Shit Happens by Hannah Storm

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Shit Happens

Sometimes, I dream I am back there. I’m not sure if the dreams are worse at night or in the day, when the nightmare becomes reality.
The earth rolls and the toilet bowl rocks and I watch as the cockroach scampers across my foot and under the door. I am trapped. It doesn’t matter how loud I shout, nobody can hear me. I’m left, not even a roach for company, gagging on the smell and planning my own epitaph.
It’s weird to be scared of toilets, don’t you think? I mean I’ve googled what the name for a fear of loos is: ‘coprophobia’, in case you’re interested. I even found a ‘toilet anxiety’ document I could buy off the internet for £1.50; I mean I’ve heard of spending a penny, but that really takes the piss.
My shrink says it’s probably something to do with feeling trapped. No shit Sherlock. 
Train toilets and plane loos are some of the worst, up there with those fancy new cubicles where you step inside and press the button and the whole door seals and you feel like you’re in a tardis, only all you’re trying to do is pee while hoping that the green button will still be working when you pull up your pants and wash your hands.
These are the kind of toilets I try to avoid, but you can’t avoid peeing forever, especially when your bladder is the size of a peanut like mine. 
Sometimes I ask my daughter to come in with me, especially when the door closes all the way to the bottom. She humours me with a look that says, I’m still young enough not to be completely embarrassed by you. 
I wonder when that will change and what I’ll do when she starts saying ‘get a grip, I won’t be your toilet attendant’. 
If I knew for sure I could get out, I’d be fine. If I didn’t have to lock the door, I’d be fine. Don’t get me wrong, I’m no exhibitionist, far from it. However, I would much rather drop my pants around the back of a bush somewhere than run the risk of getting stuck. 
What scares me is that sense that when I close the door, I might not get out, that I might be trapped for ever in this small, airless cubicle, where the water is close to overflowing and the waste is so near the top of the bowl that one more flush and I’ll be covered in this stuff. 
And if I die here, this is what my epitaph will say: 1977-2010; killed Haiti: shit happens.

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Hannah Storm is new to writing flash, although she's been telling stories as a journalist for almost 20 years. Today her writing is her way of keeping up with some of the extraordinary people she has met and places she has visited, while juggling a busy job and two young children.

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