Counter Culture : Adam Matcho
Ramblings from the Nametag Subculture
All I wanted to do was take a shit.
I counted the two people in the store again by clenching my ass cheeks together: One. Two.
It felt like I was forcing the shit back up into me.
Lights flashed all around the store. Strobe lights flickering like the abdomens of fireflies. Touch responsive plasma balls full of dancing, purple electricity. Neon bar signs buzzed on high shelves while blacklights illuminated the dim corner in the back, where all the mallrats like to ditch empty packages.
I still had to shit.
One of the remaining customers approached the counter. I was in a crouched position with the heel of my Airwalks shoved halfway up my ass. One of my hands was up on the plexiglass countertop. It was stuck, like an amphibian hand.
The man was wearing military fatigues and a fishing permit pinned to the side of his hat.
“I need one of them green and blue lava lamps,” he said. Like a hitchhiker, he motioned with his thumb toward the overhead stock, stacked high above the shelves.
I quickly scanned the shelves without moving. Usually, people don’t even look on the shelves. They just see the overhead stock, looming like a human pyramid at a pep rally. I spotted a boxed green and blue lava lamp on the bottom shelf. He must have overlooked it but I had the benefit of my current position: some kind of crouched, fetal stance. I may have looked like an injured animal or a great philosopher.
“I think I see one right there,” I said in an uneven voice. I was so focused on not shitting, or even farting, it affected my speech. All of my language was slow and shaky. My jaw had begun to hurt from grinding my teeth. I clenched my ass cheeks together so tightly, I thought I may sprain a muscle. I had no idea if work would even compensate me.
The man with the fishing license and a pointed, hawk-like nose didn’t even look. He seemed to resent I was not standing. “No there isn’t,” he said. Like all prey when confronted with a superior predator, I was fucked. He had the clear advantage of being the customer and was entitled to all the demands of a person who may spend money. They are not only buying products. They are buying service, momentary royalty. This man probably felt the twenty dollars he pays for a lava lamp translates to paying my wages. In truth, I have to work four hours to make twenty bucks.
I kept my right hand stuck to the counter and pointed with my left, like a man who has just spotted a shark in shallow water. The sudden shift of weight had a tremendous affect on my stomach and bowels. I bit my tongue and let out a small yelp. The man acted like none of this was happening and just glared at me down the pointed bridge of his nose.
He slowly turned his head like he was trying to crack his hairy neck and studied the path of my crocked forefinger.
“Sorry,” he said. “But that one has blue lava with green liquid.”
