The girl who works at the pizza parlor has a mustache. I’m not talking about some vague shadow of hair that only reveals itself in certain lights at certain angles. She’s got a full-blown ‘stache. My esthetician friends would politely and discretely hand her a card, cutely followed with a slight hand gesture over the lip and a “call me.”  I just stare.

She’s got to know it’s there. How could she not? If I can see it in the dimness of this cave, she has to be able to see it somewhere, if only in the fluorescent hell they’ve set aside for the ladies room in this joint. Is she so distracted following the detailed employee hand washing directives that she fails to look in the mirror?

Perhaps it’s just one of those fads popular with the youngsters that I simply don’t understand, like ear-lobe plugs. (The kids do know that those are permanent, don’t they?) At least someone somewhere in the world will find the large plugs worthy of a lavish dowry of goat and sheep. I am not as confident the dowry potential is there for mustachioed woman. If it is a trend, it’s not very popular. She is the only one of her kind I’ve seen.

If she looked like a troll, the hairy lip might not bother me so much. She’s like the nerdy girl in films who just needs someone to encourage her to take her glasses off the reveal the natural beauty she is. What really bothers me, more than the fact that she needs a shave, is that despite being a regular, she never shows the slightest registration of recognition when I get to the counter. I should tip her a razor next time.  If nothing else, she’ll remember me as the girl who insulted her.