I pushed my chair out away from the desk, and my reckless urgency showed through when I rammed into the bookshelf a few feet behind me. I mumbled something about the office being too small as I stood up and straightened my dress. The dress was a gift from my sister. I saw it at some second-hand shop when I was out with her one time, and it seemed magical to me. Usually I’m not entertained by fashion, but this dress was so incredible. It was like it was thick with a deep red that held something inside. Something that I wanted to be a part of. I would have bought anything that looked and felt like that. It sounds stupid, but I was convinced that I had finally fell in love.

Well, back to the office. I hurriedly navigated my small cubicle and was spewed out into the flow of people in the halls. At the time, I worked in a newspaper office building, and the halls were somehow always busy. It annoyed me; I always felt a little nervous in a crowd. It made me feel helpless, and I was pretty new here so I didn’t know who to trust. But that didn’t matter. I needed to use the toilet.

I looked around for any sign mentioning an upcoming restroom, and soon I found one pointing down a short hall maybe 50 feet ahead. Slowly, but anxiously, I reached the junction, and as I turned into the corner, this guy flew out and wham! We crashed. Arrggghhh! He dropped all of his stuff, the klutz, and because of all those unspoken P.C. politeness laws, I was forced to help him pick it all up. I saw the bathroom door behind him, so close, yet so far away.

The guy seemed to be looking at me, leering. These guys make me sick. They see some woman and start going after her like complete idiots, using us as some kind of a prize in their stupid little mating game, thinking that we don’t notice them staring and trying to make, like, "sneak attacks" and stuff. He was probably standing there behind the corner, waiting for me or some other "babe" to come around so he could "cop a feel," the bastard.

But it didn’t matter: I really, really, really, really, really needed to pee. So I hurried up and we got all of his stuff together; the whole time he was mumbling stuff like "Sorry… I didn’t mean to… Oh, you don’t have to… I’m really sorry about all this…" Then he looked up at me all happy, like he won or something.

"Yeah, uh, it’s no problem. I gotta go," and I shoed him off. I saw him glance back at me a few times as he left, and he sure wasn’t looking at my face.

So then I turned around toward the bathroom and was suddenly face to face with an "out of service" sign. So I went crazy. I started killing people left and right. Well, no. I didn’t kill any body. But I could have; I was really close. I began to panic, then calmed myself. I grabbed the next passer by I saw.

"Excuse me, where’s the nearest bathroom?"

He sighed, rolled his eyes, began to point at the bathroom I had just tried, and finally, as he noticed the sign, he got all defensive and mean.

"It’s not my problem, missy."

Missy? What the hell is that? I pushed him aside. I had to think. This wasn’t a very big building, and that meant that there probably wasn’t another bathroom in here. I’d have to go to another building. I raced down the stairs while my brain pounded through a few things. I would have to look for a public store. The big business buildings which populated most of the street had all this security crap. So they wouldn’t let me in to use the bathroom.

I got outside, and at once I was reminded of just how un-used to the area I was. Which way? I didn’t see anywhere satisfactory right off, and in my haste, I just followed the traffic. I pushed through the flow of people, frantic and determined, and soon I realized I didn’t have to go anymore.

Uh-oh.

I don’t know when it happened. I seem to have been so caught up in the means, I forgot about the ends. I just didn’t notice. And I messed up my best dress. In public. I remember feeling so… icky. I had been so rude to all of those people, so selfish. I felt bad. And wet. I ceased to really care much, and I found a bench in the middle of all the traffic. I sat down and got reflective.

I started watching all of the business people flow around me. Ever see those diagrams they have of the side view of a wing, and then they have all those arrows curving around it? The wing would interfere, but the arrows would only change their path a little bit. All of those business people were like those little arrows flowing around the bench I was sitting on. It seemed like they didn’t even know they were there, let alone me. It was around lunch time, but if they were on a break they were doing it wrong. All emotion had been smeared from their faces and their eyes were all distant, looking into the future, ignoring the present. Their eyes looked like the eyes of new road-kill, fixed and thoughtless. I found myself wondering if they were dead.

The crotch of my dress was soaked, but I didn’t care anymore. The color had darkened, and was actually kind of nice that way. As I looked up and around, I noticed that despite my earlier anxiety, no one was even noticing me. They didn’t care that I had wet myself. They all blended in so well together, like a chunky stream of grayness. I could have sworn I saw the same woman walk by me at least 10 times; they all look the same now with their mass-manufactured plastic bodies and airbrushed faces.

I was a part of all this. Maybe not as deep as some of the others, but I was one of them. This lifestyle, the reputations, the big buildings, the city, being a part of the base pyramid at work, had all pulled me in like a wave to the middle of the ocean, where I was nameless and unnoticeable. I was just one leg on the table, holding an "elite" group up on my shoulders.

But I wasn’t going to change. I knew I wasn’t, and I didn’t. Today I’m still just supporting the big guys, the important guys, being a nameless part of the mob. It’s too much to go against the mob. I knew I’d break if I tried. I’m still the same worthless me that I was back on that bench. I may have had a "breakthrough" or whatever, but I didn’t change. I remember looking out from the crowd, out into the street, and it felt like gazing into another world. I saw that man I bumped into earlier, driving a sickly looking friend around in a sickly looking car. He was so dirty and uncivilized, but therein lied his beauty. He was real, having relationships and feelings; he lived. I was mechanical and mindless.

Despite everything, I still envied this guy.

Onward, to Part 3!