Under Starter's Orders

Gunfight at the MS Coral.
I eyed the woman like a stock car racer might try to eyeball his opponent while they were waiting for the lights to change. I was under starter’s orders, every muscle and sinew tensed, ready for the off. She gave me a look of distain, like I was not fit to be on the same playing field as her; an unworthy opponent who would no doubt fall at the first hurdle. She puffed herself up like a horny pigeon trying to psyche me out. But I stood tall and towered over her from the moral high ground that I was standing on.

After all I had been there first, and okay I maybe have been the only one in the queue, but I had dutifully followed the sign that said queue this way. I had obediently gone through the maze of retractable belt barriers that normally kept the queue in check. I was the good upstanding citizen, she was the upstart, the pusher inner, the queue jumper. She was standing at the exit waiting to be served, brazenly ignoring the signs,. This woman was completely flouting all conventions, all shopping etiquette. No doubt believing that because she was pushing 165 years old she could do what she jolly well liked. Well she couldn’t, she hadn’t lived through the Crimean War so common British decency could be thrown out of the window.

I’d been having a shitty day, mostly involving near misses with my feet. I’d just managed to move my foot before a gob of spit from a 90-year-old woman landed exactly where my foot had been. A 90-year-old woman spitting in the street, the elderly of today!  Moments later I managed to get my foot out of the way of a tank-sized pram being pushed down the street by a pram fascist, who obviously thought being fecund made him a superior being and king of the pavement. Mate, saying excuse me as the pram touches the fabric of my shoe is not being polite, it’s merely pretending to be polite.

Anyway as you can imagine I was in no mood to let this rule breaker get served before me. I watched the shop assistant as she bleeped the shopping of the customer in front of me. My muscles twitched as I waited for the starting pistol, I was in the zone, focussed. I’d done my visualisations, seen myself reach the counter first and do my trademark double fist pump. I was ready.

Till open.

Change and receipt handed over.

Thank yous said and we were off.

She was closer but I got the start, my younger reflexes responding quicker to the bell. But she recovered well, showing remarkable agility for a veteran. It was neck and neck, my long steps eating up the ground while her old lady shuffle was efficient and effective. Now it was down to the assistant, which way would she look, which direction would she reach? Surely she would turn to me, after all I had done everything right, been there first, queued properly, she’d seen it all.

But, to my disbelief she reached out to the woman taking her shopping off her and began to process it. I slammed on the brakes and slammed down my shopping, stamping my foot indignantly. The assistant shrugged and gave me a what can I do? look. I turned on my heels and marched away, cutting off my nose to spite my face maybe, but content in the knowledge that I’d been morally right.

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