2 Minutes Out Of My 48 Hours At Camp ACRJ

The eminent male Corrections Officer, who, really, belongs in a Calvin Klein ad not a jail, unlocks my cell and swings open its door. “The nurse wants to see you.” I pad along behind him in my mismatched-by-bleach blue inmate-issued shoes to a compact room where perched at a desk sits a blonde woman wearing a white coat and more mascara than Drew Barrymore.

Nurse Imperious: Have you gotten a [mandatory] PPD recently?

Me: Not since the other one I got here last time -- over a year ago.

Nurse Imperious: You know if we give you one now, you can’t be checked until…

Me: I thought that’s why you called me in here -- to check it; y’all already gave me a shot.

Nurse Imperious: Didn’t I ask you if you’d had one recently? Didn’t I ask her if she’d had one recently?

Me: Oh, I thought you meant prior to this one. Forgive me for thinking the facility who just administered the thing to me two days ago would actually have a record of doing so.