Denise Walker

Fix Yourself at the Cellular Level

THE LOCKER IS STILL KEPT BY THE BOOK Every building that runs on shifts has a version of this woman, and she is none of them in particular; she is drawn from the kind. Call this one Ros. Ros, the depot, the locker, the lad and the book are invented for illustration. They are not real customers, and this is not a testimonial. — There is something to be clear about before going any further. Nothing in this story goes wrong, and there is no night on which everything changed. If that is the story being waited for, it is not this one. This is a story about a locker. — Ros works nights at a parcel depot on the ring road. She has done for long enough that the building has changed its name twice, and the vans have changed colour with it, and she has not changed her locker. It is the third from the end, bottom row, and it is kept the way the building's book says a locker is kept. The book is a laminated sheet on the wall of the locker room, and it has been there longer than Ros. The laminate has a bubble in one corner where the damp got in, and the bubble has been there longer than the supervisor. It says what goes in a locker and what does not. It says boots on the floor of it, not the shelf. It says the badge on the hook inside the door. It says the high-vis folded, not hung, because a hung one catches the door. It says sign in at the desk before the locker, not after. It says the locker is shut and the key is on the lanyard, and the lanyard is round the neck, and nothing is left on top. Ros does all of it. Every shift, in that order, without reading the sheet, because she has not needed to read the sheet for a long time. The key is on a lanyard that has been knotted where it frayed, and knotted again above the first knot. The boots go in left then right, because that is the way they come off. The badge photograph is of a person with a different haircut. Boots on the floor. Badge on the hook. High-vis folded. Signed in first. Locker shut, key on the lanyard, lanyard on. Nothing on top. She is not proud of it, exactly. It is not a thing to be proud of. It is the book, and she does the book. The supervisor before this one once said the sheet was going to be replaced with a new one from head office. It was not. The bubble is still in the corner, and the sheet still says seven things. — The new starters see it, because new starters see everything for a while and then stop. One of them, in this story, asked her about it. A lad new enough to still be watching, in the locker room at the start of a shift, watching her fold the high-vis along the seam it already had. He said, does anybody check? She said no. Nobody checks. The sheet has been on the wall since before the supervisor, and the supervisor does not look at lockers. He said, so why. Ros thought about it, because it was a fair question and she had not been asked it before, and she gave him the answer she had. She said: because it is the one part of the night that is finished. She said the rest of the night is the rest of the night. The vans come when they come. The belt stops when it stops. The count at the end is whatever the count is. None of that is hers to finish. The locker is hers to finish. Boots, badge, high-vis, sign, shut, key, nothing on top. Seven things, done, and the door closed on them, and that part of the night cannot be undone by anything that happens on the belt. He asked whether she did it on the way out as well. She said the sheet did not say anything about the way out, so no. He nodded, in the way new starters nod, and went to find his own locker, and she does not know whether he kept his by the book. Some do, and some do not, and it is not her locker. She did not tell him the other thing, because he had not asked it, and because it is not a thing to say to a lad that new. The other thing is that the seven things are the same seven on a good night and on the other kind, and that the sheet does not ask which kind it is. The sheet does not ask. That is most of why she likes it. — Here is the part of the story that is not going to be told. Ros does everything the building asks. That is established. What the building does not ask about, this story does not ask about either. There is no page on the laminated sheet for how the night goes for her, or what the drive home is like. The sheet is about the locker. It was never about her. It would be easy to put a line in here about the rest — about what it is like to do everything by the book and have the night still be whatever it is. This story is not going to have that line. A line like that is a space, and we are not going to put a box in it. So: she does everything the building asks. The locker is kept by the book. And the rest of the night is not on the sheet, and it is not on this page either. — That is where the depot ends. PrimeCell H2 has a book of its own, and it is shorter than the depot's. Here it is, with the part we refuse first. We are not going to tell you how PrimeCell H2 feels to take. We are not going to name a day, a week, or a season for anything. And we are not going to write a line about the rest of anybody's night and then put a tablet at the end of it. Ros's sheet stops at the locker. Ours stops at the label. Two standing notes while we are here. This goes alongside the rest of a routine — the meals, the walks, the sleep — not in place of any of it. And talk to your doctor or pharmacist before adding any supplement, especially if you take any medication. Now the product facts and directions, plainly. PrimeCell H2 is an effervescent tablet. One tablet, one glass of water, once a day. Dissolve one tablet in 12–16 oz cool water — not hot. Full dissolution in 60–90 seconds. Drink within 10 minutes. The box holds 30 tablets, a 30-day supply. On the label: no artificial additives. PrimeCell H2 contains zero caffeine and zero stimulants. No added sugar. Non-GMO and vegan-friendly. Third-party tested for purity, and tested for heavy metals and contaminants. Manufactured in the USA from globally sourced ingredients. Those are verified product facts. The usage directions, the "no artificial additives" wording, and "zero caffeine, zero stimulants" are stated on the package. The testing and origin statements are verified product facts rather than package wording. That is the box in plain terms. It is a sheet the length of a label. Quantity, water, temperature, dissolution time, the window to drink it in, the frequency. It does not say which shift, and it does not say where in anybody's day it goes, because the label does not know and we do not either. The science, in one place. Molecular hydrogen is one of the smallest molecules in nature. Oxidative stress is a natural part of how the body responds to daily life; the body maintains its own antioxidant defenses to keep things in balance. Its small size allows it to be quickly absorbed. Which returns this to the locker room. Ros's seven things are not an answer to the rest of the night. They were never offered as one, by her or by the sheet. They are seven things done by the book, and the door closed on them. The depot's sheet and the label are the same kind of document. Each says what to do with an object, in order, and then stops. Neither has a page for the person doing it. A tablet in a glass is a thing done by a label. It is not offered as anything else here, and it is not the line this story left out. PrimeCell H2 supports healthy cellular function.* So, the sheet, plainly. One tablet: dissolve in 12–16 oz cool water — not hot; full dissolution in 60–90 seconds; drink within 10 minutes; once daily. If there is a part of your own day that you do by the book, the question is not what the book settles, because a sheet settles nothing outside itself. It is whether that part is finished when you close the door on it, and whether you want one more thing on the sheet or not. The locker is still kept by the book. Ros is drawn from a kind of person, not a person, and so are the depot, the lad and the sheet. The first line said so, and this one says it again. — Amala Health P.S. The guarantee, plainly: If you're not satisfied with PrimeCell H2, return your order within 90 days of delivery for a full refund. P.P.S. For the label-readers: each box is 30 tablets, a 30-day supply. Zero caffeine, zero stimulants. No added sugar. Non-GMO and vegan-friendly. Free of soy, dairy, gluten, GMO, caffeine and artificial additives. Third-party tested for purity, and tested for heavy metals and contaminants. https://track.getamalahealth.com/5548c06d-d9c3-4785-b466-fec64a6fdb28 Individual experiences vary. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.