12,057 Words: 5-in-One Irish Spring and Face-Butt Pants

Ok, wow. What a productive writing session, which is to say, I did nothing to advance the plot but managed to waste a bunch of words by making as many EsNoWriMo inside jokes as possible. I think to great effect, but you be the judge. My characters pretty much did nothing besides stand in the hallway and muse on various EsNoWriMo related themes for the entire 1800 or so words. No one inappropriately called anything Kafka-esque- that will have to wait until tomorrow. Here is an excerpt that captures both the Irish Spring and the face-butt pants. It's little long but I wanted to include both.

“Right,” Cass said. “As I was saying. While I have been ‘volun-told’ to act as ‘Coordinator of Discourse Analysis Aid Kits,’ it is an empty title with no accompanying pay increase, budget, or power. They distributed the kits during the Mandatory Return to Office meeting, and have provided no further resources, so I don’t have anything to offer you, although…” she said, as an idea struck her. “I could offer you this Irish Spring Five-In-One Product that someone left behind in one of the shower rooms.” She reached into her bag and pulled out a green bottle. The bottle of body cleaning gel was huge, but apparently appropriately so, because the label announced loudly that it contained 50% more/plus. She held it out to Gordon, but he shrunk back from her hand as though she had offered him a garlic laced fitbit (his stance on fitbits as yet another example of cultural surveillance was well known).

“What even are the five things that one solution can do?” he asked, a slight tremble in his voice.

“Um, I don’t know,” Cass said, looking at the label to see if any explanation was offered. “It… doesn’t say.” Gordon grabbed the bottle from her hand and flung it away from them, nearly striking a pink-legging-ed child who was inexplicably playing dead in the middle of the hallway.

“Did it ever occur to you,” Gordon said, his voice dropping down to a frantic whisper, “that one of its applications might be surveillance and another one might be control?” his voice rose in pitch until he was practically whisper shrieking. “What even is there after shampoo, conditioner, and body wash??” It was a fair question, but Cass was also wary of Foucauldian scholars who became so suspicious about power and authority that they started to dislike government census or a sign telling people to wash their hands. Or wash their bodies, as it were. Although in this case, given the degree of dominance and control being demonstrated by the school administration, perhaps he was expressing the correct amount of suspicion toward power and authority.

“Ok, sorry. Um, I guess I can share something for you to use today, and the rest of us will gather up some supplies, get you kitted out,” Cass said, reaching for a couple of items she had recently acquired but not come up with a legitimate educational use for yet: a button with only one hole and a Warrant t-shirt. Gordon yanked them from her hands, staring at them intently.

“These… will be perfect. I am teaching Grade 9 Civics this morning, and this will be a perfect accompaniment to my lesson plan on the absurdity of late stage capitalism, its inherent immorality and the connection between free market economics and death cults.” He clutched them to his chest and then scuttled off down the hall, before Cass could even express her admiration for his impeccable use of the Foulcauldian Discourse Analysis aids. 

As Cass, Berto, and Logan watched him leave, their admiration for his impeccable use of Foucauldian Discourse Analysis Aids were overshadowed with their admiration for his impeccable fashion sense. Cass had already been impressed with how Gordon had pulled off the waist length cape, but now she saw that he had deliberately chosen the waist length rather than the full length cape, so as to accentuate the seat of his pants, which were adorned with a pair of eyes, a tear shaped nose, and a pair of lips. A full length cape would have covered the butt art, and that would have been a crime against fashion.

“I don’t know what impresses me more,” Cass said, as much to herself as to Logan and Berto. “The fact that someone thinks these are work attire, the terrifying cut-out face, or the fact that they appear to dissuade the wearing of underwear.”

“Cheeky,” Logan said, with a wink. And although he was surely far enough away that there was no way he could have heard the comment, Gordon looked over his shoulder from the far end of the hall and dropped a return wink. Somehow, both Logan and Gordon had pulled off the impossible, a wink that was not awkward or gross, but charming.

Cass and Logan turned toward Berto, expecting a saucy remark, but saw that their mouth was hanging open and the colour had drained from their face. Cass wanted to point out that they were in danger of a fly flying into their mouth, but before she could warn them, Berto spoke.

“I know those pants,” they said. “No other costume designer could make the face-butt sit ‘just so’ on the wearer’s butt.” When they saw that Logan and Cass had no idea what they were talking about, they clarified. “Those are definitely an exclusive Windigo Esmort design. I would recognize them anywhere, on any butt.”