Sorry...I'm Inebriated

Today I started work again after a four-day holiday visiting my family and friends in America. I had a great time there, but was sad to return now to the mind-numbing routine of work. I was also having one of those moments when I hated men—very, very much! I felt very unwanted and upset that no man I was ever attracted to wanted me (certain men in particular) and that the world was just full of boring men and I was doomed to either singleness or a boring life. Then, before I knew it, about an hour passed and an oddly endearing event took place that made my entire day so much brighter that I had to write about it. Not that my situation in life really changed, but it’s funny how weird events like this can help to change your attitude…

I was minding my own business by the cash register when the “door-ringer” rang and I looked to my right. An attractive-looking young man slowly walked in the door. His arm was in a cast and in one hand he held a can of carbonated juice.

“Hello,” I said in my cheeriest of voices.

He looked in my direction. “Do you guys have anything for newlyweds?” he asked.

“Uh…you mean as a gift?”

“Yeah, my roommate just got married. I gotta get them something.”

“Okay, well, most of our wedding gift stuff is right over here.” I walked over to our wedding display which happened to be about three feet in front of him though I wasn’t going to be sarcastic enough to point that out.

He didn’t budge. An awkward silence ensued.

“Do you have any ideas of what you might want to get?”

“Nope.”

Silence.

“Ya…so this is most of what we have right here…” I began.

“Sorry, the doctors gave me something so I’m kind of inebriated.”

I couldn’t help giggling a little bit, and he smiled at me.

“Ya, so I have no idea what to get. I went to Spencer’s earlier and the guy showed me the love section and I was like 'I can't give them that! They're Christian people!’” He held up his hand to hold an imaginary item that I probably didn’t want to know about. "So I came here," he concluded.

I awkwardly laughed. "Ya…well, we have what’s right here and then I can show you any other stuff we have. We have our personalized section where you can write your own message on something…”

“Ya, I don’t wanna write anything.”

I tried not to laugh again. Didn’t surprise me. He didn’t seem like that type. Especially while he was “inebriated”. We wandered over to the giftware section as I nervously showed him some random items, because to be honest, if I were in his shoes, I’d be just as clueless about what to get. I’m not always the greatest at giving socially appropriate solutions. He muttered some supposed-to-be-funny comments with a straight face and finally decided on a pair of “Mr.” and “Mrs.” mugs. The ones that are cute, but also make me want to barf. I gave an internal sigh of relief that we had found something he liked and brought them to the till upon his request.

“Is your phone number in our customer list?” I asked him.

“I don’t know, maybe.” He rattled off the number.

“(insert anonymous name)?”

“Ya. Well it’s (full version of anonymous name that wasn’t written in the computer). Get it right,” he commanded while smiling. “Just kidding.” He commenced to explain to me what his name meant while I continued with the sale transaction.

I smiled. “Cool.”

“And what does Jessica mean?” He said it in a manner that suggested he thought it was some sort of contest or something. By this point, I had been stifling my uncontrollable laughter too many times that it was about ready to burst at any point. This guy was ridiculous.

Tearing the receipt, I responded very coolly, “I’ve heard it means ‘God beholds’ or ‘wealthy’.”

“Oh, really? That’s so cool! That’s awesome! Is that a promise ring?” His sudden shift of focus drew my attention to the ring on my left ring finger. I tried hard to will my face not to blush like a nun or something.

“Ya.” I responded quickly as I focused much too intently on stapling the right receipts together. “Well, I mean…what do you mean? Like, some people, I mean…I’ve heard some people have promise rings as some sort of ‘pre-engagement’ ring or something or…”

“Oh. Well, I’ve heard that some people wear them as an abstinence…sorry, I didn’t”

“Yeah. Yeah that’s what it’s supposed…yeah.” I avoided looking at him. I waited for the other receipts to print. By this point, I couldn’t control my laughter anymore and it burst from me unwantedly like a maniac.

“What?,” he asked.

Still avoiding looking at him, I shook my head and responded, “nothing.” I grabbed the mugs and turned around to the counter behind me to put them in boxes for him. Self-conscious, I hoped he wouldn’t notice and critique my crappy wrapping abilities, and muttered “what the heck” when I couldn’t get the second mug to fit in its box.

Finally, I turned around and began putting the boxes in a bag while still avoiding eye contact.

“Could you put them in this?” he asked, holding out his own wrinkled plastic bag. “I don’t what them to see it. They don’t know I was here.” He said it so seriously like he was on a underground mission or something.

“Oh, sure!” I responded, back to my formal cheer. After placing them in his bag, he still stood there, so I made myself look at his face.

He gazed deeply into my eyes and said, “Thank you, Jessica. Have a nice day.” My heart fluttered annoyingly as I resented the fact that I was disgustingly attracted to this “inebriated” man. He left and I realized I hadn’t given him his receipt. I shoved our copy of it into the till, threw the other copy in the garbage, and hurried to the back of the store where I could laugh without reserve. I walked around the store with a cheesy smirk on my face for the whole rest of the day and stifled laughs every so often.

For whatever reason, this experience with this random guy totally made my day. And as I sit here analyzing all of this now, I realized that this guy gave me hope. He gave me hope that there are still other interesting men out there. They just have to be all drugged up first…this is a good life lesson…right? I also realized just how desperately, boringly pathetic my everyday life is that an event like the one above could inspire such a long blog post. Guess it was just another interesting day in the life of Jessica Cruz.