Looks can be deceiving….

Those were the days when I was in charge of a hospital (a small one but a hospital nevertheless!!)…… Used to get up by early in the morning to start our cases as our Op used to begin At 9…… On a peak day would operate many cases and see around many pure ENT patients. Having so many Ent patients is by itself a great experience…and no I was just managing the hospital and I never had any share of the profits!!..
But this is not about that….. This had happened to me before but I am a slow learner!!…
Your son needs tonsil surgery is what I told the father of a kid who was having severe tonsillitis and growth impact….. The frequent infection and severe nose block had made the poor kids life miserable. Why they had to wait for so long was beyond my understanding but when I saw the kids father I understood. His tattered clothes mangy hair and nicotine stained teeth gave more information than you could ask for.
In any case I told him that we can reduce the rate by ten percent but apparently even that was a bit too much for the father to chew. After much haggling and a call to my head in the main hospital I could reduce the price to almost half the initial cost!….. Surgery was smooth and the kid recovered well…. Since the discharge took some time the parents were taking the kid just as I was getting down closing for the day….. I usually avoid speaking to patients beyond hospital hours or outside cause I have seen that it initiates an unnecessary flow of random questions!!….. Also since most of the time I try to save time and come by bike rather than the car there’s the matter of prestige in front of the patients which only another doctor in a corporate hospital would understand!!….
But this one was different…. This kid was special and looking at him I could feel the warmth of the halo over my head!!… I made some non important comment while patting the kids head ( I recently got to know that kids hate it when someone does that!!)…. As a final farewell to the father I gave him some money (I think it was around 100₹…) And told him to take his kid by an auto to his home and not by bus….. He sheepishly looked at me and asked if car is fine?…. Perturbed I thought that this father would have kept money for going in a taxi and that would explain the bargaining…. In any case every penny saved is important…. I was lost in this thought and muttered in agreement which is when I saw the father call out to another equally dirty guy standing for the family ( I thought he was their relative…)…
The guy who was apparently one of their many drivers saluted the father and took their luggage and kept it in a shiny innova parked just beside my old rusty bike!!…. The whole family then gave me big smiles showing their dirty teeth reminding me how looks are surely deceiving!!…..