'I've lost my voice', I whispered hoarsely for the tenth time in the past hour. The coffee girl behind the counter laughed. A few hours ago, I would have laughed with her. However, pulling out my little notebook, I quickly jotted down my order and showed it to her. As I walked away, I had a distinct feeling that the whole thing was taking on the air of something quite unpleasant.
Earlier, at the pharmacy, a note about my condition made the pharmacist exclaim - 'There is NOTHING that can bring your voice back!' I'd given him a thumbs up and walked out.
I'm not usually very talkative. Unless I'm surrounded by people who are lower down on the talkative scale than I am, which leads me to talk 2-3 times more than I normally would to keep the silence and awkwardness at bay.
The flu seemed harmless at first. Modern, easily accessible medicine kept the symptoms under cover, and I functioned normally. Towards the end of the week, a tadpole in my throat was born, and quickly grew to take on its role as a full fledged working-frog. Alistair MacLean described this condition succinctly in one of his books, when the hero sounded like a toad or a frog with bronchitis.
Even though the prospect of taking flash cards to work on Monday seemed amusing at first, I don't think I can do it anymore.
What makes things less amusing? Fear. Fear of what? Death. What brings on fear? Old age.
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