poopy procrastination

CONTENT WARNING: Graphic descriptions of physical illness and bodily functions done in bathrooms. Do not read while eating.

On some level, the fear of starting a new job had existed long before any hope James might actually have one did. The fear of beginning a new enterprise was always worse before said journey had begun. Anticipation ate at him, hopes existed alongside the ever-present anxiety, but as long as any job was theoretical, James maintained calm. His calm was formed from a lack of belief in the willingness of labs or anywhere else to take a chance on him, but calm was nevertheless a decent state of mind to go through life in.

Now, James was not calm. He was laying in bed, paralyzed by the dread of his future as a grocery store employee. He would have to use a grocery cart, bag items, interact with strangers, have his fellow employees somehow move from strangers to not-strangers.

 James was terrible at remembering names and places, and the grocery store was full of places where things were located that he would have to package and move. He could kill someone if an item arrived at the wrong temperature. If he placed a frozen item in the refrigerated section or vice versa, the temperature danger zone felt like a place any food James had eaten recently must have been because he felt sick to his stomach as these thoughts spiraled, the training videos from the past week terrifying him. 

James let out what he thought was a fart, only to be horrified as it was evidently not as gas-filled as he expected, as James ran to the toilet. His nausea hadn't been entirely anxiety induced, or if was, anxiety must have magically begun causing one to poop mucus when James wasn't paying attention because that's what seemed to be exiting his gut. Mucus and blood clots. Could this be a food borne illness like he had been trained on? Following the bloody toilet paper James let float in the toilet came a cramp that let out another 'fart' which was actually diarrhea.

 James wanted to die, only maybe he already had. Maybe this what how he died, having purchased and eaten his past few meals from the very location where he had been terrified he might kill someone by working at, instead James would be a casualty of some other underpaid employee's failure to check the temperature or how long slices of pizza were out or - James thoughts were interrupted by pain. James didn't know how long had passed. He wondered if he could somehow poop in his sleep, as all he wanted to do was sleep but his gut had very different ideas about what it wanted him to do. Although eventually his stomach had nothing left to expel so James could return back to his comfortable bed.

James curled into as small a ball as he could to soothe his cramping stomach and fell into sleep. Being asleep meant he had no fear anymore. Can't have an anxiety spiral with his brain offline. Sunlight would stream through his window, waking him up in the middle of the afternoon. At first James just felt thirsty, so he walked to the kitchen for water, only as he poured himself a glass, he saw the clock on his microwave. 

James' fear around his first shift at the grocery store had been unnecessary since he had missed the shift altogether. James didn't know what he should do. Although his body led him back to the bathroom so he did that again. But regarding the job he had only just accepted after months of trying to avoid retail, he had missed the entire shift. The first shift, the first one where he would have been on the floor being trained by a person rather than videos on a screen, he had missed that and was still stuck on the toilet. His poop was solid now but the fact that blood accompanied it was still worrying. Not as worrying as the fact he had made a horrible impression by failing to make any impression because he had failed to show up to his first day of work, but still somewhat worrying.

Eventually James was finally able to make himself leave the toilet. He had a phone. He has an obligation to inform his new job about his symptoms, since one of them was diarrhea which in theory could mean he had the very food-borne illnesses he had been fearing causing in other people. James didn't think that was what he had, he suspected he was simply shitting himself in anxiety, but if he called the store and explained he had been having diarrhea, maybe they would appreciate his candor and thoroughness in maintaining a safe work environment and therefore not fire him before he had ever had the opportunity to start. Jakes took his phone off of the charger, then felt a swell of paranoia hit him. He needed to wash his hands first. James returned to the bathroom and then again to his bedroom, hands now clean. No more excuse to procrastinate what was expected of an employee: communication.

Only the act of leaving the bathroom almost immediately brought with it the need to return, to expel still more of what was left in James, but James figured he still ought to call and inform his supervisor, even though he was late, even though he'd be calling from on the toilet. Of all the fears he had had about his first day, he hadn't thought for this to be one of them, but nonetheless James expelled what was left inside him until his body had him wishing he had drank more water so he could have more diarrhea, then once his gut had finally ceased moving anything but air, James flushed the toilet and called the number for the grocery store. 

"Hello, I'm calling for the e-commerce department, I need to speak with Rachel." James stated, surprised at how steady his voice was despite having not spoken outside of grunts and curses all day. The store transferred him to Rachel, the head of the e-commerce department. "Hi Rachel, this is James Finkle, I was supposed to have a shift this morning but I've been having diarrhea all day so since the training had stated diarrhea was one of the symptoms of food-borne illness I couldn't - I'm sorry I'm calling after the fact-"

"It's fine, nobody needs an outbreak right now. You were next scheduled for Wednesday, do you think you'll have recovered by then?"

"I hope so, I'll call tomorrow night if I can't and get the doctor's note needed for three days -"

"No, a doctor's note is only needed if you miss three consecutive shifts in a row, like if you had been schedule today, tomorrow, and Wednesday, then by Wednesday you'd need a note but since you haven't even been trained yet, you - just focus on feeling better, and if you still need to call out by Friday, then we can talk about a doctor's note."

"Oh - okay, thank you!" James ended the call without saying goodbye. His mom would have had a comment about that if she was home. James hoped Rachel just didn't think or attributed his poor manners to being sick. His butt had gone numb since he had still had his pants down during the conversation. He should probably shower, James thought. Maybe he would feel better. Even if he was just moving from bathroom to bedroom to maybe kitchen if he needed water, being clean might still feel better.

James wondered if he was dying. His fears about his first day of work were now entirely irrelevant, replaced by fears around whatever had caused his stomach to torment him.