“You’ve had an accident, Mr. Howard, and you are at Community Park hospital.” The nurse used a tone of voice more appropriate for talking to a two year old.

            Cobie was awake now, or at least semi-awake, and his first sensation was that he couldn’t move or even talk.

            “There’s nothing broken, Mr. Howard, but you have a concussion.  The EMTs strapped you to a backboard so you can’t move and the thing in your mouth is to keep your jaw in place.  It’ll have to stay there until after we’ve x-rayed you.  Just rest comfortably, Mr. Howard, and in a few minutes we’ll take you into x-ray and check you over, then we’ll probably keep you overnight.  All in all I’d say that you’re a lucky young man, Mr. Howard.”  She then left Cobie and went back to her station to get ready for the next Friday night fuck-up.

            It came back to Cobie slowly in bits and pieces, how he’d taken his GSXR out for an evening ride.  He’d been tucked down behind the windshield, wide open in forth gear, speedometer way past one ten, when he’d come over a rise and saw a semi crossing the road ahead of him.  He’d went down and he distinctly remembered the trailer brushing his shoulder as he slid under it, and then sliding across the grass of the median strip as the cycle rolled up into a ball and burst into flames against the guard rail.  He remembered standing up, and remembered being surprised that he didn’t seem to be injured, and then waking up again in an ambulance as the attendants cut away his leather riding suit.

            Cobie tried his best to relax but under the circumstances that seemed impossible.  Instead he passed the time assessing his situation.  He could see but he was plagued with occasional fits of double vision.   His head, which ached like a son-of-a-bitch, was tightly secured to the backboard but he could lower his eyes enough to see his toes and he was relieved to see that he could still wiggle them.  Whatever else happened he wouldn’t be paralyzed.  His wrists were taped to the backboard, and a IV bag hung from a nearby stand but he could still move his fingers, which he did, one at a time, both to count them and to assure that all still worked.   The red and white leather racing suit that he’d spent over a thousand dollars for had been an object of ridicule among his buddies, and they considered the elbow and knee protectors as well as the spine shield to be a waste of good money.  They hadn’t been aware that the suit also included a nut cup or they would have also ragged him about that as well.   Now Cobie was aware that his balls also hurt a little but that was to be expected and the pain was a comfort to him in that it let him know that they were still there and functional.  The bike was a write-off, obviously as well as the expensive suit.  He’d miss a couple of days work and his insurance bill would skyrocket, but at least he was alive and intact.

            He closed his eyes for a few minutes, wondering what was taking so damn long for them to take him to x-ray, and when he opened them again he saw a familiar face.

            “Well, Mr. Howard, long time no see.”  The face belonged to one of Cobie’s least favorite people:  State patrolman Brand.  Brand, better known as ‘Dickwad’, had stopped Cobie a month ago and had written him the year’s third citation for speeding, but the officer had entered the wrong date on the form and Cobie had taken it to court and had gotten it dismissed.   The fucking Nazi pig looked just like the cop in The Village People except that he was much shorter.   He had high boots, a tight fitting uniform that accentuated his macho build, and a holstered 9mm pistol that gave him more respect than he deserved.  Fucking pig.  “I knew you’d be here sooner or later,” the cop said, writing in his ticket book.  I’m going to cite you for Speeding, Failure to Yield, Reckless Driving, and depending on what the blood test shows, probably DWI as well.  The nurse says you’re probably okay but I wouldn’t count on going to work Monday.  I’ve made you a reservation at the Gray Bar Motel and my guess is that you’ll be their guest for at least sixty days this time.”

            Cobie listened to the prick rave.  He’d like to get the little runt out by himself somewhere quiet and teach him a few manners.

            “Take my advice kid,” the cop said as he placed the completed citations in the mesh bag that also contained Cobie’s wallet, keys, and broken wristwatch. “Get yourself a new hobby.  You haven’t got enough brains to ride a motorcycle.”

            That statement pissed Cobie off royally.  He could ride circles around Officer Dickwad and his slug Harley any day, but what really ticked him off was that the cop had called him a kid.  Kid hell!   He was eighteen and had more sack than the dumb-ass flatfoot ever would have.  He just wished like hell that he could talk so he could tell the pig to kiss his ass, but instead he settled for moving his hand as hard as he could to get the cop’s attention.  Then Cobie did the only thing he could:  He flipped him the bird.

            The change that came over Officer Brand was almost comic, like that of Yosemite Sam or Elmer Fudd when foiled by Bugs Bunny.  His face grew red and Cobie could almost see the steam come out of his ears.  Cobie was sure that the cop would lose it and pop him one, and that was fine by him.  He already hurt like hell and a chipped tooth or broken nose wouldn’t matter much, and he knew that if the cop laid so much as a finger on him the citations would surely be dismissed.  Cobie watched as the cop looked around for witnesses and clenched his fist.  He closed his eyes against the blow to his face, but suddenly felt cool air as his blanket was lifted, and he opened his eyes just in time to see Officer Dickwad deliver a rabbit punch into his naked balls.

            Cobie almost passed out as the sudden pain swept through his guts.  He’d been popped in the balls before, of course, but always before he’d been able to curl up and at least partially ease the pain.  Now the only thing he could do was close his eyes and grit his teeth while he waited for the pain to dissipate.  When he was finally able to open his eyes again he saw that his nemesis, Dickwad, was calmly sitting at a bench filling out more paperwork, this time in an aluminum binder instead of his familiar ticket book.  He finally finished writing, rose, and slid the binder into a slot at the foot of Cobie’s gurney.  “Have a good day, sir,” he said politely as he left.  “I’m sure you’ll feel a lot better tomorrow.”

            Cobie closed his eyes again, wondering what was taking them so damned long to take him to x-ray.

            “Good evening.  What seems to be the problem?”  The accent was clipped and difficult to understand, and Cobie opened his eyes to see that some guy in a white coat had extracted the binder and was paging through it.  His looked like a fucking raghead from Pakistan or something, and his nametag proclaimed him to be Dr. Patel.  Great.  A fucking Hindu doctor that no one could understand would be the one x-raying him.

            The doctor seemed to be muttering under his breath and Cobie couldn’t really hear what he was saying, but one word sounded sort of like ‘carcinoma’, which Cobie had heard before but didn’t know what was, something about ‘bilateral orchiectomy’, which was also unfamiliar to him.  The doctor them pulled on a rubber glove, lifted Cobie’s blanket, and grabbed Cobie’s balls, rolling each around in his long delicate fingers like a teasing lover might.

            “Ah yes, a definite problem,” the doctor said as Cobie involuntarily flinched.  His balls had hurt a little after the accident, but Dickwad’s pop had caused an immediate swelling and the organs were now tender as hell.  “Okay, we’ll get it taken care of and you’ll feel a lot better tomorrow.”  The shift at the hospital had just changed, and it took him a minute to summon a nurse, who promptly emptied a syringe of something or other into IV tubing connected to Cobie’s arm. 

            Cobie had been a little woozy before and whatever the nurse had gave him just about knocked him out, but he was still relieved to find out they were finally going to get their asses in gear and get him to x-rayed and then into a decent bed.  An orderly pushed his gurney along several corridors and after a ride up an elevator they finally arrived in the x-ray room, where several nurses helped the orderly shift him onto a large table.  This kind of puzzled Cobie; he’d had x-rays before, but this room looked different somehow, and the nurses were all wearing surgical masks, which the other x-ray technicians had never bothered with.

            “What’s his procedure?”  The nurse, Cobie couldn’t help but noticing, had a hell of a nice rack.

            “A Bilateral,” the other nurse answered.  “ So young, too.”

            They finally finished strapping Cobie to the table and the nurse with the big boobs had placed a basin of water between his legs and was washing his crotch.  Cobie had never been hospitalized but he knew they did things like that and he really wasn’t too concerned until he saw her shoot some shaving cream on his crotch and pick up a safety razor.  The other nurse finally removed the plastic guard from his mouth and Cobie started to ask what the hell was going on when the third nurse clamped a mask over his face.  “Just breath normally now,” the nurse told him.  “I know it hurts but you’ll be asleep in just a few seconds and when you wake up you’ll feel a lot better.”