February 24th, 2006, started out rather like usual for me, but quickly descended into something that, as you’ll see, caused a bit of worrying. The Friday before my birthday had me sitting, along with twenty other students, in the nurse’s office, waiting for drug testing. That’s right. Two days before my birthday, and I had to pee in a cup.
All I could think about while spending an hour and twelve, of course I counted them, minutes sitting on that antiquated brown leather chaise- yes, I believe chaise would be the appropriate word- was what if some how I’d come in contact with drugs and they showed up?
Now, obviously some of you are going to, at this point, think of me as a goody-two-shoe or something equally lame. Yes, I know, you’re all laughing at me. But the only things that I could think of were possible scenarios. Perhaps my parents were really smoking pot instead of regular cigarettes. I could have inhaled something while hugging my older brother, who is, in fact, not a goody-two-shoe. Did someone slip something into my orange juice? Or maybe, just maybe, that prank from Homewrecker where Ryan Dunn filled the vents of a car with little pieces of paper, had been adapted to some how put drugs into my system and ruin my chances of ever…
Well, actually, at that point I didn’t have any goals, but testing positive on a drug test would have most surely ruined my chance at having goals. At least, that’s what the commercials say. But, don’t believe everything you hear.
The seconds ticked by so slow it seemed they were almost going backwards. The girl sitting next to me- crammed, really- got up and peed in her cup and after the little strip said she was clean, she skipped right out.
Lucky me, I had to wait about forty-five minutes longer. The students filtered out slowly. One was taken out by the vice-principal for trying to suggest doing the testing later in the day. After all, doesn’t everyone use the bathroom when they get up? Morning testing is slow and tedious. And when you’re more awake, you have better aim.
I was on my second little paper cone of water when they had me try the second time. I felt like I was on death row, walking to the bathroom to try again with that plastic see through cup in my hand. Clop, clop, clop, clop. The female tester’s shoes followed me down the hall. She was of course, filling them and they weren’t just moving of their own accord. I have to verify, because there are some of you readers that will try to make a joke. You know who you are. My shoes were more of a shuffling sound, being flip-flops and all, but that’s not important. Why would it be? This is a story about peeing in a cup.
I shut the door behind me and got ready. “What if it doesn’t happen?” I asked myself, silently, of course. I didn’t want the lady to think I was talking to my pee. I waited for a moment. Two moments, actually.
Then, it happened. And I know that everyone is hanging on their seats to read about me going number one into a cup. I did my business, and what business it was. I fixed myself up and opened the door, proudly handing the half full cup to her and accidentally sloshing a bit. It was okay, she had gloves on. I imagined she got spilled on quite a bit.
The worry instantly returned to my forethought as we walked back into the nurse’s office to test the contents of the cup. What if the school had a conspiracy and put drugs into the cups or the tests always showed up positive? I had walked right into their trap.
Of course, I tested clean. All that worry for nothing, right? The day went on; I went to my classes, accidentally licked oil pastels from my fingers in my art class, the usual stuff. The day was decidedly more boring after my adventure in drug-testing land. That is, until my friends and I were nearly thrown out of Shogun’s for being a disturbance because of a fortune cookie, the tradition of adding ‘in bed’ to the end of it, and getting confused over drapery, but that’s another story.
