Why Does No One Understand Personal Space?!

I have an immune system the equivalent of dunking a teabag in a bath and pretending it’s the same as in a teacup. It’s a mess with my medication, but that’s what keeps me alive. You can imagine, a global health crisis has not been a fun time for me. I’ve been super careful and lost out on two years of my “best years” of life.

Local rules have eased up the lockdown and the holidays are coming. I’ve tried my best to order online and avoid… humans… but I have one package I need to collect in person at a mall. The store is near the entrance, so I decide to chance plague central. I live life on the edge. 

Most people are over the lockdown and all over the place. Luckily, I’m shopping in a store that’s quite quiet when I go in. I timed super early to avoid people. It’s practically empty, so I take my first chance in months to actually look at the merchandise in a store. So many shinies I pick up to buy.

There is one woman nearby, though. I think she is just interested in the specific merch like me… but as I get my new purchases and pull my personal hand gel from my handbag, I hear a voice right next to my ear at the counter.

Woman: “Oh, that smells amazing! Where did you get it?”

I jump out of my skin!

Me: “I ordered it from [Store]. Back off from my shoulder!”

She looks like I just threw her prized kitten into a pack of rabid wolves.

Woman: “I was only asking. I have a son with the same taste! I thought I might be able to ask…”

Me: “Back up first!”

Woman: “You are the rudest young woman I’ve ever met! I’m so at risk being out in the open like this.”

And then, with her mask at half-mast under her nose, she flounced away with the grace of a distressed jellyfish. 

Luckily, I did not catch the yuckies from her.