s been kept waiting, the treatment is always short so appointments usually run on time. But today is clearly different. Now a uniform comes over “We’re running behind today, we have a new machine installed so we are taking some extra time with each patient. It might help if I go over the instructions with you now. This machine is more powerful than the one that you are used to so you need to be prepared if it gets a bit warm. To be on the safe side, for this first time we will go right back to the beginning and only give you 20 seconds of treatment. Then we’ll increase the time up again, at each of your future sessions, just like we did with the old machine. If you find the light is getting too warm there is an alarm chord inside. Just pull it if you feel at all uncomfortable. Otherwise everything happens in the same way.”

The free health service was one of the things that Drake had really liked when he first came over from the States. He used to joke that it made up for the weather. These days he hardly ever thought about either. It’s been a long time and you get settled into your environment. Not so long ago he would have used this waiting time to plot out a sketch in his head. There’s always going to be comedy potential in a waiting room and it wouldn’t be the first time that he had used real life. It’s strange how sketches took over. Back home he was really only known for Song writing but then, over here, he discovered Pantomime. Falling into English comedy language came easy so, from then on, comedy songs and sketches became the bread and butter. In turn that led to TV sketches and has provided a good lifestyle. A marriage, two houses and endless cars later, life is comfortable. These days he’s more or less retired, in fact the last songs he worked on were for Schools during Covid. ‘If You’re Happy and you know it, wash your hands’ was an easy one, and it was always obvious that ‘Don’t pick your nose, it’s dangerous’ would be an instant winner with the kids. It’s often true that the best ideas are the simple ones that come quickly and easily.

‘How much longer..? Ok stay cool’. The skin irritation was always worse when he got hot. 'Ah! Someone is just coming out. Looks like they’re finished.’ “Ok Drake, in you go. Bang on the door as usual when you’re ready.”

The new machine was big and shiny. Larger than the shower cubicle sized previous one so now it filled the whole corner of the treatment room. The only obvious design difference was the handle. The previous machine had a long vertical handle running from top to bottom, but this has a horizontal bar across the middle. Now the boring bit, the preparation. First take everything off, then cover up all the sensitive areas of skin that might be at risk of getting damaged by the light or heat. The supplied hard hat for his head and thick dark goggles for the eyes. Then the final bit of protection, his own black sock, which he had to bring each time and fit on his undercarriage, to keep his tackle from being burnt. For some reason there was now also a long mirror on the wall which you couldn’t avoid. "As if I don’t feel weird enough already. (he muttered) Someone must have a really strange sense of humour." Now comes the race. Bang on the outer door to let them know that you are ready and then make sure you are inside the machine with the door closed before anyone comes in to the room.

At this late moment Drake realised that there was another difference with the new machine. The step up into it was much higher. He could barely see through the goggles so had to feel for the horizontal handle and then almost tripped as he stepped up to get inside. But it was OK, there were still time to spare before he heard the outer door open. Then the familiar conversation through the closed machine door. “OK Drake. Can you confirm your date of birth please? Thank you. So, just to repeat, I know that we’ve been increasing the treatment time with each session over the last month. But today we are going right back to twenty seconds just so we are sure that you’re body is comfortable with the extra power. Remember there is a pull cord beside you if there are any problems.”

Now Drake waited. He knew that they would press the start button before leaving the room. He heard the outer door slam shut but then nothing happened. For several seconds there was just silence. Then, suddenly, a woman's voice spoke right in his ear “Your treatment is about to start.” This surprise voice was startling to say the least. Now it began, as usual the light was bright. Even with his eyes closed behind the dark goggles, it was strong. This was definitely warmer than the previous sessions but didn’t actually feel like it was burning and the twenty seconds was soon over. Now the same voice was in his ear again. “Your treatment is complete. Please leave the cubicle.”

For a moment Drake just stood still. Leaving the cubicle was easier said than done because (to be truthful) the women's voice had been so startling it had actually given Drake a bit of…shrinkage. The result was that he had lost his sock!

You can ask anyone and they will all tell you the same. Drake never gets flustered. There have been many occasions when, while standing in the wings, he has watched something going horribly wrong on stage which he had not seen coming. TV was easier because it was nearly always recorded so you can redo things. But you don’t have that luxury on stage. Even so, Drake always remained cool no matter what. So the next few moments were not what he would call his finest hour. Looking back he should have known that there was no urgency, he was on his own and could do things at his own pace. But at the time his one thought was to recover the sock as quickly as possible. And looking back, it would have been much better if he had simply removed the goggles so he could see what he was doing, but he just didn’t think of that. As he leant forward, to feel round his feet for the sock, his hard hat hit the horizontal door bar which made the door swing open. This, in turn, made him lose balance and fall forward out of the machine into a heap on the floor below. The impact of falling meant that his hard hat now fell off his head and was rolling noisily round the tiled floor. Panic took over as he felt his temperature rising. ‘They must be able to hear all this outside, at any moment there’s going to be a stream of uniforms come running in to find out what’s wrong. This isn’t a sketch it’s real. This sort of thing doesn’t happen to me, it’s like one of those stupid things you get on Utube or Social Media? Social Media! God .. Where IS that bloody sock?’