Chapstick Man

I was on the tube into town to do some shopping, and I was looking around the tube carriage when I spotted a young,  very, very good looking man of approximately 25 years of age. Naturally, my eyelids fluttered, in a flirtatious manner rather than an I'm-going-to-faint sort of way, and I subtly gave him the once over. I was mid undressing him with my eyes when I saw it. One could hardly miss it, poking out of his jeans; a stick of cherry Chapstick.
Well, I was in such a state of shock I must have been staring for a while before a flurry of thoughts came into my mind. Firstly, what was a man of such bountiful good looks doing with a Chapstick in his pocket? I gave him another analytical stare and concluded that he wasn't gay (the Nuts magazine poking out of his rucksack gave me my first clue). Couldn't he then have got one in a less conspicuous colour?
Then my next emotion hit me; anger. How very dare he? Do all men go around stealing women's beauty secrets? Now, while I am pretty confident he paid for said Chapstick, he still stole it from us, us women who are creatures of beauty and, most importantly, mystery. I gradually began to feel offended that this man had the audacity to go out and buy a product he knew would give him as beautifully soft lips as us girls. And my mind continued to wonder. No longer would the wonder of how we stay so smooth and feel so soft and smell so good be a mystery if men like Chapstick Man kept stealing our trade secrets!
Suddenly I felt embarrassed. I felt like I was sitting in the train carriage stark naked, no, worse, I felt like I was naked bar my granny pants. I felt very aware I hadn't shaved my legs and had forgotten to apply an extra layer of concealer and began to feel very exposed. If he knew the secret of soft kissable lips, what else did Chapstick Man know? And would he share it with others? I randomly thought of that quote from Spiderman, you know, "with great power comes great responsibility," and wondered whether Chapstick Man believed himself to be some sort of chosen one, chosen to expose the secrets of women everywhere.
Can you imagine if men saw us as we really were? Imagine if they knew the ritual involved in getting to look like we do, the hours spent, the hairs plucked/shaved/waxed, the products applied to the face, hair, body? While long term boyfriends are gradually eased into this loss of mystery, random men cannot know this information.
While I got, I'll admit it, a little flustered while thinking about all this, I became aware that I had spend the last 3 - 4 minutes staring at this man's crotch. I quickly stole a glance at his face hoping he hadn't noticed- he had, and he sat there smirking at me in that gross, oily manner that only Mediterranean men seem to effortlessly master. I made a disgusted noise at the back of my throat which came out as a sort of phlegmmy cough and looked up pointedly at the tube map.
Clearly we were nearing his stop as Chapstick Man stood up ready to depart from the train. But wait- could it be? Yes, it could. There it was, clear as day, his bright pink cherry Chapstick lay abandoned on his seat. Now, there was still time for me to point it out to him, putting my selfish need for feminine mystery to one side, but then it occurred to me- would it be in fact, rude, to point out he had left his girly lipbalm on his seat? From the gross way he smirked at me though, I thought his masculinity deserved to be challenged, but just as I was about to say something, the doors opened and he stepped off the carriage.
I stood up, stupidly, before I realised this wasn't my stop, and I would have to then unexplainedly sit back down again. Random actions make people on the tube very uncomfortable, so I turned this impulsive standing up into a lunge for Chapstick Man's Chapstick. As the doors closed and the train began to move again, I caught sight of Chapstick man patting his pocket and looking toward the speeding train. I don't know if he saw, but I held the offending item up to the window with a smug smile on my face, before I realised I must look like a complete tit, holding a lipbalm up against the window and grinning like a mad woman.
I got off at the next stop and put the Chapstick in a bin on Bond Street. Better destroy the evidence if we don't want men to know all our secrets.