The girl’s look of horror easily told Alison that no, she had not noticed that there was something stuck to her, and that led Alison to wonder just how long she had been walking around with gum on her shorts? She could feel that secondhand embarrassment already, remembering back to when she had her own stains she didn’t notice until much, much later in the day, when it was too late and when she had made contact with many people. So of course, she understood what it felt like.
“Oh, uhm--I have tissues! But that might get stuck to the gum. I hear freezing the gum will make it easier to remove. Maybe we could put an ice cube on it and try to peel it off when it hardens?” If that doesn’t work, she also heard that hairspray was relatively good at removing gum.