Hear No Evil - Tuesday

‘What are you doing in the bathroom?’ Queries my wife, voice heavy with exasperation, if a little muffled.
It’s the sort of question you can do without at the best of times, but now I’m about to be caught out, mid-fiddle.
‘You’ve got one of those cotton buds in again, haven’t you.’ She states, rather than questions.

And despite the fact I know I shouldn’t, I give the mini-dumbbell a further, almost orgasmic twist and receive a sharp stabbing pain for my troubles. And the throbbing returns, re-doubled. The container carries all sorts of dire warning about not inserting the sticks into your inner ear canal, but why else have them? Anyway, they must know there’s a certain transient satisfaction in excavating a clinging clot of earwax, at least until you smell it.

Exiting the bathroom with a feeling of guilt and a disapproving look, I find the relief is indeed temporary, as now I really can’t hear out of my left ear, and it still feels as if I’ve been swimming and have some brackish, piss-flecked pool water, lodged inside the drum. Then my wife issues the sort of command I dread, announcing.
‘You’ll have to go and see the doctor.’

‘I’m sorry you feel that way.’ I apologise to an irate vendor later, who blames the economic meltdown on me personally as his overpriced home isn’t even attracting viewers, let alone offers he would consider derisory – but might welcome with open arms in six months time. Only he’ll have swapped agents by then, of course.
‘We could try trimming the price a little,’ I venture cautiously. ‘Re-advertise and try and stimulate fresh interest.

I know this suggestion will be falling on ears deafer than mine, as the parsimonious prig even argued over whether we should have a £995 ending to his price, rather than a £950 when I listed it. True to form, he confirms my thoughts by launching a rant about not wanting to give his house away, and how wretched agents pushed all the prices up and are forcing them down again. And now my diminished hearing comes in handy, as I swap the phone handset across to the impaired side while he blows himself out.

‘Just wait over there.’ Instructs the receptionist with a stifled yawn. ‘And the doctor will call you through when they’re ready.’
Gloomily, I shuffle to join a disparate band of grey haired, wan faced coughing and spluttering pensioners, a smattering of heavily pregnant mother’s-to-be and one nervous looking schoolgirl, still in her uniform. Soon to be pregnant as well, I think uncharitably, or here for a morning after pill.

‘Hello sir.’ Announces an elderly well-dressed man wearing a deerstalker-style hat. I don’t recognise him and anyway the greeting is far too courteous to come from a property-based contact. A fact confirmed, when he starts ranting about his missing wife and the fact that they’ve all killed themselves - every last one.

‘Calm down Mr Simmonds,’ Calls the receptionist disinterestedly. ‘Just wait for the doctor to call you.’

Moving seats and getting a disapproving look from the promiscuous schoolgirl as I shift towards her, I grab a dog-eared local magazine and choke back a laugh. There, two years out of date is a page display of one of our property adverts. I recognise every home and at least one of assistant manger T’s mis-framed shots. But it’s the prices that have me shaking my head, until the fluid shifts uncomfortably. And then a distant fuzzy voice calls me to room two.

As I rise uncertainly, another man, short and elderly, gazumps me and shuffles along the corridor. I follow the ancient mariner, still marvelling at the absurdly optimistic prices in the advert I was reading and the knowledge, unspoken then, but validated now, that the price increases were unsustainable.

‘Excuse me.’ I call, as the old fool in front attempts to pinch my appointment. And I explain, confidence evaporating, that it was my name called. He gives me the sort of disappointed look I see a lot nowadays, as does the youthful doctor when I tell him my profession.

I have a feeling the pain is going to last a little longer.