Delusions of grandeur: The erroneous belief that one is greater or more influential than they really are.

Have you ever been at work, minding your own business-- perhaps performing some menial, repetitive task as we partially educated twenty-somethings are often forced to do—when, all of a sudden, your charismatic, strikingly attractive co-worker saunters up to you, flashes you an impossibly white smile, and asks you to accompany him on a romantic candle-lit dinner at a French restaurant?

...What’s it like?

Perhaps not surprisingly, things do not work out this way for me. Ever. To make the above scenario remotely plausible for my life, we would need to replace “charismatic” with “socially inept”, and “strikingly attractive”, with “mildly to moderately mentally retarded”... Oh, and “white smile” with “no teeth”.

Don’t believe me? I present, for your reading pleasure, Exhibit A:

I work in a dead end, menial, minimum wage-paying job at a nepotistic, autocratic, quasi-slavering box store I shall henceforth refer to as The Mines. My job requires light computer work, repetitive tasks, and what I am fairly certain is the constant, methodical extraction of my soul by upper management to be used for what I can only assume are Satanist rituals to appease the restless spirit of Walt Disney.

And it’s a night shift. Seriously, for $8 an hour, the company gets its money’s worth.

The only things I can really say I enjoy about my job are the people I work with. The night crew are great. We have lots of fun at work because the store is closed, and generally speaking, loud conversations about sodomy tend to go over better when there are no customers to hear them.
I should also mention I am the only female on the entire night staff. This would probably perturb most normal women. Luckily, I don’t fit that mould. I find my lack of Y-chromosomes gives me a special place in the hierarchy of the crew: I am exempt from filthy comments the guys usually hurl at each other, and am generally treated with a level of respect virtually unknown to the male portion of the staff.

However, this only applies to the employees who work for The Mines. The company hires out two employees from a cleaning company to mop and wax the floors after the store closes. It should be noted that I use the term “employees” loosely. For their protection, we will call them George and Jeb. If I can describe them adequately, it will certainly be the highlight of my literary career, but I will try.

Okay. Are you familiar with Peking Man? The Neanderthal hominid monkey-creature that was unearthed in Beijing?

George and Jeb may be his primitive ancestors.

They are brothers, and my very limited knowledge of medicine leads me to believe they both suffer from Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, autism, brain damage, inbreeding, or any combination thereof. I have known them nearly four years. For the first three and a half, I didn’t know they could speak. When they finally did begin to speak, it became evident that George had a severe lisp and Jeb has an even worse stutter. They are both somewhere in their twenties. Jeb has no teeth. George’s are brown. Neither of them are above 5 feet tall. They stare and leer and seem to have absolutely no inkling that this is socially inappropriate. They frantically hump both inanimate objects and each other.

Of course, it was only a matter of time before one of them fell desperately in love with me.

I realized something was different when I came in for my shift one night, said ‘hello’ to George as I usually did, and he actually responded. Even more astounding, every time he saw me for the rest of the night, he smiled. Sure, his teeth are the colour of feces, but at least it was an effort.
Soon, it was 4 am and time for our break. The other guys on the night crew told me to go sit down in the breakroom, they’d be over in a minute. I took out my snack and very unceremoniously began stuffing my face. My mouth was still blocked when George appeared in the doorway, saying something very incoherent, as per usual.

I nodded and smiled as I usually do when someone with a severe speech impediment speaks to me and I have absolutely no clue what they’re saying. This time, however, George looked a little frustrated at my vacant smile. I asked him to repeat himself, and then took another bite of my bagel.

“Wuhh u wike an flfghgdhhg”

Riiiiiiiiight.

Mouth still full, I raise my eyebrows in such a way as to convey my complete misunderstanding.

“WOULD-YOU-WIKE-TO-GO-OUT-SOMETIME-WOBYN” he nearly shouted, as though I were the stupidest person he’d ever come across.

Fuuuuccccck. My mouth was still full and the guy who had just asked me out is pretty much as gross as you possibly can be while your cells still perform cellular respiration.

I nearly choked on my mouthful of bagel trying to swallow it. It was taking me a long time to answer, and the long silence seemed to suggest to George that I was formulating a long, eloquent, painfully romantic acceptance, and a smug grin was creeping across his face. Finally, I could speak.

“Well, I think I would be in trouble. I have a boyfriend.” I managed. Instantly, his face fell.

“Oh.” He said. He turned on his heel and literally ran out the door.

“Thanks, though!” I called after him.

For the next twenty minutes, I alternated between extreme guilt, and hysterical laughter.

That was three months ago. He hasn’t spoken to me since.

So ladies, if anyone is in the market for a short, anti-social, lisping, creepy, intellectually impaired sexual deviant, you will be pleased to know I have jilted your Prince Charming. Feel free to claim him. I will do my best to repress the angry beast of my jealousy.