Strange Encounters of the Restroom Kind

Cheryl danced as she watched her computer at work shut down.  She was happy because it was Taco Tuesday at the Taco Hut in Denton.  So what if she had to drive 30 minutes away, but all you can eat tacos for 99 cents each was well worth the gas that it cost to get there.

She bobbed her head to the song that was playing in the air as she walked out of the room after the computer had shut down.  She yelled, “Bye,” to whoever was listening at that moment in the building.  She walked towards the parking lot exit door.  As she got close to a restroom that was in the hall, her stomach grumbled and gurgled at the same time.  She paused for a moment and thought, “Should I go to the restroom before I get on the road?”  She didn’t have to go pee; she had gone only 30 minutes earlier.  She brushed it off.  Her belly must have been acting that way because she was hungry.  She hadn’t been able to eat lunch because she had to run all over the school building looking for a kid’s jacket after the AM dismissal, which was her lunch time.

“Should have just let the little booger freeze, wasting my lunch time looking for his jacket.”

After Cheryl finally reached her parking spot, she softly kicked the bumper of her white 2000 Mitsubishi Mirage, which needed to be fixed, to make sure it was on tight.  It was hanging on by a piece of metal and some string.  It could fall off at any moment.  She didn’t want it falling off while she was on the freeway.  The stupid thing had come off before, but she was on a residential street and no harm was done to the car, at least.  Her pride was bruised as other drivers drove and looked at her in her raggedy car.

Nothing was going to spoil her today, not even a busted up hood and fender.  She was on her way to get some tacos.  She tried to put her backpack in the back of the car after she opened the door, but stumbled a bit.  She grunted.  Her backpack was so heavy because her laptop was in there.  She was going to need back surgery, carrying that thing around.  She got into the front seat of her car and started it up.  She put on her seatbelt and then plugged the auxiliary cable into her I-Pad and found the “PAJAM Insured” playlist.  She needed some music that was bumping and J. Moss and the PAJAM family was always on point when it came to the hottest Gospel music around.  She clicked “The Prayer” by J. Moss featuring Hezekiah Walker.  The song was about praying, but it had a funky bass line and infectious beat that would have her hands banging on the steering wheel in no time.

Cheryl smiled and thought, “At least this piece of junk has an awesome stereo system.” She turned the volume up to 25 and sung with J. Moss as loudly as she could while she backed out of the parking space.  She was on her way and she was ecstatic.

***

Cheryl was finally in the city of Denton.  She had about five more exits to go before she reached the exit for the Taco Hut.  “Afraid No More,” by J. Moss was playing. She bobbed her head to the beat of the song.  As J. Moss sang, “That spirit ain’t here with me.  God didn’t put that in me…” Cheryl’s gut gurgled.  She grimaced and shook her head.  Whatever was in her body, God hadn’t put that in her.

Her body was telling her, “You need to go to the bathroom.”  She didn’t want to listen to her body.  She was fine.  It didn’t matter that she hadn’t had a bowel movement since the previous morning and she was due to have one, soon.  She wanted those tacos and that’s all she was thinking about.

Cheryl made it to the Taco Hut and pulled into her usual parking space.  She grabbed her I-Pad, T-Mobile Hotspot, and jacket, and then headed into the orange and black building.  Only three tables were occupied.  Coming to the Taco Hut after 3:30 pm was a great time to come because the lunch rush was over and there were rarely that many people in the building.  She could eat her tacos in peace and enjoy herself without worrying about having to finish up quickly because someone wanted the table.

As she walked towards the counter, her stomach bubbled.  She quietly said, “Shut up,” as looked down at her stomach.  She walked up to the counter where the cashier was standing in her orange and yellow Taco Hut shirt, Brown polyester looking pants, and yellow Taco Hut hat.  The outfit was very unflattering.  The cashiers always acted like they were Top Models dressed in the latest fashion, though as they stepped up to the counter to wait on customers.  They were always smiling and friendly, too.

“Hello, welcome to Taco Hut.  May I help you?” the cashier said.

Cheryl studied the menu as if she didn’t already know what she was getting before she said, “May I have four tacos with just meat, cheese, and onions?”

The cashier hit some buttons and then said, “Four tacos, just meat, cheese, and onions.  Would you like a drink with that?”

“Yes, may I have a medium half sweet tea and half pink lemonade?” Cheryl said after smiling.

The cashier rung up the drink up.  She picked up a large cup and showed it to Cheryl, “You know you can get the large for the same price as the medium.  All our drinks are a dollar right now.”

“No, thanks.  I’ll take the medium,” Cheryl said as the cashier turned to make the drink.

They were always offering her a large drink instead of the medium.  She couldn’t finish the large drink and most of it ended up sitting in her car couple holder for a couple of days, and then finally getting thrown away.  The large was just too big.  The medium one, though, was just right.

The cashier handed the cup of liquid to Cheryl and said, “That’ll be $5.38.”

Cheryl handed the cashier $6.00.  “What name is on the order,” the cashier asked.

“Madkins, M-A-D-K-I-N-S,” Cheryl answered.

“OK.  Makins,” the cashier said.  Cheryl laughed.  She was too excited about the tacos to even correct the cashier.

She found her spot, put her drink on the table, put her I-Pad on the bench, then covered it with her jacket, and headed to the restroom to wash her hands.  Cheryl’s belly bubbled loudly.  She looked around to see if anyone had heard her belly.  No one was paying her any attention.  Her stomach was saying, “You need to empty me before you put more food in me.”  Cheryl just ignored her gut and walked out after she threw the used paper towel into the trashcan.

The cashier met Cheryl at her table with the tray full of food, as was their tradition, when the place wasn’t packed.

***

Cheryl’s favorite city of Denton library, the Emily Fowler Central Library, was on Oakland Street.  She had just turned onto N. Locust Street and she was about six blocks from the library.  Her stomach gurgled.  There was a loud rumbling sound from her rear end.  Cheryl smelled the foul scent that was coming from her.  She knew she was in trouble.  Her belly was hurting, too.  She should have listened to her body and gone to the restroom before he left the Taco Hut, but she thought she could make it to the library before anything catastrophic happened.

Cheryl told her gut, “Alright now, stop acting up.  I can make it to the library.  It’s like 3 more blocks.”

Her gut wasn’t listening.  It made a rumbling sound.  Cheryl tried to clench her butt cheeks to keep the air from seeping from her rump.  It didn’t work.  The bad air came out and filled her Mirage up with “Brown Air,” as her husband liked to call it.

Cheryl willed herself to hold herself together until she made it to the library.  After she passed her favorite house, the quaint white and blue vintage looking home, she sighed because the library was just past the house.  She was happy, too.

Cheryl whipped into the first parking spot that she could find.  She got out of the car quickly.  As she was opening the back door of her car, her belly bubbled.  She grunted and held her stomach.  There were people close to her talking, so, she willed the bad air to stay in its place, successfully, this time, it did.  She grabbed her backpack and jacket and hurried into the building.  She knew she should have just gone to the restroom, but she didn’t want to come back outside after entering the building to get her stuff.

She was glad that the restrooms were in the front of the building, just after the main entrance.  She wasn’t sure that she could make it any further.  Her stomach was cramping, rumbling, gurgling, and grumbling, all at the same time.

Cheryl quickly opened the restroom door, slowly walked in, trying to control her bodily functions.  She barely made it into the stall, threw her stuff on the floor, damn the laptop, and fixed herself so she could sit on the commode.

She didn’t even have time to do her usual wipe down of the toilet.  She was probably sitting on thousands of cooties at that moment.

Cheryl was upset.  There was a person on her left side.  The person had on blue canvas Ked's or Levi's.  Cheryl could see the shoes under the stall.  There was a person on the right side of Cheryl, too.  Cheryl couldn’t see her shoes under the stall.  Cheryl shook her head before having to grunt because she was stopping her bowels from releasing themselves.  Cheryl had to try to control what was going to happen; it was either going to be loud or “stanky”.  Cheryl could control the funk because she always kept a bottle of body spray in her backpack.  She knew just how to spray it, so that it wouldn’t be that bad.  She couldn’t control the sound though, and knowing her body, it would act “ignant”, as her grandmother would say, and be all kinds of loud with those two ladies in there with her.

Cheryl couldn’t hold it any longer.  She braced herself and willed her buttocks to be quiet.  Cheryl unclenched her cheeks and let go.  It sounded as if a starter pistol had been fired.  Then there the sound that sounded like the almost empty ketchup bottle when someone was squeezing it too hard.  Cheryl was embarrassed.  Her body had acted “ignant.”

Cheryl moved her red Levi shoes closer to the middle of the stall, hoping that the ladies hadn’t paid any attention to her feet.  She didn’t want them to associate those horrific sounds with her red shoes, just in case they were walking around the library afterward.

The lady on the right, flushed, then left the stall.  Cheryl heard the water from the sink run and thought, “At least she washes her hands.  I can’t stand it when people don’t at least pretend to wash their hands when other people are in the restroom.  Just nasty!”

Cheryl had no right to call any one nasty and her body reminded her of that with a sound that sounded like someone squishing around in mud.

She stopped the stream, hoping that taking a break would quiet the sound.  She let it go again and to her horror, there was that ketchup bottle sound again.  She didn’t know what to do, her stomach was hurting and it needed to be free.

Cheryl stopped the stream one more time. She quietly pleaded with her body, “Please don’t be so loud.  Please.  This is too embarrassing.”  She let the stream flow again.  Her body was being hard headed.  This time, it sounded even louder than the other two times.

Starter pistol, empty ketchup bottle, and then squishy mud sound.

“Damn!”

Cheryl refused to stop the stream anymore.  Her belly was hurting too bad.

The lady in the stall on the right let out a loud HUFF!  She flushed the toilet violently, banged the stall door, and loudly exited the restroom without even washing her hands.

“Nasty chick,” Cheryl said audibly.

Cheryl finished with the task at hand.  It seemed to take forever, but finally, it was slowing down.  Cheryl scowled as cold droplets of water hit her butt.

“Seriously, you have got to be kidding me,” she said loudly as she leaned forward to look in her backpack to see if she had any baby wipes, normally she kept some in there.

She found the bag and looked; there weren’t any in the plastic baggie.  She had forgotten to fill it up.

“Damn!”

Cheryl didn’t normally curse that much, but this incident was bringing out the worse in her.

Finally, her belly, bowels, and intestines were empty.  She pushed her stomach one more time to make sure.  Yep, it was done.  She began fumbling for the toilet paper.

“Damn!”

She hated library toilet paper and it was the same in every library she had ever been in.  They had to have rigged it so that you could only pull off two squares at a time.  Cheryl, pulled several times, trying to get a length of toilet paper off the roll, but it didn’t work.  Finally, she slowed down, fidgeted with the toilet paper holder, and then began to pull the toilet paper off the roll.  She was able to get some off.  She went through the clean-up process and then discarded the toilet paper.  She cleaned herself two more times, making sure that she was completely cleaned.

She sniffed the air.  Thankfully, there was no odor.

“Seriously, I don’t stink, but I sound like a noise factory.  You have got to be kidding me,” she said to her belly.  She didn’t need to spray her body spray.  She was glad because there was only a little bit in the bottle; it probably wouldn’t have been enough to cover up the funk that she had been emitting earlier in the car.

She waited a few minutes before composing herself to leave the restroom.  She wanted to out-wait anyone who had decided to hang around to see who was making all that noise.  She pulled out her I-Pad and played a game.

After about three or four minutes, she put her I-Pad back in the backpack.

“Did I just touch all this stuff without washing my hands?  I am so nasty.  Somebody get me out of here, please,” she said out loud to whoever was listening.  She fixed herself, grabbed her stuff, then went to wash her hands, and exited the restroom.

Cheryl walked casually towards the doors to the library, trying to be cool.  As she reached the class doors, she heard two distinct voices laughing like hyenas behind her.  She froze.  She turned around to see who was laughing.

There was Blue Canvas Shoes, a blond-headed teenage girl, and a friend laughing.  Blue Canvas’ friend stopped laughing when she saw Cheryl look at her.  Blue canvas shoes was laughing so hard that she fell over on her friend and almost knocked both of them off the bench.

Cheryl turned around and walked on into the library, shaking her head.  She could still hear Blue Canvas Shoes and her friend cackling after the doors to the library closed.

Cheryl thought, “This little heifer waited to see who came out of the restroom.  Just like a damn nosey teenager.”