Irrelevant Cheetah

It was early. I don’t know how early, exactly. I only know that the sun hadn’t yet risen fully above the horizon and that I had a final exam for which I didn’t feel prepared. Stumbling through the morning wasn’t an option, so I went coffee-hunting.

Though drinking Starbucks is not unlike dipping your tongue in battery acid and setting it on fire, when the synapses and neurons demand caffeine, there’s nothing for it but to soldier into the nearest purveyor. Luckily, in Portland you can’t throw a rock without hitting two Starbucks and a guy on a skateboard juggling poodles.

“And what can I get you?” chirped the impossibly cheery barista. (He might have been the poodle-juggler.)

“Mocha, extra shot,” I mumbled, fishing through the pocket detritus for my last $3. He rang up the drink, and I looked up to hand him the money.

My subsequent double-take was entirely involuntary, yet entirely warranted. The guy had more metal in his head than the Terminator. As I placed my 31 cents change in the tip jar, I wondered if he’d considered a sideline as Iron Man’s stunt double. I made a bold attempt to count the bars and rings and studs extruding randomly from his face, but the glittering reflections from the flourescent lights distracted me, and I couldn’t count past 25.

And that’s when it struck me: I have become the rebel.

There is no metal anywhere on my person. By choosing to remain entirely non-magnetic, with no more than the original nine holes in my body, I now stand out from the crowd as the local freak.

(Yes, I’ll pause for a moment here while you count. I know you’re going through them in your head: lessee, two eyes, two ears…)

(Back? Good. Now, then…)

I can only imagine that people are pointing at me and snickering as I walk by. At the bus stop, a child tugs on her mother’s pant leg, calling up plaintively, “Mommy? Why doesn’t that man have metal in his face?”

To which the mother replies, as mommies are wont to do, “Hush, Lilith. It’s not polite to stare. Maybe he’s sick.”

I wonder if this will affect my job search. “You know, I like your qualifications, and I think you’d definitely fit in here, but your appearance… well, it’s just not right for us, you know?”

I think it’s a safe bet that a career as a barista is out of the question.