I went for my annual visit to the gym on Monday, and had a fitness test with an instructor who had halitosis so severe you could chew it and taste it.
I didn't notice it at first. When you're being moved around the room and weighed and measured, you're not in the line of fire long enough to get a whiff. It wasn't until I sat down for the blood pressure measure thing that I started to wonder if there was a four-year old egg sandwich in the room somewhere. As the pump pumped and the arm compressor compressed, Hal (not his real name) kept telling me what good blood pressure is and bad, and all the time I'm wondering what the dreadful smell is. It did occur to me momentarily it could be the poor boy's breath, but to be honest, I dismissed the idea because I thought nothing that disgusting could possibly be emitted from a person's body. Mouth or otherwise.
Hal gently told me to relax so he could see what my resting heart rate would be, but by this time the putrid stench was hitting me in waves which were clearly coinciding with the times when he was talking right at me, and so I took in the awful truth. Literally.
As the digital read-out dropped to what we both hoped would be the sort of number that didn't show me up as a bloater who's had one chocolate Hob Nob too many, I held my breath. My heart rate stayed steady, which is amazing because I must have held my breath for a good fifteen seconds trying to look as if, well, as if I wasn't.
As the arm-grippy-blood-sleeve loosened its grip, I exhaled slowly, professionally, like a weight lifter might, to show that I was quite a fit bloke really and breathing it out carefully. Controlled. Calm. Disguised. Not at all the breathing out of a man now utterly nauseous from the stench talking to me a meter away.
I felt pretty pleased with myself for averting that particular assault but, being too unfit to even hold my breath sitting down, I then had to inhale more than I normally would, to compensate. Which, because Hal is still banging on about my BMI divided by my IBS (I'm joking, I don't have IBS, but maybe he did? orally), meant trying to look interested (which I wasn't) whilst moving my face away, side to side, up and down, and then, ooh! is that an itch in both nostrils? I must scratch both by pinching them and squeezing them. He must have thought I was an asthmatic with twitch.
Things didn't get any better when we went into the gym itself to go through my tasks on the machines. He showed me a few and demonstrated that breathe-in-lift-breathe-out thing whilst still telling me to snack from now on with green beans and carrots. But, if anything, his breath seemed to get worse. And it's rude not to look at a man whilst he's talking, and certainly when he's bench-pressing fifty kilos and discussing vegetables, so what can you do? And then, whilst I was pedaling away on a bike that goes nowhere, and him standing there with his watch and clipboard and bin-liner breath, I was now starting to feel really sick and considerably dizzy. The problem was, as I did my best to keep pedaling and trying not look like a complete loser (yet all the time suppressing a monumental gag reflex) I couldn't be sure if I was just ludicrously unfit or, thanks to Hal breathing on me, going into some sort of coma.
Of course, many times it went through my mind that someone ought to tell him about his problem. Or that maybe that I should be the one to tell him, but added to my dilemma was the guilt that I couldn't. I mean, what do you say? Really? Sorry, look, I really appreciate this fitness programme thing you're working out for me, but I think something has died in your mouth? Or maybe, Hey, I've just noticed I've got some mints in my pocket, would you like one? no? oh yes you do. You bloody DO! TAKE ONE FOR PETE'S SAKE, TAKE THE PACKET TAKE IT ALL AND SWALLOW IT WHOLE OR YOU'RE GONNA KILL SOMEBODY... ARRRRRGGGGH!!!!! before I, job done, civilisation saved, cancer cured and the world a better place to raise our children, let go finally, let it all go, and no more holding of my own breath, no more stench and skunk and pain, and collapse, collapse helplessly in slow heroic motion, down, down, my dying (unfit) body dropping to the ground, my eyes watering, (fat) face green, and nose bleeding, life exhaling out of me, leaking air, leaking thoughts wild, memories vivid and then...and then...
Silence
And still.
The whisper of my final breath.
Clean, pure and with minty freshness.
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