The Misogynist, again

Women are disgusting creatures, JR thought, dropping the line of cord tied to the knob, and stepping through the door.

The bathroom stank, but not of urine, or not only of urine, or even sweat or body odor. Fecal matter was animal, was regenerative. No, here, reflected JR, pushing each of stall doors open with a baton, here were processes outside nature. A tampon, cotton swollen beyond recognition, lay like a ravaged rodent on the first stall's floor. Presumably it had been beached there; the uneven floors lead away from the door downward to the back wall underneath the sinks. Between the slope and uninterrupted flow from a faucet, the puddle had a tide of its own, the waves lapping at the body of the bloated sanitary napkin.

A girl stepped in, tall, with a vague post-goth cast to her wardrobe. She scanned harder at JR's cheerleader baton than the muck on the floor; possibly all the university toilets were this bad. Or not: JR could see the unraveling threads of the goth's knock-off bag. This wing, though not mandated as such, was unofficially all night students. JR watched as the girl walked into the last stall on the right with swagger and came shuttering out a moment later, dodging into another. By now JR had walked all the way to the end of the row of stalls and stood reviewing her own female visage. Possibly this job did not require the costuming, but she donned it anyway, with a certain glee. Thus the cowgirl hat, the designer hand bag, the pink high tops. Yellow hair hung down on either side of the face.

Women are disgusting, JR thought. What a shame to be one.

This can't come back to the clubs, or here, or to George Pfenning, Pfennigan, whatever the fuck his name is. JR had nodded, lackadaisically, in the office. By now she had already started sporting the cowgirl hat and though light-weight, she liked to allow the hat to bring her head forward as if with gravity, in a movement that eliminated all her features beneath the brim. JR liked the dim of the office; the agency had an aversion to electric lights. She sat on the other side of the desk, watching a line of ants busy about the leg, and reflected that only a handful of cases had needed to be traceable back to one of the clubs. The agency was never involved. But it was probably not bad, she thought, for there to be a public face, or the possibility of a public face, as certain situations called for it.

This job was not one. Jr knew details that led, train-track like to her standing in the flooded college bathroom, but that same line of tracks in her head was devoid of trains, absent of motivations. A dancer, Cheri, had lined up a champagne room with a client on the stipulation that there was no cum to be shot on or near her person. The client, drunk or dumb or both, had shot her face. Later in the evening she had feigned not believing his age, and getting his driver's license, memorized his address. JR's thoughts were diverted to the door. The goth kid had come and gone (with unwashed hands) and now a second vaguely goth figure, although a little shorter and broader with bobbed hair, cut came in.

JR suddenly realized that she was going to enjoy the job.

She had seen, of course, photos of Cheri (formerly Kitten, when her hair had been blond and longer and crimped) and recognized the pointed chin and blunt, flat nose. But looking at her now, JR could extrapolate on the girl's life, constructing connective tissue between the facts gathered in her research. The blond locks and silly name had been changed during her first French class. Nasal intonation, hovering half-breathed r, and unspoken ending letters had proved too tough for a kid in school part time and so a second and third class had not followed. Nevertheless, Cheri-Kitten (also: Becci Sparks) had felt inspired, alienated by the class room and confused by the teacher's chattering, but somehow still inaugurated into something ... else. Special.

Cheri had furtively glanced at JR, dropped her eyes, never saw the baton. JR grinned. What was it about the shy ones? The silly kid, who couldn't meet the eyes of another woman in a public bathroom, had reeked minor havoc with her desperate need to avenge her cummed on face.

JR pulled the cord, shutting and locking the door to the restroom. Cheri had stepped into a stall and startled by the noise half turned. But JR was already there, grinning.