Fear and Testing in Las Vegas
I went to the UNLV walk-in testing site looking for the same thing everyone else wanted: peace of mind.
Someone at my dad's work had gotten sick. He woke up one day feeling ill and called off so he could take a test. When he received the results days later, he notified management and self-isolated. That was sometime last week, but we only found out last night. Why? Management had never told the employees - they probably figured that if they knew, then they would have to test all of the employees and the airplanes would go uncleaned. No, my dad and his coworkers were left wondering "Where's Brandon?", texting him, and finding out the hard way. At this same workplace, my dad's supervisor proudly proclaimed just two months ago that she didn't believe the virus existed. "Do you guys know anyone who's gotten sick? I don't." Since then, at least three people have tested positive there. She still doesn't wear her mask at work.
So there we were, wondering if our family Christmas had become a superspreader event. We had just dropped my brother off at the airport to fly back to LA and he would be on a crowded plane for the next two hours. My father is an at-risk demographic. Enquiring minds wanted to know: were we infected?
When we arrived, the first thing I noticed was the absurd number of military fatigues everywhere. No less than six national guard members assisted us with parking in a half empty lot and showed us where the front of the building was (it was, unsurprisingly, in the front). My dad and I got out of the car. He was wearing full Niners apparel. Noticing this, a person next to us immediately chats him up and they both proceeded to pull off their masks to talk about football. We approached the building and I wondered if someone was going to scold us, but another national guard member pulled off his own mask to shout "Go Niners!" Ozymandias was wrong: there will always be football.
Inside, I sign up for my walk-in. The person assisting me is Liz, a pretty brunette and part of the half of the staff that isn't military or adjacent. She's got some fantastic boots on - as someone who likes fashion I tell her so and she earnestly thanks me. Then she tells me that she got them from her job. I ask her why the school or the medical center would buy her such nice boots. She looks at me while trying to figure out the simplest way to explain and that's when I found out some strange facts in quick succession. She's a model. She isn't volunteering, the modeling agency assigned her to do COVID testing assistance. The site was short on workers and the fire department has a working relationship with that modeling agency because they know they're "dependable workers" so they made the arrangement. I still have no idea why the modeling agency works with the Las Vegas Fire Department or why the Fire Department is the one responsible for staffing the impromptu University Medical Center testing site but I didn't care to dive in further so we both laugh about how strange the situation is. She gets me to follow her on Instagram.
Two more national guard members directed me to the testing room. I guess they didn't trust me to read the signs posted everywhere. I follow the arrows to my designated station and approach the covid test technician. She's dressed in full protective gear: faceshield, face mask, gloves, and she's even wearing a smock to keep covid off her clothes. She hands me the test kit. Then she tells me step-by-step instructions - first remove the kit from bag. Pull my mask down below my nose, but do not ever expose my mouth. Unscrew the lid... Finally I realized what was going on. "Wait, do I have to self-administer this test?" I asked. She said yes and reminded me to stay behind the table. That's when I noticed the fear of death in her eyes. She probably saw a hundred people a day at least and it would only take one of them to kill her.
So I started swabbing my own nose. The few times I had taken a test in the spring and summer, someone had done it for me. Today I had to be thorough all on my own. I reached all the way back into my nostril and began to twist in large circles like she told me. One... two... but by seven or eight I figured that was enough even though she had said fifteen. The other nostril was even less thorough - you're supposed to go as far as you can but my body was suddenly afraid of the pain. The spirit was willing, but the flesh was weak, and truthfully it's easier to have someone do it for you. I put the swab in the container, put it into the ziplock, and placed it on the table, not at all confident that I had done it correctly. I grabbed some tissues for my involuntary tears and left.
My dad leaves the makeshift testing site and is beaming with satisfaction. "See?" he tells me, "Fast and easy." We go to the White Castle to celebrate. As I ate my sliders in the parking lot I tried to process everything I had just experienced. I thought of the word pantomime. At some point I look across the street to the Bavarian restaurant on the corner and notice a couple of masked older teens holding hands. They walk in through the front door. They are on a date.
