Lloyd,(the co-worker in the previous blog entry) became
a true nuisance, whether from low intelligence or no social skills I couldn’t
say but it did become a game to see how long it would take me to run him off.
On one particular night I was in no mood when he approached me and a co-worker with nothing
important to say but decided to run his mouth anyway. My co-worker, Frank, and
I had met up because we had candy and were planning on eating it but the
man-child who stopped to annoy us didn’t rank up there as someone I would share
candy with so we had to put off our snack. That reason alone gave me license
for what I was about to say to him. For
a bit we made some small talk with him, thinking that at some point he would
wander off and annoy others but as luck would have it, he had no one else he
wanted to bother or else they were all better at hiding than Frank and I had
been. After what seemed like a lifetime of listening to him talk about his mom
and his sister and his brother and his neighbor’s sister’s best friend’s uncle
I had had enough and it just flew out of my mouth. It was out before I knew
what I’d said, it didn’t take the time to complete itself as a coherent thought
in my head , it just formed and became ‘moron-be-gone’. I looked him straight
in the face and asked “Do you think your parents still do it?” I was shocked at
myself and mortified that he might actually answer this question. Maybe he came
from a completely inappropriate family where this subject didn’t make his skin
crawl as it should’ve. I stood my ground; I didn’t give myself pause or permission to look
away. I had said it and if I acknowledged that I shouldn’t have said it then
that would’ve put me in the position to be nice to this headache of a man for
all time. There would be more conversations because if I show that I am sorry
or feel that I crossed the line then that gives him the upper hand, it shows a
change in the balance of power and I refuse, refuse to be held to niceties of
office politics. I continue to look at him as though expecting an answer.
Truthfully I expected him to flush and walk away but that would’ve been too
simple. He sputters and says that "no, they don’t do it, my dad sleeps on the
couch" to which I hip him to the fact that people can have sex on couches. I
can’t shut up, at this point I am so tired of him that I just keep talking,
arguing. Frank has a look of total astonishment on his face, mixed with a look
that says he is trying with all his might to not laugh. To the comment I made
about the couch as a place for rampant, wild, hot, sweaty sex he assures me
that they do not have sex anymore. I ask how he knows this. He tells me that he
just knows. I say that that is no answer. He stutters, clearly uncomfortable
and wanting this to be over but it’s not going to be over, not until he leaves
me and my friend to our candy consumption. We could be in for a long night of
back-and-forthing about his parent’s sex life and considering that Lloyd is
wholly unattractive I don’t want to even think about the parents doing it on
the family sofa. Finally I say to him that since he is standing in front of me
and I know that he has a sister and a brother that I also know that his mom has
given it up at least three times in her cloistered and virginal life and he
might as well accept that. He has a blank look on his face, it seems that the
wheels in his head are turning and that maybe he never considered the fact that
he and his siblings were not conjured out of thin air or found in the cabbage
patch or grown in a jar like sea monkeys or even adopted. He turns and leaves.
Frank and I ate our candy and laugh ourselves stupid over the conversation that
just occurred. It became the stuff of legend. I did not get fired although I
did sweat it out for a while, waiting to see if I got a call to visit H.R. to
discuss my inappropriate conduct. It was inappropriate and I have no excuse
other than I just couldn’t take it anymore and I snapped. It was rather
out-of-body like, truth be told.
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