Sharks Bite

It felt fine at first. Without the Keep It Together spray, the Shark Spray Adhesive seemed like a viable alternative. Without the Keep it Together hair spray, then it felt like bites into Janelle Cambria’s scalp. Her temperature was rising. She hyperventilated.

She ran to the bathtub, and tried to wash out the adhesive to no avail. Tears streamed down her forty-year-old dark-skinned cheeks. Janelle screamed.

Her four children climbed up the stairs to see their mommy screeching at the top of her lungs. All of them were aged ten and under.

“Calm down, Mommy! What is it?!” her son Dayon asked.

“Mommy just did something bad to her hair.”

“Do you want us to call the hospital?” Jarella asked.

“No, but hand me my phone.”

With no technical expertise in lighting or sound, Janelle recorded her predicament.

“I’m Janelle. I just used some Shark Spray Adhesive on my scalp.” She patted it, and it was like beating on a desk; the hair never moved.

“So now I am anxious to,” through tears, “to get this stuff out of my hair.”

She sent the footage to an online video site. Within a few minutes, she had a few hundred views. Ten minutes later, she had thousands and an hour, over a million.

“Look, Mommy. People are picking up on your video!” Armella said.

Janelle looked at the numbers rise on the video site. She then wiped the tears from her eyes. And grinned a bit. She located a little black book with the list of hotlines to call in case an emergency like getting the Shark Spray Adhesive in the hair occurred.

“To the Top Corporation, how may I direct your call?”

“Yes, I would like to speak with a representative from the Shark Spray Adhesive Company division.”

“Just a moment.”

While Janelle was on hold, she flipped back to the count on the video hits which approached one and a half million views. A voice came on the receiver.

“This is Mary-Ellen Ferret with Shark Spray Adhesive, how may I direct your call?”

“Yes, I just used some of the spray on my hair and it’s really starting to hurt.”

“Now, you can calm down. I can hear the pain in your voice. How long ago was this when you applied the adhesive to your hair?”

“About a half an hour ago.”

“Okay. What you’re going to want to do is end this phone call and dial 9-1-1 and seek medical attention. Now, are you able to drive yourself to the nearest hospital?”

“Yes.”

“Alright. I’m going to let you off the line. See if you can get some help.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re going to be alright, now.”

The video got passed around like a cheap whore on a Thursday night. Janelle grabbed her keys, and dropped her kids off at their grandmother’s house and made her way to the Delahealth Emergency Room in Newark, Delaware.

The bites kept coming to her scalp. She affixed a mask to her face, and stepped to a nurse who directed her to registration, where she completed her patient intake forms. She waited for what seemed like an eternity.

“Miss Cambria?”

“Yes,” Janelle said through the pain.

“I’m Dr. Donovan Henry. Come on back and we’ll see what we can do for you.”

The doctor observed Janelle’s hair.

“I’m going to prescribe you a mixture that has proven to be effective in 98% of cases.”

“And what about the other 2%?”

“We’re pretty confident those would have been in cases where medical aid was not administered in enough time.”

Janelle said, “Okay.”

“So I want you to go home, relax and apply this product to your hair and stay away from spray glue!”

“Thank you, Doctor.”

“My pleasure. Oh, don’t forget the product.”

“Of course.”

Janelle arrived at her grandmother’s house to pick up her children. Everyone in the house had masks on their faces.

“Look, Mommy,” nine-year-old Camillica said. “You’re up to two million views!”

“And Mom, you have a GimmeFunds page setup for you. You’ve already gained up to twenty-thousand dollars!”

Janelle looked at the phone. “Let’s go, y’all. Thanks for watching, Mama.”

Her mother just nodded her head.

Once they reached the house there were a few people from around the neighborhood with their phones out, ready to record Janelle and the kids’ arrival.

She rushed all of them into the house and once she was inside, she turned around and locked the door. She instructed the children to stay away from the windows.

“Everybody, it’s late. We’ve eaten all we're going to eat tonight. Let’s go to bed.”

Her children all charged upstairs, got into their pajamas and found rest in their beds. Janelle ran a bath, and applied the product to her hair and scalp. She let the shark bites subside, and allowed the mixture do its job. She held a glass of wine in one hand, and her phone in the other. she sipped her wine and checked her GimmeFunds numbers.

“Looks like it stopped at twenty-thousand,” she said softly to herself.

“I’m satisfied with just that amount.” The shark bites had all but stopped by now.