She’s Really Pushing It

(My family has gathered to celebrate a birthday, and I go with my fifteen-year-old cousin to buy a cake. Since it’s quite busy, I tell my cousin to get in line for the registers while I go and pick the cake. Just as I’m getting in line with her, a middle-aged woman cuts the line right in front. My cousin speaks up but the woman just tells her to get out of her way. I tell my cousin to just let it go, and when she asks why, I say, loudly:)

Me: “Well… it’s clear that she’s in such a hurry, she can’t wait any longer and felt it necessary to be rude to other people and cut the line. If we let her go before us, we get to be the kind young people who let an older lady who’s in a hurry go first, while she ends up as the one who shouted and almost pushed a fifteen-year-old girl.”

(The woman, as was my intention, heard me and began to shout at me and my cousin. The manager approached her and asked her to leave, because she had cut the line and was annoying the other customers.)