I still Covid Test do you?

[Ben Jackson]

The Test

A narrow white room, bathed in fluorescent light. The walls are too smooth, almost like skin stretched tight over bone. The kind of white that burns your eyes if you stare too long, so you focus on the floor—linoleum, scuffed with the black marks of rubber soles passing over it endlessly. In the corner, an old clock ticks, louder than it should.

You sit on a plastic chair, its edges cold and hard, almost like punishment. You’re waiting, but time feels different here. It stretches and bends like you’ve been sitting for hours, or maybe only minutes. The clock ticks, slower now.

A figure in a white coat approaches, face obscured behind a mask. Only the eyes show—a dull, clinical gaze, detached. They carry a long, slender swab, not quite an object, not quite a tool, more like a probe designed to reach some part of you that shouldn’t be reached. They tell you to tilt your head back. The swab hovers for a moment, then plunges into your nostril, far deeper than you expect. It touches a place you didn’t know existed, a hidden corridor inside your head, and for a moment you wonder if it’s more than just a test—if this probe is digging into something else entirely. Your mind? Your soul?

The figure pulls the swab out, and you feel a strange emptiness where the swab had been, like they took something with them. You want to ask, but the figure is already turning, moving down the hall, into the next white room.

You’re told to wait again.

Minutes pass—or are they hours? The fluorescent lights flicker, casting shadows that dance across the sterile walls. The air feels thick with something unspoken, something hidden in the white. You can hear a faint hum—maybe it’s the air conditioning, or maybe it’s something else. Something deeper. You can’t be sure anymore.

Finally, another figure comes in, but they don’t say anything. They just hand you a piece of paper with a single word on it: Negative. You look up, but the figure is gone, the door clicking shut behind them.

You step outside into a world that doesn’t quite feel the same. It’s still your street, still your neighborhood, but the sky has a strange tint to it now, a shade you’ve never seen before. The air smells… different, like static. You wonder, briefly, if the test was about the virus at all, or if it was something more. Something they’re not telling you.

The world keeps moving, but you feel out of step with it, like a dream you can’t wake from. You keep walking, though, because what else is there to do?

The test is over. Or maybe it never really ended.

The Brown Bunny-

[Ben Jackson]

Positive-

[Ben Jackson]

Still positive and isolated as I distance.

[flippedcanvas]

Maybe I'll get some testing done at some point with my Amazon vouchers, that'll be!

[Ben Jackson]

You should Covid test. That way you are safe around others.

[Ben Jackson]

Oj you Covid test right?

[Ben Jackson]

I really think we can drive Covid out by testing and social distance. I recommend standing 9.5 feet between folks, lovers, or friends. Use an old tee shirt as a bandana around your face. Something stylish and fun. Really this is about having fun while you safe lives.

[Ben Jackson]

Al any updates on your testing?

[Pickles]

Just used up one of my coveted covid test kits and turns out I am not got it rn.

[Ben Jackson]

Testing testing testing hard.

[Pickles]

^same guy who wouldn't allow his parents or his daughter into his home without a mask.

[flippedcanvas]

Abover poster I feel bad for the parents and daughter, perhaps this person was a breaking point with others in which case is understandable!

[Ben Jackson]

I was in a BreAkdiwn and should not be held against me.

[Ben Jackson]

Positive!

[Pickles]

This place tested positive for a moron.