Mister Mister

I am crossing between lines of stalled buses and cars on Dame Street when I hear someone shout "Mister, Mister."
I wonder who the Mister is and why he is being called.

The student on the bike with no working brakes comes down the hill between the buses and catches me on the side and over I go in a short sleeved shirt.

The rider comes over the handlebars on top of me and slams my bare arm into the tarmac once more breaking a bone that is attached to other bones and disrupting the lines of communication to my hand as it snaps.
Nonetheless, I pick him and his bike up off the Dublin street and carry the bike with my working hand to place it beneath the Olympia Theatre canopy. I ask if he is alright and he says he shouted Mister to warn me. It seems he thinks it's my fault he ran into me.

I make my way to a busy city post office public phone.
I ring emergency to find where the nearest hospital is and he says he'll send an ambulance.

I say I only want directions. I'll walk, it's my arm that hurts like hell. My feet are working still.

But he insists and I am to wait.
There is nobody with me, I tell him when he asks.

While I wait for the unwanted ambulance I am dizzy and I prop myself against a wall in case I lose consciousness. That way they'll be able to see me, unconscious but upright, when they rush in.

The perplexed paramedic asks me where my bike is? I say a bike hit me, not me it.
He says I look alright and he can't take me in the ambulance for that.

I say I only wanted directions and to take it up with his dispatcher. I have been waiting too long for them and am now somewhat testy.

He says you better get in the ambulance then. I try to get in beside the driver but they insist I get in the back and be strapped into a stretcher.

The siren clears the streets of people.
I try to apologise to the people for the fuss; but they can't hear me inside the ambulance.

In the hospital, a nurse takes my jacket and tells me I am bleeding profusely and there is dried blood on the inside of my jacket.

I say it is a floral motif that is faded and she agrees and we wonder what the flowers were before they faded.

A doctor comes in and says I have a bad sprain to my elbow and to go home and take a warm bath.

I ask if I should stand on my head in the bath since it is my elbow that is hurting even more now and the bath water won't come up that high, unless I submerge and swim for it.
He pretends not to understand English and goes off looking for more polite excitement.

I leave without the promised aspirin for the headache.

I walk back down the street, against the wall, for the ambulance is gone for there is nothing wrong with me, according to medically qualified observers.

I take a bus to my home in suburbia. It is full with commuters.

I have to stand and hold on to the overhead bar with my good hand.

The other arm swings loosely on every corner like a demented scarecrow in a storm.

The next day I go to a different hospital and say I was knocked down and have a sore arm.

They say it's not sore, it's broken.

I knew that already.

Mister.

storytelling here