Leaning back against the counter, Kim tried to decide if she wanted a cigarette or not. She had only ever been a social smoker, but this past semester had been far more stressful that any previous. Eyeing her neon pink purse emblazoned with green skulls where it was hidden under the counter, she chewed on her lip. The corner of a pack of Camels peeked out at her invitingly.
“Hey, Kim,” yelled Wes from his register. “I’m going out for a smoke, okay?”
“You’re a bastard, Wes.”
Her co-worker gave her a goofy grin as he locked his drawer and slid out from behind his counter. His brown hair a perpetual mess in that questionable style, his blue shirt had two thin paint marks across the front.
They looked relatively fresh.
“What happened to you?”
“Huh?” replied Wes, looking down at his slim frame to where she was pointing. “Oh, I was helping Angie in the back. Dwight was, er… busy.”
“For fuck’s sake,” muttered Kim. “Go smoke.”
As Wes ambled out the door, Kim hit the buzzer to ring for Angie back in receiving. She liked both Angie and Wes, Kim and Wes even had some of the same tastes in music, but he had been holding Angie’s hand on this job for too long. Especially when it came to Dwight.
Kim didn’t mind her job, but she had harbored a few reservations about taking the assistant manager’s position. At twenty-eight, she was in a distinctly weird age bracket at Thru-Drug. A larger chain pharmacy and convenience store, almost all of the employees were either firmly in middle age or right out of high school. She had snagged part-time after she had moved back to Logres over a year ago when she had re-enrolled at Franklin State University. Kim felt ancient compared to the kids who made up most of the cashiers and stockers, and felt like a freakin’ alien compared to the PTA homeowners who comprised the pharmacy team and management.
“Um, yeah Kim?”
Kim sighed inwardly. Angie was a year or two younger than Wes, and had about as many curves. Thin blonde hair and anime-large blue eyes that hid behind glasses made her seem even younger. Was I ever this innocent? thought Kim, as she stared at Angie. Angie just stood there awkwardly, not making eye contact.
“So… why does Wes have paint all over him?”
“Um…”
“Yes?”
“He was helping me?”
“He was? And where was Dwight?”
Silence.
Kim sighed loudly this time. “Angie, when you’re on receiving duty, you get to boss around the stockers. Dwight is a stocker. Wes is a cashier. I know you and Wes have been tight since you were little, but I need everybody to do their job. Is there a problem with Dwight?”
“Dwight is…” she whispered.
“Dwight is what?”
“Nothing.”
Kim peered at Angie and didn’t say anything. Dwight was the general bane in her Thru-Drug existence. The only other employee in their late twenties, he was Dr. Melissa Homme’s cousin and an all-around annoyance to the other workers. He was lazy, he didn’t like any form of authority, and he occasionally said creepy shit to the younger females on staff. Wes had been dumb enough to get in his face one time after he had said something to Angie. Dwight was six-foot-four and over two hundred and fifty pounds.
“Listen, I’ll make sure Dwight does…”
“Excuse me?”
Kim jumped. She hadn’t seen the old woman walk up.
“I’m sorry, can I help you?”
“Yes. Yes…”
Angie took a step back. So did Kim. The old woman had drawn the word out almost like a hiss. Kim gave her a once over and blinked. Her clothes were faded, a strange dingy brown and her styled hair looked messed. Angie gave a little cough when the woman reached up with a dirty finger to slowly rub a rotting tooth exposed when she gave them a smile.
“Yes?” Kim tried again.
“Do you have any fish hooks?”
“Fish hooks?”
“I don’t think…” began Angie.
The old woman interrupted, “Oh, that’s okay.” She hummed badly off key as she wandered away.
Once she had vanished around into aisle, Angie let out a breath.
“What the hell was that?”
Off to the west, the sun lost its daily battle to the darkness and the sky grew into deeper shades of purple and orange. Kim sat outside on the tiny bench beside the soda machines that nobody ever used and smoked a cigarette, thinking about her abnormal psychology test. At least, she was
trying to think about it. Mostly, she was trying not to think about Drew.
After two years with Drew down in Atlanta, she had left. It had been her choice in the end, but it still hurt. Returning to Logres had seemed like admitting defeat at the time, but once she had come back she had realized that she had fared far better than most of her peers.
So many of her old friends had settled down – or simply settled.
Loveless marriages, dead-end jobs, two-point-five kids, the white picket fence dream that didn’t really exist anymore. Of course, that was Logres.
The manager, Joyce, was an old family friend and was thrilled to hire Kim while she returned to school. Dr. Homme, on the other hand, the pharmacy head with her Volvo and her PTA meetings, took one look at Kim’s tattoos, piercings and black hair and felt instant revulsion. All of it amused Kim greatly. She took out her lip ring before shift and all of her tats were covered.
“Fucking Ohio,” stated Kim, as she flicked her spent cigarette butt out into the parking lot in an act of immature defiance. She’d be the one to clean it up later.
Stepping back inside, she saw Wes leaning over the counter and trying to engage a customer in conversation. He glanced over to her with a pleading look on his face. Brows creased, she walked past.
“What’s wrong?”
“Ah, I don’t even know,” replied Wes, clearly exasperated.
Diagonally, at one of the corner displays, a heavy-set man was digging through the candy bars. He made desperate wheezing sounds, punctuated by short whines. His frantic search grew more aggressive.
“Sir, can I help you find anything?”
His snapped up, rigid for a moment, then his head teetered like a bobble dolls’. Kim and Wes gasped in unison. His eyes were bloodshot and he had something that suspiciously looked like mucus running from his nose and mouth. When he opened his mouth to whine, they could see his teeth were just as grime-encrusted as the fingernails gripping handfuls of candy bars.
“Wants… you gots…”
“Sir, are… are you okay?” asked Kim.
He wheezed twice then whined loudly before shambling off quickly down an aisle still clutching a dozen candy bars. Kim and Wes stood frozen for a three count. Then Wes shook his head violently.
“Did you just see that?”
“We had an old lady earlier… listen, he’s gotta be sick or something.
Get Dwight on the buzzer. I’m gonna go find him.”
“You sure?”
Kim took off down through the store, hearing Wes yell Be careful!
behind her. She passed along the front so that she could see down the aisles.
The store was essentially one big box, and the set up was designed to allow the employees a better way of keeping track of “customers’ needs.” This translated into shoplifters. Even though the second row of aisles were slightly off-angle… nothing.