Embarrassment

Its amazing how some people are so embarrassed about the silliest things. Yesterday, I was talking to some friends of mine when we had gone to see off a friend at the station and those guys began teasing one of us ‘cause he was petrified of something. They were quite vague about what it was exactly that he was scared of and from what little I could pick up from the sardonic jokes, I figured it was probably about talking to girls the first time out. I couldn’t have been further from the truth. Funnily though, the jokes seemed hilarious at the time and after being enlightened about his phobia, I was in splits and literally fell down on the floor of the train clutching my stomach!!!
Well, in order to help him out of his misery, I decided to help him out that evening itself. The last two times he had set out to accomplish this unthinkable task, he had ended up pondering about a plan of action until eventually drowning himself in booze in desperation. Something had to be done for the boy lest he should end up running away from the situation all his life. Me being the extremist that I am, decided that the best way for someone like him to get over his fear was to face upto it amidst the presence of as large an audience as possible and so proceeded to take him to the mall NUCLEUS. If there were anywhere he would get over his fear, it would only be at this mall in the presence of at least a hundred others on a nice Sunday evening.
And so it was that we walked into the store and started hunting down our target. We discovered that the prey was housed on the second floor and we began making our way towards the final destination. On the way to the escalator, we were privileged enough to have been able to see a female of our species accomplish the same task with consummate ease and composure. However, instead of garnering courage from the sight, our subject here was pushed further into the realms of self-doubt and phobia. As we stepped off on the second floor and I had quickly spotted our quarry, I prodded my friend to stand up for himself and be a man. He was 22 years old, old enough to be legally married and it was high time he learnt to stand up for himself. I tried encouraging him with some inspiring words. He eventually took his first step towards his target and a quiet smile passed my lips.
Alas! The elation was short lived as his next step was backwards leading back to the downward spiral of stairs. Poor chappy, had himself being called a chicken in front of a score of people, his very manhood being questioned in public. I think that was the final straw that broke the camels back. He mustered up all his courage, picked up the box and walked up to the counter. He was beaming with the biggest smile I have ever seen him display as he walked out of the store with the first pair of briefs he ever bought!!!