Powell Home: A Short Story

When Jeanne Powell woke up in her freshman dorm room with a stuffy nose, but without someone to call in sick for her; with a surplus of mucous and phlegm, and a serious shortage of chicken soup on her bedside table, she may not have realized it at that moment, but growing up had become an inevitability. A terrifying chest cold plagued her sinuses and throat. Leaving her heaving and gasping for air like a fish on dry land. College is supposed to be a place for trying new things, and this was no different. Although her first time being sick without someone to care for her wasn’t on Jeanne’s list of college firsts to look forward to. It was undoubtedly a crucial one.
Sniffles and sneezes had been taken quite seriously back at the Powell home, on account of Jeanne’s asthma. Which, although not crippling, had become an ever present blip on her radar for trouble, after it had landed her in the hospital, twice. Nearly ending her high school career, and dashing her hopes of being an engineer. Her mother, already a protective personality, responded in full force. Since then, nothing but the whole nine yards of treatment for anything worse than a sniffle would be expected from their family doctor. This was to ensure that Jeanne, a then nothing but A’s student, wouldn’t miss any school she didn’t have to.

Calling the doctor’s office had been hard enough, an awkward mix of “who?”, “what?” and “where?”.

It was with an afterthought that Jeanne realized she would have to walk to the doctor’s office on her own, not easy to do for an asthmatic on the expansive Ohio State campus. The frigid November air provided another unexpected hurdle, forcing her to retreat back to her dorm momentarily, in search of a scarf to protect her sensitive throat and nose. Checking into the hospital could be added to the list of trials on Jeanne Ogden’s noble quest for diagnosis and treatment. Which was proving to become more tedious every

moment.
Instead of the whole nine yards, the doctor barely gave an inch. A quick once over and her terrifying chest cold was diagnosed into a much milder form of the common cold. Requiring barely more than the basic over the counter medications, available at the nearest drug store. Anything else would be unnecessary, a useless attempt to comfort a scared college student. The exact opposite opinion of Jeanne Ogden, who had never once been given less than prescription medication to treat her potent respiratory ailments.
Stalking the aisles of Walgreen’s, Jeanne was forced to acknowledge defeat, and carried a bottle of cough syrup to the checkout area with disdain. After a brief bus trip, four flights of stairs, each taller and steeper than the one before, she was back home. The vial of viscous fluid laughed at her as she struggled with the childproof lid. Taking care to hold her nose and jam the spoon as far back into her mouth as it could go without gagging her with its petrifying aroma, before swallowing. Her quest complete, diagnosis attained, and energy exhausted, she fell asleep with no trouble at all. Astonishingly, to Jeanne at least, she awoke the next day feeling significantly better. It seemed this time, like many others, the experts really new what they were talking about.