Читать книгу The Three of U.S.: A New Life in New York - Peter Godwin - Страница 21

My results are finally in. My time, it appears, is not up after all. There is nothing wrong with me. Nothing to explain the lump on my elbow. Dr Epstein sits across the desk flipping through the charts. He is bewildered.

‘How’s the writing going?’ he asks, knowing that I am a writer.

I feel this is no time for small talk.

‘Fine,’ I reply, wanting to get back to my polyp.

‘Still blocked?’ he asks.

What is he, my agent?

‘Well I had a bit of spurt a couple of weeks ago,’ I admit, ‘but it wasn’t very good stuff.’

He asks to feel my polyp again and then his face lights up.

‘I think you may have Carpal Tunnel Syndrome,’ he says.

‘What’s that?’ I ask fearfully.

‘I think you guys call it Repetitive Stress Injury. It’s caused by too much typing.’

I return to the apartment to break the news to Joanna.

‘Turns out I’m fine,’ I tell her. ‘I’m not going to die after all. My test results are all negative. He thinks it’s RSI. I must be the only blocked writer who has managed to contract RSI.’

Joanna doesn’t seem particularly engaged by my relieved chatter.

‘I got my test results too,’ she says and hands me a package.

I unwrap it to find that it is a book entitled The Expectant Father.