‘The Drug Line’ is a short story about a group of people forced to share their time together in a hospital queue. The bare hospital walls provide the setting for a display of some of the complex facets of love. Read Chapter 2 here.
Mel and Grant assume their usual position, exchanging bites of their favorite conversations. Mel gossips about her friends, and Grant cross-examines cases at the law firm. They play verbal tennis, both paying little attention to the other, just waiting for their turn to hit the shot.
They’re only a few minutes into their game when the hatch rolls up and their match referee calls them to a halt by shouting, “Next!”. Being further back in the queue Mel and Grant continue the game while Sister Mary deals with Matt. All the usual spectators know that Grant has the upper hand as Mel is distracted from the game by the sight of Matt. He always makes her look twice. But today her weakness is accentuated, as her concern about the heavy burden he’s so obviously carrying starts to hinder herself. Grant notices the weakness and pounces, pouring forth the latest case. It’s the equivalent of rushing to the net and volleying, with the opponent stuck on the other side of the court. But the point doesn’t matter because Mel is completely off balance. Her glazed eyes and frozen expression causes Grant to finally assess the point of her distraction and he too sees the weight crippling Matt’s young shoulders.
As Matt shuffles off, Mel can’t even bring herself to say goodbye. Grant notices a small tear. Like a traffic cop stepping out behind the bush so do the tears pull Grant over, and he remains silent, unsure what to say.
Eventually he does the only thing he knows; he asks for a new ball and serves again, changing the topic. Mel is relieved; at least she gets to turn her attention away from Matt. Her concern for him has moved from a simple crush to the area of deep sympathy, and her desire to save him is no longer driven by a desire to validate her own worth, but a deeper drive to heal the hurt that she now shares with him.
Mel realises she gets this from her mom, a loving and caring woman who always taught her to think of others before herself. It was her mom who prompted her to stand in the drug line for the elderly in the first place. While she does feel like her outreach to the elderly matters in some way, she can’t help wondering whether she should be feeling the same amount of concern for those individuals as she now does for Matt. Is that even possible, she wonders?
“Is what possible?”, Grants asks. It’s then that Mel realizes that she was thinking out loud, and deciding against letting the ball go past the racket, she replies, “Is it possible for me to care as much about all the old people on this list as I do for one person?”. “You mean Matt?”, he replies. Mel sighs, knowing there is no hiding from an experienced lawyer and just nods. “It may not be possible to feel the same amount for each individual, but it’s the same driving force in both cases. It’s not like you’re diminishing the effect just because the attention is divided, you know what I mean?”, he answers. “No Grant, I’m still in school, I have no idea what you mean”.
“It’s like this”, he says. “You feel like you have love to give to the world, and maybe it’s like having a tank with say 100 litres in it. If you give that to 10 people, they only get 10 litres right? And if you give 50 litres to Matt, then that only leaves 50 litres for the people on your list, and if there’s 10, then they now only get 5 litres each. Is that what you’re worried about?”
“Kinda”, she says, still doing a little maths in her head. “Well, maybe it’s not like a tank with water in, that runs out as you give it away, but more like a hydraulic system.” Mel rolls her eyes. Science is not her forte. “It’s simple”, he says. “Let’s say you connect two different tanks together, one much bigger than the other, with a small pipe. Let’s say the tanks have a roof that floats on the surface of the liquid, and you can stand on it to force it down”. “Like two bicycle pumps connected together?”, she asks nervously. “Exactly! Now if you push down just a little on the smaller tank, let’s say you stand on it with all your 50kg, it will result in the roof of the other tank lifting, and as it turns out, you could probably lift an elephant”.
‘OK’, she says, still confused, “but what does that have to do with Matt and the old people on my drug list?”.
“Well you have a capacity of love to give, and you can exert it on your little piston, and it can raise a whole community. It can also raise a young man with a heavy burden on his back. Either way, your love is not depleted, just like the liquid never leaves the tanks. In both cases you’re lifting people up. It’s just a small force with a powerful influence, and you shouldn’t worry as much about what it’s lifting as about keeping the pressure on’.
The players retire for drinks, tired by the heavy, but sincere, exchange. They both move away pretty satisfied, content and closer to each other. It’s amazing what conversation can do, even if it’s sometimes just two players smacking a ball around to pass the time.
“Next!”, Mel waves goodbye to Harry and approaches the hatch. In his old age, he’s become a little forgetful, leaving one of his containers behind on the counter. Mel grabs it to give to Harry, and can’t help noticing the ‘Chronic’ label on the outside. She runs after Harry and gingerly offers the container to him, pretending not to have realised that his life rests solely on that little container…