Well what do ya know, I’m actually 2 for 2 on this whole Random Facts series! Someone give me a gold star. Or a Starbucks, which is the equivalent of a gold star in my book.
So on to the story. Let me just pause for a second and explain to you just how deep my love is for you, because I am currently on the cusp (don’t you love that word?) of telling you my most embarrassing, god awfully mortifying story of my life. It involves death (or something near it). It involves a hot paramedic. And it involves me crashing like Goliath and tasting the mall floor, something which no poor soul should ever have to endure. Are you ready? Because I’m not sure I am. Alright let’s do this.
It was my sophomore year in College and the end of my teenage adolescence (by this I mean I was 19.) I was working in the mall as a sales clerk at the most darling fashion boutique, Lucca (it’s also the store that my sister Courtney met her husband through, you should hear the story it’s quite precious) and I took my job pretty seriously. Not everyone can weild the tagging gun with such precision guys. It’s a hard job.
As we neared the end of a horrifically cold winter, I began getting the snuffles. A cough here, a sneeze there. Nothing too serious, I kept telling myself. Until suddenly I ended up not being able to survive the day without Dayquill, Tylenol, a box of Kleenex and a sweater or four. I went on like this for a few days, don’t even ask me why, I had somehow developed a really bad case of the Denials and refused to think I was actually sick.
I went to class one morning feeling utterly disgusting. I can remember sitting in class thinking that my head was going to explode. I considered calling in to work sick, but NO I was dedicated and I wasn’t really sick, so I was going in to work! I ran home after class to eat a bowl of chicken noodle with a side of medication and hauled my little tushy in to Lucca.
At some point in the afternoon I realized just how sick I was. I was shivering, my eyes wouldn’t focus, and I was having a hard time keeping my head from toppling off my neck. As I fought back tears I thought to myself, “just a few more hours and then someone will come in for their shift and you can go home. Just hold on for a few more hours.”
At that point I felt a cold sweat break out over my body and I couldn’t stand up any longer. I laid my head down on the cash register, thinking that I would rest for just a second, when I heard a hrrumph from the vicinity of the store floor. I raised my head about half an inch and blearily eyed the mom pants standing huffily in front of me. “I’m sure you’re super busy or SOMEthing but do you THINK you could get up and get me a dressing room, PUHlease?”
I hauled myself together, ever the customer service slave, and attempted to say “of course I can, I’m so sorry about that” but really all that came out was, “whimper whimper, I’m so sorry”.
I began walking blindly from the cash register to the dressing rooms with Huffy McMom Pants clacking away behind me when suddenly I just couldn’t do it. Little did I know that I was running a 100+ temp at this point; all I knew was that I had suddenly lost all control of my body parts and my mind was floating somewhere over the industrial lights. “Are you ALRIGHT?” screeched Huffers. I mumbled something along the lines of “I’m so sorry” and slowly began my Goliath impression, falling face first with a smack right onto the hard wood floors. I remember thinking, “where did the floor come from?” as Mommy Dearest screamed ” OH MY GOD SHE’S DEAD!” and ran out of the store.
My mind conveniently decided to return to it’s rightful place at this point, leaving me fully aware of the fact that I had just fainted in the MALL of all places and a wretched woman was screaming for a paramedic. I shakily pulled myself up onto my elbows and when I did, I noticed something lying on the floor by my hand. I picked it up and stared at it for a good 10 years before it finally clicked in my head that I wasn’t holding a piece of Chicklet gum; I was holding a rather large chunk of my front tooth. Yes, I now resembled Nanny Mcfee, and I was at the mall. My life was offically over.
I began trying to cry; I say trying because what came out of me was not sniffles and tears. No it was more like donkey dry heaves. There was no moisture involved, all of that was clogged behind the headache from hell. I just laid on the floor, making this horrible sobbing noise and cradling my poor broken tooth in my hands like it was a baby bird.
I felt a hand on my back; I looked up and realized that God hated me. Standing in front of me was the most beautiful Bay Watch of a paramedic I had ever seen in my life. Picture Brad Pitt carrying a heart monitor. I suddenly wished I could have knocked myself out again.
Paramedic Pitt began checking my pulse, asking me my name and where I lived and all the other questions you have to ask when you find a Goliath reenactment gone terribly wrong. But then things got even worse.
“Are you pregnant?” I just stared at him. My hazy sick/love/mortified induced brain was having a hard time keeping up. “Are you with CHILD?” Dude I know what prego means. “No I’m not”. “Could you be with child?” “um…no?” what does this have to do with anything Brad? If you want to know if I’m single just ask, don’t bring in the baby drama.
“I need you to give me honest answers ma’am” Paramedic Pitt said quite snippily. “If you have been participating in intercourse, you could be pregnant which could have caused you to faint.” You know when all of that blood left my head earlier? It all came rushing back at that point. Blush City. “Oh oh oh NO no no no no no, I’m not pregnant, I couldn’t be pregnant, I’m not…ya no, that, no I’m not…doing THAT.”
“Are you sure ma’am? Because if you’re lying you are only hurting yourself”. Suddenly Paramedic Pitt was getting on my ever lovin’ nerves. “No, I’m really NOT pregnant, I swear”. “Well do you eat?” Do I eat?! “Of course I eat, I love to eat?” “What have you ate today?” I just passed out and now you want me to recite my lunch choices? I’m weak. Literally and figuratively. “Um I had cereal this morning and then I had soup for lunch.”
“young lady that is not enough food, if you are trying to starve yourself you are going to end up dying, anorexia is a serious illness and you should not be treating yourself like this, you need to get help-”
“woah dude, I’m not ANOREXIC, I freaking love eating, food is great, I would have ate more except I think I’m sick, I’ve been sick for a few days!” lay off Paramedic Prick.
I got the beady eye for a few seconds before P.P laid his hand on my forehead and officially announced me sick. DER idiot.
At this point my sweet friend Taylor, who worked at Lucca with me, just happened to walk by on her way to return something to Sephora. She wasn’t scheduled to work but she volunteered to take my place so I could go home. We called my mom, since my legs still resembled The Little Mermaids (post sea legs). My mom picked me up and got me into the doctors office where we found out that I was running a dangerously high temperature with a severe case of Strep. I was also Anemic which, combined with the high temp, had caused me to pass out.
What was really lovely about this whole situation was that since I was running a fever, the dentist refused to see me until about 4 days later when I had been declared non toxic. So I walked about for 4 days with half a tooth, then two weeks after that with a temp tooth that looked yellow and was slightly longer than the rest of my teeth before they could get me a veneer in place. Needless to say, there was no smiling done in the month of January.
Probably one of the weirdest experiences of my life was being hyped up on cough medicine with my face numb from the dentist’s numbing gel. They drilled what was left of my natural tooth down into a stub to fit the temp over but before putting it in place the dim witted assistant asked if I wanted to see what it looked like. Somehow my hand extended itself and I found myself holding a mirror as it slowly made it’s way up to my face. “no, no no no no no,” my mind yelled at me but it was too late. I looked in the mirror and saw this horrible, puffy faced, drooling HICK with her front tooth missing and a tiny pencil eraser stub in it’s place. I think I made some sort of Frankenstein moan because the assistant quickly snatched the mirror from me and whipped the temp tooth into place before the histrionics could start.
Almost 5 years later I have a nicely proportioned and naturally colored veneer that you would never know was fake unless I decided to tell you. Or unless my sister called me Nanny McFee in front of you, as she so loves to do, and then I have to tell the whole story.
The End.
vintage fur collar//forever21 sweater//Topshop pants//Target socks// Guess heels
linking up with Rolled Up Pretty and Because Shanna Said So!
