Tampons Aisle Five

by Rae Matthews

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Beaver Feaver

  Flying Chicken

  Condoms are One Size fits All

  Oh, The Shame

  Chocolate Covered Cherries

  Get Out of My Way

  Starting Over

  Better Be Going

  Give Up the Goods

  Get the Fuck Out of Dodge

  Home Sweet Home

  The Next Day

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Copyright © 2019 Rae Matthews

  Cover Design by: Q Designs

  Edited by: Tammy Jones

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN 10: 1086579550

  ISBN 13: 978-1086579550

  For all those that have lived through a WTF

  moment and lived to tell the tale.

  First, I would like to take Aunt Flo for stopping by each month. Without your monthly visits, this book would never have been.

  Second, I would like to thank whoever invested tampons, because without you I would be walking around with a diaper under my pants twelve times a year.

  To my husband who has to put up with me becoming a big BEOTCH and yelling at him for being alive when he annoys me.

  For all those about to read this book... I’m sorry about chapter five.

  And last, to my mom, quit complaining about menopause and those damn hot flashes. I would rather have those and not the beaver fever each month. Love you!

  “No, no, no! Not yet, not yet, not yet!” I scream at my vagina as I run for my bathroom the moment I feel the arrival of my period, two days ahead of schedule, might I add. I don’t bother to close the door behind me as I drop my pants and underwear before I plant my ass on the cool toilet seat.

  Looking down, I pray I made it in time to save my favorite pink lace panties. I am relieved to see I made it just in time. What I mean is, I made it before any part of the red river left its mark on them. I should have known better than to wear them this close to Beaver Fever Week. My only defense is that I felt bloated this morning and I wanted to feel sexy one last time before I turn into the Stay Puft Marshmallow Woman for a week. I figured I had a few days before I had to worry about my favorite Victoria Secret panties and that they would remain safe from harm. Unfortunately, I was wrong.

  With a sigh of relief, I look up to see my Rottweiler, Bella, staring at me from the doorway. She is my bigger-than-expected eighty-pound rescue dog that was listed as a pug and miniature pinscher mix. She was only supposed to grow to, at most, twenty-five pounds. Yeah, not. After I brought her home and she reached her twenty-five pounds, she just kept growing and growing and growing. Eventually, I took her to my vet to confirm her breed. He just laughed and told me I had a female Rottweiler and not the little ankle biter I thought I was getting. I have to admit I felt like the dumbest blonde out there as he pointed out the obvious signs of her breed. Once I overcame the shock of it all, I came to terms with the fact that rescuers do the best they can but they are not experts in all breeds. Yeah, she is bigger than I was ready for given the size of my apartment, but I wouldn’t trade her for anything in the world.

  On any other day, she would have playfully chased after me down the hall after I jumped off the couch and sprinted to the bathroom, but not tonight. Instead, she followed calmly and is now just sitting in the doorway with those big brown eyes staring at me, like she knows now is not the time to mess with the one that feeds her. I smile at her when she steps forward and places her head on my thigh.

  “Hey Bella, it’s ok,” I tell her as I pat the top of her head and give a scratch behind her left ear. “Mama is just going to bleed for a week, but will live to tell the tale.”

  She slowly lifts her head from my leg and tilts her head at me letting me know she has no freaking clue what I’m telling her. She scooches closer to me and leans her body against my leg, I give her another pat on the head and scratch behind the ears before I reach over her to open the cabinet door below my sink to retrieve my economy-size box of tampons.

  “FUCK!” I shout when I find only one super-sized tampon left in the box.

  How is this possible? I never would’ve let my stash get this low.

  “Damn it, Ava Bennett!” I scold myself as I grab the last tampon and toss the box to the floor.

  Bella tilts her head in confusion toward me.

  I continue scolding myself. “You are twenty-three years old and should know better!”

  I smack my palm on my forehead when I remember why I am out of tampons. I completely forgot that when my friend Sue was here last weekend during her Beaver Fever week, she forgot to bring her own tampons so I told her to use mine. Thank God I warned her that she’d better leave me at least one super, just in case I forget to get more. So, what did she do? She used all of them, except the one. Do I know myself or what? Of course I would forget!

  I unwrap the little rat-bastard and well, you know what I did next. If you don’t, well then you have had one sheltered-ass life and I don’t have time to go into all the details of what one does with a tampon, so I will just say this: the little white mouse went to visit the beaver in her den, leaving only her little tail to be seen. If you still don’t get it, I can’t help you.

  I flush and pull up my pants then, after washing my hands, I wander off to my bedroom to trade in my super-awesome sexy panties for my super-not-sexy it’s that time of the month black granny panties. Bella follows close behind me and jumps on the bed once we enter my bedroom. You would think she is staring at me to get a better view of my craziness but, she doesn’t really care how crazy I am as long as I feed her twice a day and toss her a treat anytime she comes in from outside. I give her another pat on the head to tell her that I love her.

  After pulling the tent they call panties on, I fall backwards onto my bed and allow Bella to comfort me. She licks my face a few times before placing her head on my chest. Her head moves up and down with each breath I take as I contemplate my choices.

  One, I can get up and make a run to the store now and get this over with, or two, I can procrastinate by finishing the sappy romance movie I was watching before I was so rudely interrupted, then go to bed and deal with it when I get up in the morning.

  On the one hand, if I procrastinate, by morning my granny panties will look like a freaking crime scene happened while I slept and, on the other hand, if I go now I will have to deal with weird middle-of-the-night shoppers.

  Damn it, Sue should have known to leave me at least two supers.

  And she calls herself my friend.

  Slowly and with a huge amount of effort, I contort my neck to look at the clock on my nightstand—It’s twelve thirty-seven in the morning. Ugh, I hadn’t realized it had gotten so late. I guess my super awesome Friday night filled with a few stupid romantic movies, popcorn, and snuggling with Bella was more entertaining than I thought. This is what happens when you are twenty-three, have no money, live alone, currently without a boyfriend, and you are PMS-ing to the point of not wanting to go out with your friends.

  “Urrr, focus Ava, focus,” I tell myself as I rub my temples.

  Ok, finish the movie or drive my ass to store? Well, it’s not as if I haven’t watched The Notebook like a thousand times before, so I suppose the smart money bets on me getting my lazy, bloated, chocolate-craving ass
up to head to the store for an even more exciting-action packed Saturday.

  “BARK. BARK.” Bella lifts her head from my chest before she scrambles off the bed and runs to sit, barking, in the doorway.

  I’m startled but not surprised. She often does this to me, so much that I wonder if she knows what I’m thinking. Can dogs read our minds? Do they have some sixth sense that allows them to know exactly what their human is thinking?

  I give her my best squinty-eyed look of curiosity as I ponder the possibilities. She, in turn, wriggles in excitement and inches her body closer before jumping back onto the bed and nudging her nose against my arm.

  “FINE, I’m going!” I tell her as I jump off of my bed.

  I hurriedly toss on some clothes, then do a quick check in the mirror to make sure I don’t look like a complete wreck before grabbing my keys and cell phone and heading for the door.

  This sucks. I really don’t want to be doing this. Mental note, call Sue in the morning and yell at her. Then again, why should I wait until morning? I pull out my cell as I walk down the stairs of my apartment building. I bring the screen to life and bring up my messenger app.

  Ava: SUE!! You SUCK ASS! You left me one damn tampon and now I have to go to the only store open in the middle of the night, you know the one! If I end up on some website because of this, I will NEVER forgive you.

  I know she won’t wake up to my message because she sleeps like the dead. Even so, she will definitely call me when she gets up. And she better be sorry!

  While pulling into the mostly empty parking lot, I remind myself I’m only here for a few things and this mission should be an in-and-out operation, hopefully with very little damage to my checking account.

  Even though there were plenty of open parking spots closer to the door, I parked next to one of those cart port things out of habit. I always try to park next to them so I don’t have very far to walk to put the cart away.

  I started doing this when I realized most drivers in an oversized parking lot are assholes; if you take even ten seconds too long to pull out of your spot, they start honking and tossing out dirty looks. So anything I can do as a pedestrian to limit my exposure to them is just smart thinking, you know, the whole self-preservation stuff. I realize that it’s almost one o’clock in the morning and the chance of running into one of the aforementioned assholes is slim to none. Still, I don’t feel the need to take any chances—those fuckers will wait for a spot that is two spaces closer even if there are five open spaces available.

  After putting my car in park, I turn off the ignition and grab my purse, then I flip down my visor, slide the mirror cover open, and proceed to give myself one last pep talk on how I am not going to detour from my assigned mission.

  “You will not buy anything you do not need! You will keep your eyes to the floor when passing shiny things! You will not enter the clothing area! You will stay focused at all times!” I sternly tell my reflection with an I-mean-business glare.

  As I flip the visor back up, I think about how someone can walk into a store for two or three items, then come out an hour later carrying ten bags of crap they didn’t need and feeling like it has only been fifteen minutes. What power do these walls hold over us? Is there some kind of time warp that happens once you walk past the automatic sliding doors?

  I take a deep breath and again remind myself that my checkbook cannot take a big blow this week. I unbuckle my seatbelt, open my car door, then step out. It's a nice, warm summer evening; the night air is scented with a faint hint of burning firewood and I realize someone must be having bonfire. I haven’t been to a bonfire in ages so I make a mental note to call Sue and see if she wants to have one next weekend, assuming I survive this week and forgive her for forcing me to venture out at one o’clock in the morning.

  As I walk, my eyes wander around the parking lot and land on the large, blue sign glowing in the night. My mind starts to wander again about the power of this particular big-box store. You hear stories about casinos getting people to stay and play longer by pumping oxygen into the gaming areas, offering free-play cards, free night stays and, most important, free alcohol. Could this superstore giant be pumping oxygen into the air along with their well-known strategy of placing shiny items on end caps for maximum impulse-buying potential? I should probably stand outside and rent blinders to anyone entering, that way they only see whatever is directly in front of them. I could be a millionaire in a week.

  Once my thoughts reach their conclusion, I notice it’s eerily quiet. The normally busy parking lot is empty of people and only a handful of parked cars are scattered around the lot. I am overcome with a sudden sensation that I am being watched. I take another glance around the lot but there is no one to be found. I still can’t shake the feeling, so I quicken my pace and continue to look around and make sure I am not being followed. I know I'm being paranoid, but better safe than sorry.

  I finally reach the giant sliding doors but I’m forced to stop dead in my tracks when I see a man and a woman obviously in some kind of fight, yelling and running toward me. The man is running away from a woman who is chasing him, screaming, and is only a few steps behind him. Any other time, I would have sidestepped as fast as I could, avoided eye contact, and kept walking past them while pretending I didn’t notice a thing. Unfortunately, tonight is not my night because the man is approaching too fast and I don’t have time to get out of his way.

  He’s tall, wearing a hooded sweatshirt and jeans, and he grabs my arms as he passes by me. Before I can react, he spins around behind me in one fluid motion to use me as a human shield against the woman chasing him.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, keep this crazy ass bitch away from me!” he shouts next to my ear.

  “Get over here you limp dick mother-fucking butt-clown!” she yells as she throws what looks like frozen chicken nuggets toward us.

  “I said I was sorry! It was a joke!” he shouts back while keeping his grip on my arms and his body behind mine.

  “Um, could you let me go? I really don’t want to get in the middle of whatever this is,” I yell back to him while trying to hold up my hands to block the flying nuggets.

  Damn it, I should have stayed home and dealt with the vagina crime scene in the morning I tell myself as the woman continues throwing frozen chicken nuggets at me and the man.

  The couple completely ignore the fact that I am there and continue fighting as if I am an invisible shield, rather than the irritated innocent bystander that I am.

  “Baby please, I really love your chicken wings, they are so sexy. I love you, you are the sexiest woman in the world. Please stop.”

  “You’re just sorry I heard your smart-ass little fucking comment. I work all damn day like a damn fool and you lay on the fucking couch playing with yourself, but I gotta come home and cook dinner for your lazy ass. Then you have the nerve to say shit about my body as if I woke up one day and decided I wanted these flabby ass things floating around”

  “Baby, I love you and I promise I will never make fun of your chicken wing arms again,” he says round me. “My mama had wings, too. It wasn’t a big deal, just means you’re getting older. I mean bigger... I mean, shit... Did I tell you how much I love you?”

  I flinch at the man’s words. I definitely felt bad for him at first, but now I want to smack him too. I can’t say with a hundred percent certainty that I know what the hell they are arguing about, but given her rant and seeing her biceps waving at me with each thrown chicken nugget—not to mention the references to chicken wings—he made the horrible mistake of joking about her arms along with the other stuff she said. He is not helping himself with his sorry excuse of a so-called apology either. She is not a large woman by any means, she is average size and maybe in her late forties. I remember my mom getting those flabby upper arms too but we never would make a comment about them. Ever.

  “Fuck you. The day you were born your mama looked at your birth certificate and realized it was an apology from the damn condom com
pany. She should have sued,” the woman shouted while throwing yet another nugget.

  “Baby, please—" the man starts again, peeking his head around my shoulder.

  “OK ENOUGH!” I shout, shaking my shoulders free.

  They both stop long enough for me to step away from him. I yank down my shirt that had bunched up and then snatch my purse back onto my shoulder.

  “I am in no mood to deal with your chicken-wing-drama. I am PMSing, cramping, and I’m only here to get some fucking tampons, that’s it. I am not here to referee the two of you. If he’s such a lazy asshole who has no respect for you, then just hurry up and leave his ass already. And while you are at it, leave me out of it,” I yell, puffing out my chest standing tall to let them both know I mean business.

  They both look at each other with wide eyes. He takes a few steps back before the woman places her hands on her hips and, her eyes all pissed off, starts shouting at me.

  “What in the hell you just say to me? Did you really just tell me your kitty is having its monthly then call my man a lazy asshole? Bitch, who the hell do you think you are?” She screams taking a few steps toward me.

  My eyes go wide and immediately regret opening my mouth. I should have gotten free and ran for cover. Why did I have to go off on her? When I don’t respond, she starts throwing the rest of her chicken nuggets at me as hard as she can.

  I pull my purse up to my face to block the flying breaded chicken hunks coming straight at me. Why, why me? All I wanted was to sit at home and enjoy a few cheesy romantic comedies while cuddling up to Bella. Yet here I am, dealing with this shit in the middle of the night.

  “I’m sorry Please stop. I just want to get a box of tampons and go home. Please just leave me alone!” I shout between the thumps chicken nuggets pelting against my purse.

  The woman either doesn’t hear me or doesn’t care because she just keeps mumbling under her breath and throwing chicken at me. Luckily, she finally runs out of nuggets. As soon as I hear her complain that the bag is empty I pull my purse down from my face and search for an escape route. I assess the woman first, and she still looks pissed off. I am frozen in place as I watch her crumple up the empty nugget bag, toss it at the man, then stomps towards me in a huff, anger still filling her expression. I glance past her to see the sliding doors are close behind her. If I can just get through them, I should find asylum in the safety of the retail giant, where they have employees that will hopefully help me get out of this ridiculous situation.