The whites of my eyes turned noticeably yellow. Banana yellow. I did not want to see a doctor about this, because I otherwise felt fine.
My eyeball yellowness went on several days. I stared at my eyeballs in the bathroom mirror. Was this yellowness the start of something? Early onset jaundice?
I called the nurse’s advice hotline. The nurse would advise me what to do.
‘I don’t know what could be causing that,’ she said. ‘You need to see a doctor.’
‘ … What if I didn’t see a doctor?’
‘My advice is for you to see a doctor.’ You could tell she was stating this clearly so that if I died of yellow eye, my family couldn’t dig up a recording of this call and sue.
I went to a different walk-in clinic. This time, I saw a young woman who wore a white lab coat. There wasn’t even any dog hair on it.
‘What are you here about?’
‘The whites of my eyes have turned yellow.’
She shone a tiny flashlight in my eyes. Then she laughed. ‘Well, I don’t know how yellow the whites of your eyes normally are.’
‘They’re normally white.’
‘Uh-huh.’ She laughed again. ‘I’m not sure what you want me to say.’
I went home. A few days later, my eyeballs returned to their usual colour.