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Conscientious Deluxe Pants-Buying Experience
Conscientious Deluxe Pants-Buying Experience
Summary: Isadore pulls on her gas mask and goes on an expedition to buy pants in a super-monetized post-pestilence hellscape that is totally not based on my personal experience.
Series: None (stand-alone)
Word Count: 1800
Notes: This story was posted with the support of the LiberaPay and Patreon crews!
The final blow came when Isadore opened the drier and discovered her final pair of jeans, just lovingly mended, had new holes in them. There was no question: she needed new pants.
She’d put it off as long as she could. She’d learned to mend (half-competently), converted pants into cutoffs and patches. But three years of plague-enforced shop closures, plus the fact that all Isadore’s pants were secondhand to begin with, had taken its toll. No amount of mending could fix mass fabric exhaustion; every time she laundered, new holes appeared. Winter was coming, and dresses could only warm her so much.
So Isadore sighed and dressed for success: a blond wig, a double layer of (mended) tights because it was chilly, then a utility Handygirl skirt because it had pockets and belt loops for the belt she also had to wear. People would look at her funny, because she was trans and wearing clothes, in public even, but Isadore didn’t have seasonally-appropriate boy-mode clothes for this. (Besides, she’d already learned it didn’t stop the staring. She’d reached that magical point in her transition where she no longer passed either way.)
She looked at her face in the mirror. She felt like a sad, shamed pervert. She put on her war paint (her best, brightest, most badass eye makeup) and told the girl in the mirror that she deserved pants without holes and a positive self-image. Then she made a silly face to make herself smile.
She still felt like a sad, shamed pervert, but at least she looked fabulous, so she put on her gas mask (decorated with graffiti flowers) and went outside. All she needed was just one pair of jeans, she told herself. She was a brave, competent adult. She could do this.
The low-tech place she preferred had nothing in her size at all, not even manageably. They had closed their fitting rooms three years ago in their budget locations. Their luxury locations still had fitting rooms, but if Isadore could afford that, she wouldn’t be wearing two pairs of tights and a Handygirl with a superfluous belt.
She sucked in her breath, girded her loins, and entered the thrift shop one block down.
“Hello and welcome to Conscientious: crowdfunding the revolution! It’s good to see you again, Deadname McGee!”
A Conscientious Thrift subscription was too much for Isadore alone, so a crew of her friends had taken advantage of a plague sale to illicitly split a membership. Since membership required a name and photo, they’d mutually chosen a famous (well-seeded in search engines) micro-blogger (who never posted her image) and done a photo-merge of all of them wearing the same blond wig to pass the ID check. As soon as masking became socially unacceptable again, they’d be sunk, but for now, they could be proud crowdfunders for the poor, disabled, and desperate who got paid sub-minimum wage there.
“I notice you haven’t been here in a while,” the smart app continued to chime in its relentlessly perky voice. “Would you like to review our hot trending new items and sales?”
Isadore swiped her eyes left to get the voice out of her head and commenced digging through the racks. She found three potentials and made her way to one of the mirrored roof pillars in the middle of the aisles. One woman was already there, stripping down to sports bra and tights to try on a sheath dress. She had the stoic, eyes-forward expression of someone accustomed to being crucified in public.
“Conscientious Deluxe subscribers get fitting and bathroom access, along with other special deals!” chirped the app. “Please upgrade your subscription now!”
Eye-swiping left did nothing, so Isadore did her best to ignore the looping voice (periodically interrupted by pop music and Christian testimonials) and unbelted her Handygirl. She tried hard to ignore all the other patrons, who may or may not be staring at her—she wasn’t going to look to check. She kept her eyes forward and thanked entropy for her cast-iron bladder, trained under years of transness, and her gas mask, which concealed both her features and her expression. She pulled the first pair of jeans up over her tights and put her no-longer superfluous belt to use.
She had rejected two of the pairs and was trying to find a place to hang them (the pillar had no hooks) when a young woman in glasses and headscarf approached her to ask where the bathroom was.
“I don’t know; I’m not Deluxe.”
“Oh!” The woman covered her masked mouth. “I’m so sorry, I thought you worked here. You seemed to know what you’re doing. I’m sorry!”
“Sorry.”
“Sorry!”
The last pair fit. The app was apparently stuck in the “please upgrade your subscription” menu, Isadore couldn’t back out of it, and she had learned the hard way that force-quitting and rebooting the thing while in the store would set off an alarm, so she left the shop, force-quit, reboot, and then re-entered. This time it worked, and she was spared having to go to the shop management and explaining why she was called Deadname McGee and why her photo ID looked like a bad PhotoShop.
Isadore paid the consignor via the app (along with the assorted taxes, hosting, and transaction fees), refused to add a “charity boost” (she had read the article showing that such boosts went to Conscientious management, not the sub-min workers), and left. She felt humiliated and defeated, but she had achieved her goal: she had a new pair of jeans with no holes. They didn’t look that great on her, and they were stretch fabric so wouldn’t last as long, but whatever. The point was, she had pants.
As she hustled down the chilly street, clutching her new treasure, a text message popped up in front of her right eye from one of her other Deadname McGee girls. Trina’s email was the one that all the receipt messages went to, so no purchase escaped her.
{heyyyyy grrl! new pants??? call meeeee}
Isadore flicked her voice connection on and explained her adventure via audio, while Trina stuck with text, as she preferred. “Ugh, fucking Conscientious.”
{so slimy!!!}
“They’re Astroturf SJ, crip lib without a ramp. I wish everywhere hadn’t deluxed their fitting rooms and made it a class war thing—I can’t even complain about it to most people because they ask if I think minimum-wage workers deserve to deal with vandalism and inappropriate pooping.”
{why pay a janitr when u cn deluxe????}
“I feel like a barbarian.”
{u shd shit in the aisles!!!! (poop emoji) btw speakin of, nu place w/dressin rooms}
“I told you, I can’t afford that stupid vintage crap.”
{nah nah mah grrl its Pink Triangle Factory Fire they just reopened. I checkd, its fittin rooms 4 free! $$$}
“Triangle Factory… is that in Lowell?”
{well yah}
“Lowell’s like 90 minutes away!”
{grrl u alrdy dressin and peein special 2 try on pants at least they got stuff -_- c’mon trying 2 help here no horizontal violence}
“Sorry. I just feel so crummy after that. I have to monitor my bladder every time I leave the house now because all the bathrooms are deluxe or closed.”
{(pink triangle emoji) got gender-neutral bths~~}
“…Really?”
{peed there mahself}
Isadore sucked her teeth.
{cmon we Deadname McGee grrls go party shop lk its 1999!!! day trip & dinner @ mah place, b here b queer b clothd! (rainbow emoji)} Then, after a moment, and in standard English to make sure Isadore realized Trina’s seriousness, {come on girl you’re unemployed, I worry about you sometimes. Come up. It’ll be nice.}
Isadore sighed. “Okay, I admit, that sounds kinda fun. But it’s so far… I dunno…”
{grrl what else u going 2 do, jill off & watch catgirl anime?}
Isadore snorted. “Hey, Feline Fine is quality entertainment.”
{we cn trash Conscientious~~}
“Oh no.”
{2GETHA~~}
“Okay,” Isadore laughed. “It’s a date.”
And she and her welfare princess, Deadname McGee friends got together at Pink Triangle Factory Fire, bought pants (fit!), used the bathrooms (open! gender-neutral! cleanish!), and used the fitting rooms (acceptable length of line!). They then went back to Trina’s place to drink a box of wine (terrible), eat community fridge gleanings (rice and beans), and don gauzy veils (leftover shower curtains) for what Trina called “the Ceremony.” (You could hear her metaphorically pronounce the capital letter even if she insisted using upper case was against her religion.)
Trina grew up Pentecostal, so she knew how to throw a ceremony. She was even willing to use standard spelling for it. {MAH GRRLS!} she pronounced, holding the Conscientious Smart-Card high. {have we not suffered under this bullshit enough?}
The Deadname McGee girls, sitting in a circle, holding prayer candles to Saint Barbara or Saint Lazarus and keeping their faces determinedly straight, nodded solemnly. “Indeed, sister, we are sore misused!”
{has it not brought negative energy, parasitic vibes, and perky artificial stupidity into our lives?}
“It has!”
Trina wielded her shears high. {must we not expunge the evil?????}
“Kill it! Kill it with fire!”
{SO WILL IT BE} With her shears, Trina chopped off a corner of the card, dropped it into the bowl in the center of the circle, and then passed the mutilated card and shears to the woman on her left.
Every Deadname McGee girl chopped off a piece of the card. There was just enough to go around, and by the end, the bowl was full of little bits of plastic. Here, Trina’s confidence faltered.
{ok} she admitted, {I was gna [fire emoji] this pos, but plastic gna smell nasty & set off the smoke alarm. ideas???}
The women considered.
“Pour cola on it?” Tulip suggested. “The acid should dissolve it after a week.”
{I ain’t keepin this evil in my house for a week ill get demon rats}
“Put it in the cat box?” Wendy suggested.
{Mittens deserves better [cat emoji] [heart emoji]}
As all the girls agreed that Mittens did indeed deserve better, Isadore remembered the poop emoji. “We could all pee on it,” she said.
All the women looked at her. They looked at Trina.
{YES GOOD} Trina declared, and it was settled.
By the end, their metaphorical (though thankfully not literal) cup was running over, and everyone agreed that the power of girl pee had neutralized the evil Conscientious Smart-Card. Declaring them all piss-sisters, Trina rounded them up to go pour the urine down the toilet, deliver the soaked shards of plastic unto the big garbage bin around the side of the building, and pour a little take-out packet of salt on top, just in case. The women declared themselves free, laughed, and hugged each other (after washing the bowl and their hands). Thus liberated, they hung out and talked, and as Isadore sat in the threadbare, saggy armchair that Trina had salvaged off the side of the road, she felt warm, safe, well-fed, and content.
It was good to have friends.
Summary: Isadore pulls on her gas mask and goes on an expedition to buy pants in a super-monetized post-pestilence hellscape that is totally not based on my personal experience.
Series: None (stand-alone)
Word Count: 1800
Notes: This story was posted with the support of the LiberaPay and Patreon crews!
The final blow came when Isadore opened the drier and discovered her final pair of jeans, just lovingly mended, had new holes in them. There was no question: she needed new pants.
She’d put it off as long as she could. She’d learned to mend (half-competently), converted pants into cutoffs and patches. But three years of plague-enforced shop closures, plus the fact that all Isadore’s pants were secondhand to begin with, had taken its toll. No amount of mending could fix mass fabric exhaustion; every time she laundered, new holes appeared. Winter was coming, and dresses could only warm her so much.
So Isadore sighed and dressed for success: a blond wig, a double layer of (mended) tights because it was chilly, then a utility Handygirl skirt because it had pockets and belt loops for the belt she also had to wear. People would look at her funny, because she was trans and wearing clothes, in public even, but Isadore didn’t have seasonally-appropriate boy-mode clothes for this. (Besides, she’d already learned it didn’t stop the staring. She’d reached that magical point in her transition where she no longer passed either way.)
She looked at her face in the mirror. She felt like a sad, shamed pervert. She put on her war paint (her best, brightest, most badass eye makeup) and told the girl in the mirror that she deserved pants without holes and a positive self-image. Then she made a silly face to make herself smile.
She still felt like a sad, shamed pervert, but at least she looked fabulous, so she put on her gas mask (decorated with graffiti flowers) and went outside. All she needed was just one pair of jeans, she told herself. She was a brave, competent adult. She could do this.
The low-tech place she preferred had nothing in her size at all, not even manageably. They had closed their fitting rooms three years ago in their budget locations. Their luxury locations still had fitting rooms, but if Isadore could afford that, she wouldn’t be wearing two pairs of tights and a Handygirl with a superfluous belt.
She sucked in her breath, girded her loins, and entered the thrift shop one block down.
“Hello and welcome to Conscientious: crowdfunding the revolution! It’s good to see you again, Deadname McGee!”
A Conscientious Thrift subscription was too much for Isadore alone, so a crew of her friends had taken advantage of a plague sale to illicitly split a membership. Since membership required a name and photo, they’d mutually chosen a famous (well-seeded in search engines) micro-blogger (who never posted her image) and done a photo-merge of all of them wearing the same blond wig to pass the ID check. As soon as masking became socially unacceptable again, they’d be sunk, but for now, they could be proud crowdfunders for the poor, disabled, and desperate who got paid sub-minimum wage there.
“I notice you haven’t been here in a while,” the smart app continued to chime in its relentlessly perky voice. “Would you like to review our hot trending new items and sales?”
Isadore swiped her eyes left to get the voice out of her head and commenced digging through the racks. She found three potentials and made her way to one of the mirrored roof pillars in the middle of the aisles. One woman was already there, stripping down to sports bra and tights to try on a sheath dress. She had the stoic, eyes-forward expression of someone accustomed to being crucified in public.
“Conscientious Deluxe subscribers get fitting and bathroom access, along with other special deals!” chirped the app. “Please upgrade your subscription now!”
Eye-swiping left did nothing, so Isadore did her best to ignore the looping voice (periodically interrupted by pop music and Christian testimonials) and unbelted her Handygirl. She tried hard to ignore all the other patrons, who may or may not be staring at her—she wasn’t going to look to check. She kept her eyes forward and thanked entropy for her cast-iron bladder, trained under years of transness, and her gas mask, which concealed both her features and her expression. She pulled the first pair of jeans up over her tights and put her no-longer superfluous belt to use.
She had rejected two of the pairs and was trying to find a place to hang them (the pillar had no hooks) when a young woman in glasses and headscarf approached her to ask where the bathroom was.
“I don’t know; I’m not Deluxe.”
“Oh!” The woman covered her masked mouth. “I’m so sorry, I thought you worked here. You seemed to know what you’re doing. I’m sorry!”
“Sorry.”
“Sorry!”
The last pair fit. The app was apparently stuck in the “please upgrade your subscription” menu, Isadore couldn’t back out of it, and she had learned the hard way that force-quitting and rebooting the thing while in the store would set off an alarm, so she left the shop, force-quit, reboot, and then re-entered. This time it worked, and she was spared having to go to the shop management and explaining why she was called Deadname McGee and why her photo ID looked like a bad PhotoShop.
Isadore paid the consignor via the app (along with the assorted taxes, hosting, and transaction fees), refused to add a “charity boost” (she had read the article showing that such boosts went to Conscientious management, not the sub-min workers), and left. She felt humiliated and defeated, but she had achieved her goal: she had a new pair of jeans with no holes. They didn’t look that great on her, and they were stretch fabric so wouldn’t last as long, but whatever. The point was, she had pants.
As she hustled down the chilly street, clutching her new treasure, a text message popped up in front of her right eye from one of her other Deadname McGee girls. Trina’s email was the one that all the receipt messages went to, so no purchase escaped her.
{heyyyyy grrl! new pants??? call meeeee}
Isadore flicked her voice connection on and explained her adventure via audio, while Trina stuck with text, as she preferred. “Ugh, fucking Conscientious.”
{so slimy!!!}
“They’re Astroturf SJ, crip lib without a ramp. I wish everywhere hadn’t deluxed their fitting rooms and made it a class war thing—I can’t even complain about it to most people because they ask if I think minimum-wage workers deserve to deal with vandalism and inappropriate pooping.”
{why pay a janitr when u cn deluxe????}
“I feel like a barbarian.”
{u shd shit in the aisles!!!! (poop emoji) btw speakin of, nu place w/dressin rooms}
“I told you, I can’t afford that stupid vintage crap.”
{nah nah mah grrl its Pink Triangle Factory Fire they just reopened. I checkd, its fittin rooms 4 free! $$$}
“Triangle Factory… is that in Lowell?”
{well yah}
“Lowell’s like 90 minutes away!”
{grrl u alrdy dressin and peein special 2 try on pants at least they got stuff -_- c’mon trying 2 help here no horizontal violence}
“Sorry. I just feel so crummy after that. I have to monitor my bladder every time I leave the house now because all the bathrooms are deluxe or closed.”
{(pink triangle emoji) got gender-neutral bths~~}
“…Really?”
{peed there mahself}
Isadore sucked her teeth.
{cmon we Deadname McGee grrls go party shop lk its 1999!!! day trip & dinner @ mah place, b here b queer b clothd! (rainbow emoji)} Then, after a moment, and in standard English to make sure Isadore realized Trina’s seriousness, {come on girl you’re unemployed, I worry about you sometimes. Come up. It’ll be nice.}
Isadore sighed. “Okay, I admit, that sounds kinda fun. But it’s so far… I dunno…”
{grrl what else u going 2 do, jill off & watch catgirl anime?}
Isadore snorted. “Hey, Feline Fine is quality entertainment.”
{we cn trash Conscientious~~}
“Oh no.”
{2GETHA~~}
“Okay,” Isadore laughed. “It’s a date.”
And she and her welfare princess, Deadname McGee friends got together at Pink Triangle Factory Fire, bought pants (fit!), used the bathrooms (open! gender-neutral! cleanish!), and used the fitting rooms (acceptable length of line!). They then went back to Trina’s place to drink a box of wine (terrible), eat community fridge gleanings (rice and beans), and don gauzy veils (leftover shower curtains) for what Trina called “the Ceremony.” (You could hear her metaphorically pronounce the capital letter even if she insisted using upper case was against her religion.)
Trina grew up Pentecostal, so she knew how to throw a ceremony. She was even willing to use standard spelling for it. {MAH GRRLS!} she pronounced, holding the Conscientious Smart-Card high. {have we not suffered under this bullshit enough?}
The Deadname McGee girls, sitting in a circle, holding prayer candles to Saint Barbara or Saint Lazarus and keeping their faces determinedly straight, nodded solemnly. “Indeed, sister, we are sore misused!”
{has it not brought negative energy, parasitic vibes, and perky artificial stupidity into our lives?}
“It has!”
Trina wielded her shears high. {must we not expunge the evil?????}
“Kill it! Kill it with fire!”
{SO WILL IT BE} With her shears, Trina chopped off a corner of the card, dropped it into the bowl in the center of the circle, and then passed the mutilated card and shears to the woman on her left.
Every Deadname McGee girl chopped off a piece of the card. There was just enough to go around, and by the end, the bowl was full of little bits of plastic. Here, Trina’s confidence faltered.
{ok} she admitted, {I was gna [fire emoji] this pos, but plastic gna smell nasty & set off the smoke alarm. ideas???}
The women considered.
“Pour cola on it?” Tulip suggested. “The acid should dissolve it after a week.”
{I ain’t keepin this evil in my house for a week ill get demon rats}
“Put it in the cat box?” Wendy suggested.
{Mittens deserves better [cat emoji] [heart emoji]}
As all the girls agreed that Mittens did indeed deserve better, Isadore remembered the poop emoji. “We could all pee on it,” she said.
All the women looked at her. They looked at Trina.
{YES GOOD} Trina declared, and it was settled.
By the end, their metaphorical (though thankfully not literal) cup was running over, and everyone agreed that the power of girl pee had neutralized the evil Conscientious Smart-Card. Declaring them all piss-sisters, Trina rounded them up to go pour the urine down the toilet, deliver the soaked shards of plastic unto the big garbage bin around the side of the building, and pour a little take-out packet of salt on top, just in case. The women declared themselves free, laughed, and hugged each other (after washing the bowl and their hands). Thus liberated, they hung out and talked, and as Isadore sat in the threadbare, saggy armchair that Trina had salvaged off the side of the road, she felt warm, safe, well-fed, and content.
It was good to have friends.
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