The stain will not come out. She stood in the bathroom with a wet paper towel vigorously scrubbing the red stain on her white shirt. It wasn’t working, of course. All she was doing was creating a larger pink stain that kept blooming over her chest. Her dark disheveled hair hung over her face as she bent down to wet the towel again. It wasn’t going to work and she knew it. She was panicking now and they would know. The minute she stepped outside that door, everyone would know.
Her eyes frantically searched the small bathroom for anything that might help. There was nothing. The white subway tiles had turned dull over the years and no matter how much bleach the cleaning lady used the grout remained black. The white floor tiles were a dingy beige in places where there was the heaviest traffic - in a loose circle in front of the sink, the toilet and the hand dryer. There was an extra roll of toilet paper still wrapped in tissue perched on the tank. The roll on the holder was almost gone.
Marks on the walls indicated there used to be a door stall separating the room. Attempts had been made to update the women’s bathroom by removing the door and adding a handicap rail on the wall to make it accessible. The rail, along with the Kimberly-Clark soap and paper towel dispensers, was
the only thing that looked like it belonged in this decade.
She wondered why the bathroom had not been updated. Places like this usually boasted a comfortable and stylish women’s powder room. It was the type of place that would have real terry cloth hand towels with expensive soaps and lotions on the counter alongside a bowl of mints or chocolates.
Time was slipping away and she knew someone would stumble onto the gruesome scene in the adjoining parking lot any moment. She only managed to sneak in there unnoticed because it was before the evening rush and the maître d’ was not at his station. She kept listening for sirens but didn’t know if she would be able to hear them in here.
"Think! Think! What are you going to do? Quickly! What are you going to do?"
She scanned the bathroom over and over again. There was no window, nothing that would grant her an escape. The hum of voices outside was steadily increasing in volume. Then she noticed she had left the door unlocked. She quickly pushed in the button on the silver knob and returned to the sink. She looked at the mirror and for a moment and was surprised to see her mother’s face staring back at her. Her mother, what did she used to say about getting out stains? She used to lecture her all the time on how to wash out her undergarments of menstrual blood. And then it hit her.
Luckily this was an old-fashioned bathroom and there was a handle for the plunger behind the faucet. She turned the hot water on and while the sink was filling she took her off her blouse. Holding the blouse under the soap dispenser, she pushed the button until the entire stain was covered under a
layer of foam. She plunged it into the hot water, pushing in downward to completely submerge the stain. As she agitated the water it turned a pastel pink and then a darker rose. Scrubbing with the palms of her hands, she then switched to using her knuckles, causing as much friction as she could. The small cuts on her wrists and forearms stung.
She pulled the plug handle up, switched the water to cold and rinsed away the pink soap from the blouse. She wrung it out and as she turned toward the hand dryer she heard the door knob rattle. She froze. There was a soft knock on the door.
“Um. . . it’s occupied,” she said nervously.
“Oh, sorry,” came a woman’s voice from outside.
She glanced at the crack on the bottom of the door and could see a shadow where the woman stood. It wasn’t moving. She was going to wait.
“Uh. . . I’m going to be a few minutes.”
There was a moment’s pause and she thought the woman wasn’t going to leave. She stood in the middle of the bathroom, holding the dripping blouse and her breath. Then she saw the shadow recede. She rushed over to the hand dryer and pushed the big silver button. The light polyester blouse wouldn’t take long to dry. It took restarting the hand dryer five times before she felt it was dry enough. The edges were still damp but she didn’t think anyone would notice.
Grabbing a few paper towels, she wiped down the sink and then the drops on the floor. She couldn’t just throw it in the trash and her purse was too small to hold the wad of towels. She stepped over to the toilet. If she tried to flush them it would just block the toilet.
She suddenly got an image of her brother when he was young. He liked to eat paper. He would rip off small pieces at time and eat them, one by one. He said it was easier to get down that way. Standing over the toilet, she began shredding the paper towels into small bits and dropping them in the toilet. She would flush after shredding each one. By the time the tank filled again she would have the next
one shredded. When she flushed the last of them down she waited a few moments to make sure they would not come back up then walked over to the mirror.
From her purse, she took out a hairclip, twisted her hair into a loose French twist and clipped it in place. She could feel her heart and breathing starting to slow. She applied some powder from her compact and tried to cover up the blotches of red on her face. Then she added her favorite fuchsia
lipstick. All in all she didn’t think anyone would be able to tell what she had been through in the last forty-five minutes. A last look around the bathroom revealed everything was pristine and in order.
She grabbed the knob, opened the door and stepped out of the bathroom. The maître d’ was now at his station. He smiled at her as she approached and she was relieved there was nothing in his face to suggest he noticed anything wrong.
“Good evening, madam. How many in your party?”
“Two. We have a reservation under Hughes,” she said. She was shocked how normal her voice sounded.
“Yes, ma’am. Your other party hasn’t arrived yet. Would you like to have a drink at the bar or be seated now?”
“I prefer to be seated now. He should be here soon.”
She followed him and was thankful their table was toward the back, far away from the bright light coming in the windows.
He handed her the menu and informed her that her server for the evening would be Amanda before he returned to his station.
Amanda had seen the maître d’ escorting the lady to the table. Once the lady was seated, she grabbed her pad and the wine list, repeating in her head the daily specials.
“Good evening. My name is Amanda and I will be serving you tonight. Will there be two of you?”
“Yes.”
“Would you care for a drink while you’re waiting for your party?”
“Yes. A drink would be lovely. Woodford Reserve, neat.”
“I’ll get that for you while you look at the appetizers.”
And then Amanda did what she always did with female guests. Men were good tippers, but not if they had a woman with them. They felt that tipping anything over the standard 18% would make their wives/girlfriends jealous and would make trouble in the car ride home. Women who were with men tipped well because they wanted to prove that they weren’t jealous. So, if you wanted a good tip, you had to get the woman on your side. And the easiest way to do that is to pick something about them and pay them a compliment.
“By the way, that’s a lovely blouse. I love that shade of pink.”
