by A.E. Hodge
* * *
By the time I reach the office, breathless and clutching a lukewarm McCoffee, it’s almost ten o’clock, another sunless morning in Midtown Detroit. In a half-assed attempt at hiding my lateness, I slip through the back door of the Law Offices of Spector & Krunk, Attorneys at Law.
The sight of my reflection in the hallway mirror makes me wince—my long red hair, still wet from the shower, is drying into a mess, and my green eyes look drab without makeup. My purple blouse is wrinkled for lack of ironing.
My unusual height makes it hard to sneak into the office unnoticed, and I’m forced to smile and wave at the older woman working reception. Her eyes slide from me to the clock on the wall with disapproval.
When I reach my tiny two-walled cubicle, I set my knock-off purse under the desk and sit down. Invoices and documents pile up in my black plastic “To-Do” bin, but I ignore these. Like my tardiness and my frumpy appearance, work couldn’t concern me less right now.
I turn on my computer, sip coffee nervously, and start to research my son’s latest ailment.
Pinworms are small white roundworms that live in your upper digestive tract. At night, the female pinworms crawl out of your ass and expel their eggs while you sleep. The eggs make you itch, and when you scratch yourself you get the eggs under your nails, and then in your mouth, and thus back in your guts—the circle of life. According to Google, it’s one of the most common parasites. Over forty percent of the human population has or has had a pinworm infection. Most probably don’t even know it.
A trace of sandalwood cologne penetrates my concentration, and I turn to see the office intern, Christian, leaning casually against the gray wall of my cubicle. He wears a light blue Oxford shirt, perfectly fitted and tucked, no blousing. His dark hair’s long, but neat. When I look up, he moves in closer, eyeing my computer screen. “No solitaire this morning?” he observes.
I’ve been so pre-occupied, I almost forgot about Christian. Today is his last day in the office. “Do you know what a pinworm is?” I ask him.
He lifts an eyebrow. I motion him closer and he stands behind my faux-leather chair to watch my computer screen while I play an online video taken by a microscopic medical camera. The video shows hundreds of worms crawling on the glossy red walls of someone’s intestines. Christian sums it up perfectly: “Nasty.”
“But harmless. Almost always harmless.” I smile cheerlessly. “You could have them and not even know it.”
He looks a little concerned for me. “Is that so?”
“Sorry,” I say, realizing what I’m talking about—and who I’m talking to. “It’s just my son has these things. Here I am this morning, trying to work the damn coffee machine, and Troy comes in and says his turd has a tail...”
Christian smirks. “How is he?”
I shrug. “He still wanted to go to school.” I sigh and shake my head. “I should’ve been washing his bed sheets more often…”
“He probably caught it from school,” Christian assures me. “Those shit-holes are incubators for disease.”
I mistrust Christian’s smile; that damn cocky smile. “I’ll start washing his sheets every week,” I say again.
Hoping vaguely that he’ll leave, I swivel back to face my computer. The worms greet me on the monitor and I feel a pang of nausea as I close the web browser. The desktop background on my PC is a tranquil image of the sunset over the Mediterranean. My husband used to take photos for calendars before he died. I always thought this photo was his most beautiful.
Behind me Christian says, “They were talking about us in the break room.”