Almost Made It

                The traffic was a nightmare for Trevor. He’d had the mega burrito for lunch and then downed it with a Mountain Dew. He knew he was a potential powder keg but figured he could make it. Those burritos are just so good. They’re like having a wish come true, and that wish was for more burritos. Trevor could eat one every day until he died and never have any regrets; until today.

                It started simply enough. Meg asked him if he wanted to go to lunch for the first time in weeks. It was special because he thought he had made Meg angry when he made a few jokes about a certain guy she had dated who turned into a total butt munch and she dumped. But Meg was hard to read at times. She could be laughing hysterically one moment and then scowling the next. So he thought he’d finally sewed his doom with her and she’d never speak to him again, at work or otherwise.

                Trevor gripped the steering wheel with his left hand and wiped the sweat from his forehead with his right. It was crazy how the body could undergo such a treasonous revolution just from the pressure of a bowel incident. He imagined his little body cells, throwing burrito into his colon like patriots throwing tea over the side of a boat at The Boston Tea Party. “No relaxation without…”

His stomach gurgled and he couldn’t think of a witty end to his no taxation without representation burrito related joke.

                Meg hadn’t helped matters too much either. She was her usual aloof self at lunch. She provided non-committal answers  to almost all of Trevor’s questions about how she was, what she was doing, if she was seeing anyone, if she thought that maybe he had a chance with her, one day, maybe. She smiled her beautiful white smile but never really answered the question. She talked mostly about going out to dinner with her parents. She only got personal when she asked Trevor if he thought that much hot salsa was wise on a Monday afternoon. Trevor was trying to impress her of course with his ability to handle the hottest of the hot salsas. Now though, in the car, sweating from the gurgling in his body, he knew she wasn’t impressed.  Plus she’d made his stomach a little upset from her confusing body language. She never said if they could be an item, or “go together” but she kept putting her hand on his forearm as they spoke and smiling at him while looking right into his eyes.

                Traffic was crawling along and Trevor checked the travel times on his phone. 40 minutes to get to his house. He didn’t think he would make it. The intestinal revolutionaries were starting to win the day and Trevor felt a panicked helplessness start to take over. He wondered if Meg would be able to tolerate him in his old age, say after they had been dating or even married for a few years, if she could take his occasional ½ hour bathroom visits or irritated bowels from time to time. Would that be something she could accepts as who he was or would it be something she couldn’t handle?

                Trevor started to wonder if that was what love really was. Love was accepting the fact that your partner, your mate, the person you value over all others, actually poops. Love isn’t cuddling on a beach in Mexico or dancing a samba or helping her move from that crappy studio apartment to a one bedroom. It was accepting the fact that she is a human being and has to make waste and loving her in spite of the pure concentrated evil coming out of her.  That’s love. As disgusting it may seem, it’s the ultimate act of devotion and love.  Trevor wondered if Meg would ever feel that way about him. He wondered if she could; if she had it in her to accept him.

                Traffic was snarled in gridlock. Trevor pounded on the steering wheel and started to worry if he would make it home. The pressure inside was madness. Trevor grit his teeth and tried to focus his attention of something else, anything else. He tried not to think about Meg either. He somehow felt guilty thinking about her while he was clenching his butt cheeks so hard together. It seemed somehow disrespectful to her.

                Trevor groaned and started looking for any familiar places he knew where the bathrooms were not covered in the feces of every single other person that had been in there since 1978. He was in the rough part of town where men apparently crap lead ingots and flames shoot from their asses, destroying any actual public usage of a bathroom.  He was stopped at another green light. The cross traffic in front of him was blocking the intersection. Trevor could hear an ambulance siren wailing in the distance. He checked his travel time again. It had shot up to 58 minutes.

                Sweat dripped down Trevor’s face and he felt the bottom of his stomach drop out. He’d never make it home. Never, never, never, never.  He scanned the long line of parked cars on both sides of the street. There was no place to park, plus no places to duck into except a store that alleged it was selling hardware but all he could see in the window was an old yellow pinball machine. Trevor closed his eyes tight and tried to force his body to cooperate. He was trying to rally his body to stop the interior insurgency of burrito terrorism. His stomach only gurgled in response.  

                The traffic broke in front of him and Trevor sped forward. He knew there was a restaurant up a few blocks that was pretty new and had a bathroom that didn’t resemble something out of a Wes Craven film. He weaved through some traffic and saw the parking lot on the right. He checked his mirrors like he was a race car driver, bobbing and braking and speeding. He flipped on the turn signal and drove up to the restaurant, “The Bistro on the Mall” and screeched to a halt in the nearest parking space. He threw the car in park, hurled open the car door, grabbed his car keys from the ignition and stood. He body hated that and began the full on assault toward his south. A “Scorched Trevor” battle plan toward the sea.

                He started to run to the doors of the restaurant. A small sense of relief started to release endorphin's from his brain. He might make it after all.

                “Trevor,” asked a sweet voice.

                He didn’t want to turn around, but he did. It was Meg, in the waiting area of the restaurant with her parents. This is where they were having dinner, like she mentioned. Trevor tried to smile, but he just waved and clenched his ass and turned. He shuffled toward the men’s room and threw open the door. He kicked open a stall and dropped his pants to the floor and sat. He burst like something from a teenage sex-romp comedy, thick and noisy.

                The relief was extraordinary. It was heaven on Earth. Trevor exhaled in a long slow happy breath.

                “Oh God. Thank you Jesus,” he said.

                He heard the clink of glasses and plates being tossed into a bin and realized when he threw the door to the bathroom open. It had stayed open. Trevor looked up at the stall door. He’d barely had a chance to close it.  The bathroom door was open toward the waiting area. He could hear the faint laughter of some of the patrons. He put his head in his hands as his body loudly evacuated the rest of the traitors.  He rubbed his face, wiping the last of the sweat from his brow.  It was an unrecoverable embarrassment. He could never face Meg again. He’d have to stay in there until the restaurant closed, forever.

               Trevor sighed again. “I wonder what Sally in accounting is up to this weekend,” he thought.