THE SPLIT
Rolling like he was strapped to a waterwheel . . . That's how Terry Padlook's stomach felt. He sat at his desk in agony as his insides growled like a dying animal. Terry didn't know what caused the discomfort; maybe it was the four day old meat on his sandwich, maybe it was the mould within his bread, or the germs from his flask that he never cleaned out or the off milk on his cereal that morning. Who knew? What he did know was that he had to go to the toilet . . . Again.
Terry ran to the toilet avoiding eye contact with anybody so that there was no potential risk of being stopped for conversation. He dived into the gaudy white, red and orange decored toilets (a colour scheme specifically designed to make people want to leave as soon as possible,) and hurried himself into the cubicle, dropping his trousers like it was his wedding night. The slodgey sounds echoed around the toilet were uncomfortable and embarrassing and he was glad the cubicles next to him were unoccupied. After several loud and painful bursts (partly due to the previous night's madras) terry crouched to pull his pants up when he noticed something staring back at him, something announcing its presence in a most awkward way. It was a stain. A long brown stain along the seam of his shorts, looking right back at him. Bastard! He hadn't done anything like that since primary school. He wondered briefly if it was a sign of prostate cancer before deciding to whip off his shorts and go commando till lunchtime, at least, when he could get some replacement boxers (you can take the man out of the eighties . . .)
After Terry removed his shorts he decided to remain seated for a short while. With him having an earthquake stomach today he knew he'd better stay and wait for any aftershocks. Satisfied that there were going to be no more surprises he pulled his pants up and left the solace of the cubicle. He made the short journey to the sink, shoved the offending shorts deep into the bin, far out of right of any of his colleagues, and began to wash his hands (he couldn't understand the mentality of those who didn't) when a roar came from his stomach that sounded like he'd swallowed Godzilla and he was trying to fight his way out. Terry ran back into the cubicle and yanked his pants down while planting his arse on the seat.
“FRRRRRUURRRRRPPP!”
Terry felt a wave of slurry leave and was delighted he managed to make the booth in time. He wiped and waited and waited again for any further tremors and then made a move to leave. It was then that he noticed what the source of the noise was, and it wasn’t his arse. In his hurry to get his pants down and his legs open he’d caused his trousers to split at the crotch. The gap was huge across with three tenuous threads holding firm across the five inch tear, the orange floor beneath making the strands look like the eye of Sauron and feeling just as evil, too. Now he was sat on the toilet with a massive gap between his trousers, his boxers in the bin with a huge stain down them. He was caught in a perfect diarrhoea trap!
He just sat there a few moments and considered what he should do first . . . Flush! He shuffled sideways lowered the lid and pressed the button, scouring the bowl of its fowl contents. The poo gone his only problem now was him and his pants. He sat back down on the toilet and stared ...The gap was enormous. There was simply no way he could return to his desk without having his balls dangling between his legs which was not a good look for him.
“Okay, Terry, keep calm, keep calm, just think . . . How are you going to get out of this,” Terry thought as the evil eye of Sauron stared back at him. As he saw it he could pull his pants really high, go back into the office, grab his coat, go to the lift, tie his jacket inconspicuously around his waist, go to Mark's and Spencer’s to get some new underwear ...Or ...Wait here and hope no-one noticed he'd gone till the end of the day. The latter had a shameless appeal but fortune favoured the brave. He yanked his trousers up as far as they would go, tucked his testes down the left leg and hoped for the best. He left the booth and headed out, just as he did the door opened and in walked another bloke from his floor. Terry felt his stomach churn again, this time in fear rather than indigestion.
The bloke didn't even look at terry and instead headed for the urinals, he was safe. Until he felt one of his balls tumble over the gap. Terry had made it to the door but when he looked down there was this single gonad looking back at him saying “Remember me?” Terry had no choice and hurried back into the cubicle.
The gap in his pants could not be held shut by merely walking with his thighs together, it was way too vast for that and he would probably wind up getting arrested and sacked for indecent exposure if he risked it and headed for his coat. When at first he was thinking of options it seemed like a challenge, now the options were falling faster than senior bankers bonuses. He had to come up with another exit strategy. Of course, his phone! He could ring personnel claim to have had to go home sick, wait till everyone had headed home themselves then sneak back to section get his coat and head home at the end of the day when there was virtually nobody there. True he would have to suffer the indignity of losing a day's say to illness but it would be worth it.
Terry punched the number of personnel after the guy taking a whizz had exited the toilets. He waited and waited and then there it was; that stupid engaged tone. He pressed redial ...Same again ...And again. The worst thing about that was that the woman on personnel who recorded pick leave probably wasn't even registering sickness. The dumb-head was probably busy talking to her boyfriend over on estates, silly cow! Terry decided to do the next best thing and call his supervisor instead. He rang the number.
“You’re speaking to Jack Hallow, how can I help?” the voice replied. Sweet. Just a few more seconds and he’d be free to suffer an agonising but non-humiliating wait in the cubicles all day.
“Hello, it’s Terry here,” said Terry, putting on his best pretending-to-be-ill voice.
“Oh. You all right, Terry? Where are you?” asked Jack, fake concern echoing through the supervisor’s voice. Just as Terry was about to reply the door went again.
“Er, I’ve had to head home. I’m not feeling well at all.”
“Oh right,” said Jack. Terry, of course, was supposed to report to his supervisor and consult with personnel if he felt unwell. They both knew that but Terry was just hoping he’d let it slide till the return-to-work meeting. “Okay, but you do realise you’re supposed to report any illness while you’re still in the building you know?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. Sorry about that,” Terry replied.
“Where are you?” said Jack.
“Just driving home,” replied Terry. “A-COUGH! COUGH! COUGH!”
For a moment there was silence down the phone.
“Terry?” came a voice from over the booth.
“Oh no!” thought Terry.
“Terry?” repeated Jack. “Who was that?”
“Er, I’ll call you back,” replied Terry. As he tried to hang up he he heard the door in the next booth open and close. He looked up and eight little fingers appeared over the lip and then the face of one Terry’s colleagues, Randy Weiss, a snide, conniving individual, possibly the only person on the planet who suited the term portly reptile. The top half of his podgy face appeared at the edge and looked down, curiosity etched into the eyes and eyebrows.
“Terry, what are you up to?” asked Randy, his eyes flicking from Terry’s face to the crotch of his trousers and the massive gap now staring back up at both of them. “Oh dear!” he laughed before disappearing and leaving the toilets.
“Bollocks!” spat Terry! His smooth escape strategy was suddenly becoming rougher than a fisherman’s arse. Terry put his head in his hands. The day had betrayed him more than anyone could be betrayed; his stomach, his shorts, his trousers and now the universe itself seemed to be conspiring against him. The toilet door opened again.
“Terry?” it was Jack. Clearly Randy had informed him that Terry hadn’t left the building. He wondered what he was telling all the other members of his team. “What’s happened?”
“Well,” began Terry. This was the part he wasn’t looking to. Explaining the embarrassing nature of his predicament. “I had a bit of an, er, accident, and I had to ditch my underwear. Then I had another accident and although I made it back to the toilet in time I split my trousers at the crotch.”
“Can the hole be held together with safety pins?” asked Jack. Terry looked down. So convinced was Terry that the split had become an eye that he expected it to blink.
“No it would need about twenty of them and I don’t think I could walk properly with that much metal between my legs.”
“Is it really that bad?” asked Jack. Unlike Randy he seemed to have a sense of decorum and wasn’t about to peer over the top of the booth uninvited.
“Yeah, it’s that bad,” Terry responded.
“The nearest Top-Shop here is about ten minutes walk. If you want I could take your wallet and get some more underwear and trousers for you,” said Jack.
“Would you?” asked Terry.
“Well yeah. We can’t just leave you all day in here,” said Jack, seeming genuinely to care now.
“Please,” said Terry.
“Okay, stay put. I’ll be about twenty minutes,” replied Jack before heading out. All Terry could do now was wait. He looked at his phone and clicked onto one of the games on there. He’d never felt more alone in all of his previous thirty-two years on the planet. He pushed and pulled at the screen to move the balls into the targets and kept flicking from that to the clock to see how long it had been since Jack had left to get some replacement clothes. Eventually the loneliness got too much and Terry moved over to Facebook and Twitter to see what was happening there. He opened up his Facebook page and the details were so horrifying he nearly lost control of his sphincter again.
There on the page were dozens of messages about his ...Accident, with all of his colleagues chipping in with jokes and puns about his predicament. “Oh dear, what can the matter be, Terry Padlook’s trapped in the lavatory!” began one message, followed by “LOL. I nearly had an accident myself laughing at that.” Someone had out on twitter “What have strawberries, banana’s and Terry Padlook all have in common? They all make great splits!” and that was just one of the clean ones. Everyone in the office was making fun of him, mocking his terrible plight. It was then as he sat nervously waiting for new clothes to arrive that he realised something ...He couldn’t go back to his desk today.
Everyone knew what had happened and what was going on and he couldn’t return to that environment knowing people were laughing at him behind his back (And in all fairness to his face too!) the toilet door then opened.
“Terry?” said Jack. Terry wondered where Jack thought he might go bearing in mind his current predicament but he didn’t mention that.
“I’m here,” replied Terry, meekly.
“Oh right. Listen I got your trousers and some new underwear, I wasn’t sure of your size so I got you the best matches I could with that in mind,” began Terry while removing the clothing from the bag and inspecting it like a salesman. “Catch!”
The clothing fell into his booth into Terry’s lap. Jack had clearly decided to be generous in sizes and with the help of his old belt he was able to wear them in relative comfort. After he got them on and felt comfortable he sat back down on the toilet lid, his arms wrapped around his body and his knees up against his chest.
“Do they fit?” asked Jack, noticing the sudden quiet.
“Yeah,” replied Terry, sullenly.
“So are you coming back out then?” Jack asked, wondering why the door hadn’t opened yet.
“No,” Terry replied. “I can’t.”
“I thought you said the pants fit,” Jack asks.
“They do, but I can’t come out,” said Terry. “They all know. Everybody knows what has happened. I can’t go out and face all that embarrassment for the rest of the day. I just can’t!”
“Well, what are you going to do then?” Jack asked. “Just stay in there for the rest of the day?”
For a moment the only answer that greeted Jack was silence.
“Yes,” replied Terry.
Jack shook his head in annoyance. He wanted to kick the door in and drag his wussy colleague out of there.
“You do realise you might get sacked for this?” asked Jack. “At the least there will be major professional consequences!”
Again he was greeted with silence before the reply came back.
“Yes,” Terry replied.
“Fine then!” said Jack before leaving the toilets. Terry sat there and thought. In fact for the rest of the day that’s all he did; occasionally out of curiosity he would browse back to Facebook or Twitter on his phone and see yet more disparaging comments and jokes at his expense. Every time he did he realised that the exile from work was going to last even longer than just today. In fact he didn’t know if he could come in tomorrow, or the day after that. As time passed more internet traffic came in about his plight with even overseas contributors ripping into him. Eventually he saw a remark that was supposedly from Chris Rock which he thought was a low blow. Eventually time passed the point were some people on the early shifts that day had left. Terry waited some more and eventually heard the late shift leave. He finally felt comfortable leaving his self-imposed prison and went back to his desk to collect his jacket. Jack was sat there waiting for him.
“Management were not happy with you,” said Jack, menacingly. “The only reason they didn’t come in there and drag you out was that when it was discussed someone said “You’re taking the piss,” and they all started to laugh!”
“I’m sorry,” said Terry.
“You’re sorry!” Jack retorted. “Well that makes things easier for me, doesn’t it? That shows I can control my staff and am fit to be a manager! This affects me too, you know? You haven’t just affected things for you, you’ve affected them for me! We’ll talk about this when you get in tomorrow!”
Jack grabbed his coat and left. Terry did the same shortly after.
The next morning Terry rang in sick. He couldn’t face work due to stress ...The day after was the same, and the day after that, and the day after that. By the end of the week he was given an ultimatum to get in or get fired, instead he sent in a sick note. The law was on Terry’s side and while the Doctor kept signing him off due to stress their wasn’t much anyone could do. His work hated him but Terry’s stress wasn’t going anywhere. Twitter and Facebook gained even more comments with even Youtube showing spoofs of his tragic plight. His lowest point came when it was mentioned as a joke on the satirical news show “Mock the Week”. But eventually he couldn’t sign off any more and his work had to let him go...
TWO YEARS LATER
“...And it is due to the Benefit’s Agency’s blinding refusal to accept that Mister Padlook’s stress was real and therefore that Incapacity Benefit was due to him, that caused him to lose his house, have to sell his car and was almost certainly a factor in the end of his marriage. This is the reason the damages awarded to Mister Padlook are so high. I therefore award Mister Padlook the full nine thousand, eight hundred and two pounds incapacity benefit for two years, plus a further ...”
The judge paused. This was his X-Factor moment. The journalists in the public gallery all leaned forward, the barristers for both parties, the jury even the court recorder seemed to lean nearer to hear what the damages would be.
“...Two-hundred and fifty thousand pounds!” said the judge. Terry welled up at the verdict. Since that date with destiny’s diarrhoea, Terry’s life had been going down the proverbial toilet. When he’d lost everything he had started legal proceedings, not for the money, but to restore his pride and dignity and finally ...finally, he had that back.
On leaving court the media, who before now had made his life equally miserable, were now clamouring for some words from the very man they mocked. Terry’s barrister started to field questions but, feeling as inflated as the goodyear blimp by the scale of his victory, Terry decided to chip in.
“I’ll handle this, Roger,” said Terry, arrogantly. “Any questions?”
The journalists jostled like it was the first day at the Harrods sale. Terry pointed at the BBC reporter.
“How do you feel?”
“A nice easy one,” thought Terry before answering.
“Well it feels like I’ve lost a huge weight...” began Terry. It was then he heard it ...A snigger coming from the back. That wasn’t meant to happen. He had his dignity back. Someone else sounded like they were stiffling a chuckle too. He had to keep calm and just make sure that the next few words were chosen wisely. “I’m just ...I’m just very relieved!”
It was then that the laughing started and once it started it could not stop. Even Terry’s barrister was laughing.
“Ah well, back to square one!” thought Terry.
The end.
Don’t forget my first novel “FREE AT LAST: A NOVEL” by Zoe Lambert and Mike Lambert is still available to buy on Amazon: kindle
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