The Emergency Room for Magical Mishaps

               Sara didn’t want to wait in the waiting room. She hated waiting. It was the most boring thing ever. But she wasn’t allowed in the doctor’s office, being a non-magical person and all. So after checking her brother into the Emergency Room for Magical Mishaps, she had to take a seat in the waiting room and wait. She hated waiting. No, she detested waiting, especially when her brother had done something stupid and broken his arm and now she had to wait for him.

               But Mom was helping with the baby and Dad was at work, and now that Sara was old enough to drive, Mom insisted she help the family by running errands and using the car whenever Mom needed her to. That almost made up for waiting, but not quite.

               At first, Sara sulked in her seat by the window, ignoring everyone else in the room. But she looked up when she heard a harsh squeaking on the tile floors, as if someone wore wet rubber shoes on a gymnasium floor and was spinning on their toes. She almost screeched when she saw a giant yellow slug wearing a construction vest and hard hat slither into the waiting room. It wasn’t very long before a custodian came to try to clean up the slime trail left by the giant slug. Sara overheard the custodian comment that there wasn’t a lot of slime, and the slug replied that was why he was here; moving around caused a lot of pain.

               Sara then started to look around and watch what was going on. She noticed one little boy sitting on the other side of the waiting room. His face was gigantic and purple, as if he had eaten a Gushers and reacted like the advertisements. He hung his head and swung his legs from the chair.

               She watched as the sliding ER doors opened again and in walked a duck wearing a tie, followed by a concerned teenage girl and an unconcerned mother. Sara was close enough to hear as the mother explained that her daughter had a transmogrification accident and turned her husband into a duck. The girl looked about ready to burst into tears, while the mother kept stifling a laugh. The duck, meanwhile, just looked irritated, as if he would rather stay a duck than deal with the ER.

               A man in a custodial uniform entered the waiting room from a side door and loudly asked who had been waiting for a bucket of water. A man raised his hand, and the custodian carried the sloshing bucket over and set it beside the man.

               “What do you need a bucket for?” the custodian asked.

               “It’s actually for my sister,” the man replied, as he took a pouch out of his pocket and started to pour a powder into the bucket. “When she gets dehydrated, we need the doctor to help rehydrate and reshape her back to normal. Getting the water now will just help speed up the process. Thank you.”

               Sara stopped paying attention as the custodian and the man made arrangements to return the bucket, but she kept her eye on the water in the bucket, which had started to change color and consistency. In only a few minutes, she could see a woman’s face on the surface, looking around at the waiting room.

               A few minutes later, five men bounced in, each with large springs where their shins should have been. They were wearing sports uniforms and looked muddy from a rough game. One looked furious, three looked amused, and one looked ashamed as they started to check themselves in at the desk.

               Not far behind the athletes, a dog walked in, helping guide a man with dark glasses over his eyes. The dog walked the man to the front desk, then proceeded to tell the nurse that its master was here to check-in for his doctor’s appointment. The nurse responded to the talking dog as if it were completely normal to have an animal check-in its owner. Sara gathered that the man was both deaf and blind, but that the dog could communicate with the man with its nose and tail wagging. After checking in, the dog led its master to a couple chairs. The man sat in one and the dog sat in the other.

               As the man and his dog were getting settled, a mother came out of the doctor’s office with two children in tow. The little boy had tentacles for arms, while the little girl had antennae coming out of her forehead and a stinger protruding from the small of her back. Sara watched as the mother had a few final words with the doctor, her back to her children. The boy started to touch his sister’s face, trying to leave suction marks with his tentacles, and the sister turned and vindictively stung him in reply. Both were tense when their mother turned back and then quickly pretended nothing had happened, although the boy did limp his way out of the sliding main door.

               As they went out, a man came in. He was walking on his hands like an alien from Star Wars. He had to take his shoes and socks off to sign some paperwork with his toes while keeping impressive balance on his hands. Sara didn’t know whether to be impressed, curious, or grossed out.

               Sara sat for a few minutes as everyone in the room seemed to be waiting. Nothing was happening. Then she noticed that a lot of people were starting to look up and watch something through the window behind her. She turned around and almost laughed out loud.

               She saw several nurses being chased by a large, green ogre. The ogre had his hands raised above his head and was roaring at them as he ran. Sara could see the needle in his arm attached to an IV tree that he was pulling behind him. Then suddenly the IV tree hit a curb and fell over, causing the needle to pop out of the ogre’s arm. The ogre immediately deflated and changed color, turning into an unthreatening little blue imp. When the nurses saw the change, they started chasing the imp, who ran away. The nurses worked together to shepherd the imp towards one of the hospital doors. But shortly before they arrived, the imp tripped and scraped his knee. Sara couldn’t hear the wail of pain, but she could imagine it. As the imp acknowledged the pain, it started to enlarge and change color, turning back into the green ogre. He looked angrily at the nurses, who had almost reached him, and started to chase them again. The nurses all screamed and ran the other direction.

               One of the nurses from the ER waiting room ran out with a sucker and held it out to the rampaging ogre. He stopped, glanced at the proffered goodie, then slowly turned back into the imp as he walked up and stuck the sucker, wrapper and all, in his mouth. The other nurses came and were able to escort the imp back inside as he contentedly sucked on the candy.

               Sara turned around and sat in her chair for a few more minutes. Then she saw her brother coming out of the doctor’s office. He smiled at her, triumphantly held up his arm, which was now in a cast, and they walked out of the waiting room together. Sara knew she had some stories to tell her friends because of the waiting room. Maybe waiting wasn’t as bad as Sara expected it to be, after all.