There is one stall in our shop bathroom. There’s a little sign on the outside of it that you can flip for male or female. Since there are no women on the garage’s payroll, I flip it to reflect what I’m up to. Male means I’m taking a shit and to turn tail. Female means I’m pissing, but want some personal time to dip, swipe through my feed, maybe watch a music video, think.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBZUzl5jDd5
To the best of my knowledge, no one else ever used that stall. Either they’re too nervous to crap on the clock or they can’t stand the cobwebs. I dunno. At any rate, the stall was my unspoken throne. Some of the fellas still make jokes about it--that I’ve probably earned half my paycheck on the pooper. I usually laugh along. They’re probably right. I haven’t done the math, exactly, but…415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgZsWXiRdND
Anyway, that freestanding stall’s my sanctuary.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2stPmFwmQz
Or it was until about a week ago.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaFyDYvon8L
I’m still spooked. I haven’t shit at work in all that time, let alone number one-ed.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBWdKDlMNmW
I can’t go back in there. I won’t. 415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhNJFOTboJE
The fellas wouldn’t understand. None of them use the stall anyway.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3aegi6ggMH
I’m going to take this shit to my grave if I can help it.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡje5vz55zME
Which is funny, now that I really think about it… 415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeX0JDNhEcA
It happened last Friday and, in anticipation for the weekend, I’d retired to my watery cubicle to wile away the last fifteen minutes of my shift. I was doing some thinking and some sitting and not a whole lot of shitting, and it occurred to me that I should probably take a broom to the place soon, because another spider friend had joined my little rectangular space, but this one was brown and long-legged and had a face on its abdomen--which was unsettling to say the least.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4dwC5NV2om
I was toeing its little makeshift web when I dropped my phone with a clatter and a curse.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOHj7V14vYh
That’ll teach me to screw with mother nature, I was thinking to myself as I outwardly prayed that the thing wasn’t cracked. But reaching down to grab it, I couldn’t find it. It’d slipped under the edge of the stall when it fell. Grumbling with first-world irritation, I wiped and stood up and zipped, and was just about resigned to retrieving it after a flush--but I was interrupted. 415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrMQ3DN6VIH
At the bottom edge of the stall, a hand boasting red nail polish snaked under the rusted metal and passed me my phone with a polite waggle.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDAyJKsI2Gh
I took it without thinking. “Oh, thanks,” I said and tapped at it to make sure it was ok.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXkQZu74yaa
“Don’t mention it,” the woman said, uncommitted, almost bored. 415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOTRv2b3pOA
All the little hairs on the back of my neck stood up on their ends and, before I could summon much in the way of words, I popped out of my comfort zone with a bang of the stall door to confront the woman. What was I thinking? That I’d reprimand her? Demand why she hadn't at least knocked? Wonder how she’d walked in without making a sound? Make a big stink about the fellas not keeping a customer from coming to the back of the shop?415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡl7JCZUd179
Didn’t matter in the end.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ38gi36prNa
There was no one there.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9IqxMd0onf
Screw altruism or a sense of honor or something silly like that.415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrIzHUd2IOP
I’m not crapping on the clock anymore, because of a goddamned john ghost!415Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAlPaGShtWM
