Goodbye Rosie

(A brief conversation on the checkout line got a little hot. It got to this point quickly.)
He was ignoring me.
He’d had enough of my chat and was reading the label of a pack of Skittles from the candy rack by the checkout to indicate that it had replaced me as his focus of attention.
My last comment was the final straw.
He lowered the skittles just enough to allow his eyes to meet mine.
“You touch my face, you’re gunna have a problem.”
He said with a tone that convinced me that that would indeed be the sequence of events.
“I’m not saying I’m going to touch your face, I’m just saying that I can,” I clarified.
He slid his stuff up to the cashier and turned to me, “Yeah well I’m saying you can’t, alright?”
“No, the CDC said I can…in a way.”
“Buddy, maybe you should leave,” he hissed, making it more of an order than a suggestion.
“We got off on the wrong foot here, all I’m saying is the CDC says we shouldn’t touch our own faces. They said nothing about touching other people’s faces,” I explained.
Remember when you nagged your mother while she was washing dishes? She’d stop scrubbing and without turning her head she’d warn you to back off but she’d say it to the soapy water in the sink – and you knew she meant business.
Thats what he did, just like my mother but with a deeper voice. “Are you out of your fricken mind?” He growled to his stuff by the register.
“I’m not qualified to answer that question,” I said, matter-of-factly.
He snorted and shook his head.
“Look,” I pointed to the entrance, “those two guys pushing the lumber cart, you can touch their faces if you want…according to the CDC…I think. Definitely ask permission first, though.”
He ignored me while the young girl gave him his receipt. He wished her well, threw me a glance letting me know he was done with me and left.
I pushed my things to the cashier who finally let herself laugh having listened to the whole conversation.
“Who’s Rosie?” She asked.
“Who?”
“Rosie. You told that guy that you think she’s ‘patient zero’ for the coronavirus?”
“Oh yeah. She’s the Queen of Corona. Just a theory I’m working on. I think she has some ‘splainin’ to do.”
“Queen?”
“That’s right- Rosie, the queen of Corona.”
She shrugged her shoulders.
“Ugh. Google “Me and Julio” when you get home.”
“Ok, after all this I will. Would you like to put this purchase on your Home Depot credit card?”
“I’d rather put it on yours.”
“You can’t. “
“In that case, I’d like to pay with spices and fine cloths.”
She laughed.
The coronavirus didn’t take away her sense of humor as it did with the grumpy guy on line with me.
Don’t let it take yours.