It would be dishonest of me to say that this incident scarred me for life. It did however leave me with a lasting memory, if only as a cruel reminder of what the teenage brain is capable of doing, albeit entirely against its owners wishes.

The story….

It’s a hot, hot Saturday afternoon (the summer of 76) in Grandways, a local supermarket of meagre ambition, before the giants of Tesco and Asda ruled the aisles.
The shop is busy, there’s no air conditioning and we’re all a bit clammy, a bit irritated. I usually work in the store room, pricing up goods with the heavy pricing gun, then trolleying them out onto the shop floor to stack the shelves. Today though, what with the heat and volume of customers (I’d heard this phrase recently and had adopted it myself) the supervisor has deemed I help out on the tills.
Being on the tills is fun, it’s better than stocking shelves, and holds a mild glamour for a young boy such as myself. It does though have a potential for my worst fear. We’ll come to that.
I like talking to the customers; the conversations are brisk and superficial. I’m anxious to please, be liked, but not in an unctuous way.
I’ve been on the tills for twenty minutes or so and look up. In my queue I see a very attractive woman, mid twenties I suppose. This is both good and bad. Good, well because she’s very attractive. Bad, because I can already feel the heat rising into my face.
As a teenager I was lucky not to suffer from acne, but did cultivate the occassional big boy. On this hot summer’s day I’m reluctant host to a particularly angry looking specimen that had made its home on the sweet spot between nose and cheek. I’d had a crack at it at break time, but had only succeeded in making my eyes water, and the spot itself, resistant, defiant even, was having none of it. I’m very aware of its glowering, malignant presence, more so when talking to attractive women.
Just keep calm I tell myself; it’ll be ok. She moves forward, smiles (please don’t) and puts the basket on my till. A basket rather than a trolley. That’s good.
She’s very attractive, has fine, thick, black curls (yes they tumble, obviously) big brown eyes, and a shy smile that makes her even more orphic, if that were possible. This is what she has in her basket.
One small bag of new potatoes – 11 p: we’ll have a patch in our garden, dedicated to growing vegetables.
One box of meusili 17p: I’ve never had this before, but’s breakfast food isn’t it. I’ll take her breakfast in bed every Sunday morning.
So here I am, basing our entire fictional future on her choice of consumables. If only I knew.
One bottle of red wine – £1.20: on Fridays one of us will cook a romantic meal and we’ll share a bottle of red (I’ll be calling it just red by then, not red wine). I tried it once and it tasted of metal and dead fruit, but I’ll get used to it, even enjoy it.
We’re done. No wait, there’s a small box in the corner. I pick it up not sure what it is, not an item I’m familiar with.
It’s a small box of Tampax. I feel may face burning, the big boy throbbing already. If you could explain why I’d be grateful, but there you have it. Can it get worse? Oh yes it can. And that it’s: I’m drowning in a tsunami of white hot embarrassment. The box of Tampax has no price, the flimsy sticker has fallen off.
This had happened before, but if the customer was certain of the price, I’d use that. She doesn’t however offer a price and I’m certainly not going to ask; we’ve only just met! Once, I’d got flustered, and had simply put an item through without charging, but the fearsome supervisor had seen, and I’d been mildly reprimanded, so I daren’t do that again. So here it is then, my worst fear.
Shouting to Kiosk. Across the entire width of a busy supermarket. On a hot, hot Saturday afternoon.
“Kiosk!” I shout. I hold the package in the air like a tiny, nuclear device; if it goes off I’m taking everyone with me.
I am, of course, on the till furthest from the kiosk. So between myself and the kiosk are queues and queues of shoppers. It is, of course, very busy and Kiosk hasn’t heard so I have to yell louder “KIOSK!”
I can see movement in the kiosk; the assistant is there, holding the price list. It’s kiosk’s job to leaf through the pages and pages of goods, find the appropriate price, and yell back.
Kiosk shouts “What is it?”
“Tampax!” I’m shouting the word Tampax across a crowded store. There’s a dreadful, dreadful pause. The entire shop holds its breath. I’m dying here, please hurry. Kiosk is leafing slowly through the price list.
“Size?” Kiosk shouts.
Are you fucking kidding me?
I look down at the box, completely unable to focus. There is an aeonian pause. Mountains fall into the sea, volcanoes erupt. Time passes. Slowly. Through sad, defeated eyes I see a number on the box.
“Eighteen.” I wouldn’t say I’m in my stride, but I feel that there’s a real chance that this may soon all be over.
And then, again, unbelievably things take another turn for the worse.
“Flow?” Kiosks shouts.
Once again the shop, the entire shop, holds its breath. They’re all staring, watching the pitiful drama slowly unfold. I feel the room is entirely split in its reaction to my public unraveling. There’s a group of people (and I’d so be in this group) who are thoroughly enjoying this, experiencing a blissful schadenfreude: there’s something incredibly embarrassing happening, but not to them! The other half are kinder, older. Look at that poor, awkward, teenage boy holding up a box of Tampax in front of the entire shop. Wretched boy looks like he’s about to burst into flames. Is he going to spontaneously combust? I’ve read about that.
Charles Darwin in his work The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals described blushing as “… the most peculiar and most human of all expressions.” According to psychologists I’m communicating my shame, I’m saying that I’m really so sorry about this, that I want to put things right. And I do, I really do.

So, just when I think this whole living nightmare is nearly over, it’s got worse. Flow? I have no idea what she is talking about, I really don’t. I’m beginning to feel very, very dizzy and have lost all sense of time and space. I genuinely think I’ve left my body, to float up to a kinder, gentler place, a place where this sort of thing just doesn’t happen; I’ve become acerebral, replete with ataraxia. Socrates would have approved of this approach: the only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
Then, somewhere, in what feels like the very far distance, a voice says “Regular.” My guess is that someone’s taken pity on me. It’s not Clare (yes I’ve given her a name), she’s looking away, ashamed of me, our inchoate relationship already dead, over. I raise my head; there’s a kind, elderly face looking at me, slowly mouthing the words:
“Regular duck. You need to tell them. Regular.”
“Regular” I shout, my voice weak with despair, defeat.
“What? “
“Regular.” Louder this time.
“Forty nine pence” Kiosk replies.
It’s over. I look up again, at the kind woman’s face, drained, grateful tears in my eyes.
“Thank you, thank you so much.”