By the time work rolled around, Alixa had long since left and David had gotten her promise to call him later that night with more details and to hang out sometime in the next week or so. Washed, dressed, and early again, he walked in a confidently as he could and soon found himself sitting in the break room waiting for the minutes to pass.

“Hey, new guy didn’t get scared off.”

Turning to face the sudden voice of Aldo, David saw him and three others walk in to drop off their things. One of them was Jez, but the other two where new.

“Hey, David right? I’m Eric, and that’s Nuel.”

Eric was tall, broad, tan, and looked like he belonged in the annuls of some magazine for male models with specifically sharp features or a sculpture of grand Greek design meant to showcase the ideal form of man. Nuel, on the other hand, had the mixed characteristics of what looked like native american and east asian descent and stood a foot shorter than Eric, roughly as tall as David did but with a softer frame and a round face.

“Yeah, I am he but new guy works too.”

All of them cracked smiles at that and Aldo outright barked solid laugh.

“You know, you aren’t bad new guy. I think you’ll get along here fine. Doing your day two stuff training right?

“Yup, that sounded like the plan yesterday.”

Looking behind himself, he turned back and leaned in closer.

“Hey you live close by yeah?

An unsettled feeling settled itself at the base of David’s spine but he managed to keep the stiffness from setting on his face.

“Uh yeah, kind of. About twenty, twenty five by walking.”

This elicited a whistle from the man.

“Walking? You don’t drive?”

“Yeah, I got into an accident two years ago,” absently, David rubbed his left hand and grimaced at the flooding memories of those days passing in a haze of pain and frustration, “Lost the feeling in my hand cause of it for about a year and it still isn’t the same. And beyond the car getting trashed, I lost my license because it was declared my fault for pulling out without sighting. Which I did, but the truck blocking my line of sight didn’t show on the footage and the other driver ran off so…”

“So they thought you made it up? Typical.”

“Yeah but I cared more about my hand right then and since the insurance payout covered the costs then some, I count it as a lucky situation to come out of. Plus I caught the guy a month later driving by with the same damaged car and managed to snag his plates and then he had to reimburse me the hospital fees.”

Aldo stared at him for a long moment before exhaling and smiling.

“Holy shit man, got a survivor here too. That’s pretty fucking badass.”

That was one of the only times he’d ever actually gotten that response from what he could recall. Most people either expressed sympathy, doubt, or shock. Genuinely impressing someone with his acceptance of a situation? It was oddly nice for him to get.

Not waiting for his response, Aldo carried on.

“Frisco had something like that happen once, but they struck him dead on as a pedestrian. Guy tucked and rolled over it and barely had to spend a few months with busted ribs and a broken collarbone. But he lived.”

Now it was David’s turn to whistle poorly and be in awe.

“Well that sounds like a real badass. Is he here today?”

Aldo shook his head.

“No, just us five plus Mandy and Penny up front. Mandy is manager right now, Penny is handling cashiering.”

Making mental note of the new names and their positions, David soon found himself shuffling to the time clock with the rest and clocking in. It was time for him to get started.

“Today will be a little different than yesterday.”

Mandy, the manager, turned out to be a tall, blonde woman who looked like she’d be ready to lead a squad of Valkyries into a glorious revolt against the machinations of the unjust and unworthy.

Dismissing his random nerd thought, he responded.

“So it ISN’T another day of computer training?”

“You’ll be on them. Just after we close. Instead you get to run things from the back onto the floor. If you remember yesterday, we call that-“

“Stocking and working the rotation?”

She smiled tightly, seemingly unamused by the interruption but glad he payed attention.

“Yes indeed. Actually, you skipped a step. It’s rotation, stock new, discard expired and damaged. But the last rarely happens so usually, you would be correct. Let’s get you started.”

The next several hours of David’s life made him reevaluate his standards of personal fitness. He’d always been an active guy and his nervous habits were hardwired to taking long walks to cool himself off or doing basic body weight exercises to keep himself decently able. Habits from school and years of wanting to get negative feelings in check, along with other things he’d rather never remember again, had set him up to keep at least a minimum standard for himself that was belied by his slender frame. While he’d been forced to slow down after his accident, he’d nonetheless found that too difficult and had started working out in alternative ways to avoid aggravating his injury.

Even so, by the times his break and lunch had swung by he’d found himself tired and supremely hungry. Enough so that he ended up buying a whole chicken that they sold there and some bread, plowing through half of both to make three sandwiches that disappeared faster than a nascar driver given nitrous.

“You gonna breathe there or would that be too much for you?

Nuel and Aldo sat opposite him and Nuel was laughing with his eyes at the comment, himself also too absorbed with eating to say anything himself.

Finally feeling satisfied, he pushed the remaining chicken and bread towards the center of the table and sat back in contentment.

“Way too much for me, in every sense. Either of you want some?”

Aldo accepted, happily adding a chicken sandwich to his meal of ramen and a coke. Nuel declined, his brought from home lasagna already giving him more than enough. Plus, it looked vastly superior to both other’s meals.

“So…”

David looked over at Aldo.

“So?

“You’re what? Nineteen?”

“Yeah.”

“You a college kind of guy or is this the it for you?”

David fought the grimace but Aldo must have caught it, as he raised an eyebrow at that exact moment but said nothing more. He took a moment to think before he responded.

“College, I suppose. I went for a little while and want to go back at some point. But right now, money is the bigger deciding factor on what the future holds. I got in through financial aide but eventually that runs out and I still haven’t decided on what degree to go for. Or would fit me.”

“What about what you’re good at? Whatever that is.”

That caused David to laugh.

“That’s the problem. I’m a good student, in a sense, but a poor specialist. A lot of degrees offered seem interesting to me, but I can only pick one or maybe a double major. It still leaves a lot of decisions that I have to sort through. And not all of them are actually useful in the area.”

“Why does it matter if it’s useful here?”

“Well I wasn’t planning on moving anytime soon.”

Aldo looked at him for a long moment.

“You’re a smarty type, aren’t you? Why do you want to stick in this mixed trash fire of a city?”

Now David was the one staring.

“Trash fire seems harsh. The city has been fine to me so far. And I wouldn’t say smart, not really. I just always planned on continuing with school after any degree.”

“Not smart he says but wants to go to school forever,” Aldo said to Nuel, pulling the quite man into the conversation, “get a load of this nerd. Next he’ll say he got a scholarship to a UC or some shit.”

“Intelligence is in action as well as in study. Seems smart to me too.”

Now David felt like they were going a little too far.

“No but really, I’m not. You don’t need good grades, just decent ones, and I always placed mid way and didn’t do a lot of my classwork. I believe the college just wants a student so they get payed and I happen to both fit and fill the bill.”

“Dude, you even sound like you’re smart. What do you mean? You’ve been pulling out collegiate level words since you walked into here. You messing?”

Nuel chimed back in as well.

“Being honest, you remind me of my old man a little. He was a professor, back in Okinawa, teaching history and math. He never thought he was smart, either.”

“You two are very sweet but that’s just cause I read a lot of novels and authors are always horny for big fancy words and interesting syntax. It’s more like being raised around people with big vocabularies and picking it up after them than it is actually relating to me being smart.”

Both now stared at him, to the point of discomfort. After a solid thirty seconds at least Aldo finally spoke.

“You really think that? You just tried explaining how not smart you are by being smart and giving a thoughtful answer in a second to why you sound like it. And what the hell does syntax even mean?”

“The structure and flow of words in a given language to construct a well thought out sentence.” David responded without thinking, struck by the point the two of them were making to him.

The following laughter from both of them was both loud and wholesome, with both needing to take deep breathes after and sending back into laughing fits. David didn’t really get the joke this time, but he did feel like the entire situation was pretty amusing.

“Did you just give us the DICTIONARY answer of a word? Boy you must be tripped out. Yeah, definitely a college kiddo.”

David merely shrugged at this point, not willing to further argue a point that he seemed to be failing at. Besides, he was finding it kind of nice. It wasn’t often he felt smart despite family and friends verifying to him over the years. Not all of them, he reminded himself, but enough that he hadn’t felt stupid either.

Standing up, they all made their way to the time clocks to give the next people their lunches and head back to work. The conversation played over again in David’s mind. He’d actually done well in school, better than he usually said, especially after they’d decided to work with him and let him pick up extra activities and tutor a little for credits he’d missed due to unfinished assignments and missed school days. It had been a long while since he’d even slightly let himself feel any amount of genuine accomplishment for school and he knew it showed in his reluctance to admit to his anything, really. Compliments had gotten hard for him to hear over the years, with plenty of people having tried for various reasons and ruining many positive connections to the action.

It didn’t stop him from trying to compliment people himself but it made it feel awkward sometimes, like a wall that made it feel like giving the compliment would somehow be misconstrued into something else.

Shaking his head, David returned to the front office and knocked.

Mandy soon appeared from behind the solidly build door to the office.

“You finished your two racks and took your lunch?”

“Yes ma’am.”

Unlike Ms. Adams, Mandy seemed to enjoy the ma’am comment and let a smile far more friendly than earlier settled on her face. It changed her entire vibe, going from warrior Queen ready to take spleens to a kind Lady about to bequeath a her favored knight with her grace.

“Okay, well since that’s the case I’ll be sending you to the back to help Jez finish breaking down the load from this morning. After that and your last break, you’ll come back up and start in on more computer stuff. Got that?”

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

Giving her a tiny salute, David soon found himself weaving around boxes upon boxes and looking for his next task partner. He found Jez huddled up by what looked like the back loading door, cigarette in one hand and phone blatantly out in the other. The sound of David coming over alerted him and he jumped nearly out of his skin, exclaiming a word that wasn’t quite understood by David but he was almost certainly was either a curse or a prayer.

“Jesus man, what the hell!? Give a guy a freaking heart attack why don’t you. Fuck I thought you might be the boss lady.”

David simply shrugged, not particularly caring if the guy was or wasn’t doing his work right then but feeling slightly bad about the scare. Only slightly though. Another part of him felt amused that the guy had nearly thrown himself out the loading door at his presence.

“What, cat got your tongue? They gotta send the new guy to watch me?”

It was then that David noticed that the guy once again had something up with his eyes, both kind of blood shot and it looked like he was having trouble keeping his gaze focused on any one thing. His nose wasn’t runny or red though. David was starting to think he wasn’t the only one with some nasty sleep issues.

“No, they decided I needed hands on lessons for breaking down a load and that you had it handled to do so.” There wasn’t much point aggravating the man and it was close enough to what they said that he didn’t mind the slight ego fluffing.

Jez didn’t either, going from wary and slightly off put to friendly in less time than it took to breathe.

“Oh yeah? Cool, cool cool. So it’s pretty simple…”

The next fifteen or so minutes were spent listening and getting a run down of the bailer, for crushing cardboard, the trash cans meant for tape and packing from boxes, the return to sender for damages box, and about ten other objects and machines that were semi regularly used for various tasks around the back. Jez was surprisingly thorough and made sure to ask after if David had any questions, which he also promptly handled. It wasn’t until after they got started on the load itself that things shifted again.

“So David.” Jez said as he hefted a box and walked it over to be placed with the other soda boxes.

“Yes?”

“You didn’t mention running into me at the bathroom yesterday to anyone, did you?”

Catching the overly casual tone, David answered slowly as he also began picking up and placing boxes with much less certainty than Jez had shown.

“No, I did not. Hadn’t really thought about doing it either. Why?”

The calm that had been given by the first part of his response was replaced by that same overly casual tone from before.

“No real reason. Just don’t want them thinking I was slacking more than I already was. Plus I was… crying. From allergies. And I didn’t want them to send me home.”

“I see…” David trailed off, unsure as to what else to say.

The silence stretched on for a half hour after that, before David decided to make conversation again in the awkwardness.

“So Jez,” he started, using the same tone for more amusement than anything else.

The response wasn’t as amused. He started staring at David with a difficult to read expression but a clammy looking face.

“What?”

“Sorry, I was just wondering how long you’ve been here for. You seem like you know what you’re doing.”

The compliment seemed to set the guy at ease.

“Oh. Uhm three months here I think. I was at a different store before for two years though and did a little mom and pop grocery store before that.”

“Wow, that’s a pretty long while. Must be why they trust you with a new hire.”

“You trying to say I’ve been doing this too long?”

The shocked look on David’s face caused Jez to let out a breath.

“No of cours-“

“I’m just fucking with you, calm down new guy.” Jez started laughing at his ‘joke’.

“Ah….” David started.

“You’re pretty damned serious. Anyone ever tell you that?”

“Sometimes. Other times I’m too joking apparently. Guess it depends on who, what, and why.”

“Huh. Good answer I guess. Have any good jokes?”

David took a second to think.

“What does an iguana with no eyes sound like?”

“Those things make noise?”

“I don’t know, Guana find out I guess.” David made sure to stress the word.

It took a moment and when it hit him, Jez just stared for a second.

“Guess it was funnier in my head.”

The following weeks held a lot of the same, David steadily adjusting to the new schedule of work, study, exercise, and the occasional hanging out online or relaxing by himself. He got Alixa to tell him more about her encounters with this Doug guy who’d harassed her, which turned out to be not much from the sounds of it. She only knew his first name and that he was friends with some of her own, which is why they had run into each other so much and her friends had encouraged them together at first. David promised her he wouldn’t do anything but wanted her to know that at least someone had her back if he did anything. They hadn’t spoken much about the other stuff between them either, for which he was both glad for and disappointed. Her encounter and experience right then made it too hard to bring up, not when he was worried that she’d think he was taking advantage of her fear and vulnerability. Even if she didn’t, he still wasn’t sure. They hadn’t exactly been dating and he wasn’t sure what that, or he, meant to her.

“Hey! New guy!”

David had been walking to his work when he heard his moniker called out. Looking over at the direction, he saw Aldo waving at him from inside a vehicle.

“You heading to work?”

“Just to pick up some groceries.”

“Hop in, I’m heading there myself.”

It was a nice car, middle of the road type meant for long usage rather than flash. It was also clean and smelled like vanilla mix with something else David couldn’t quite place.

“Nice ride. What’s that smell?”

“Vanilla Lemon Meringue Pie. Smells amazing, right?”

“Yeah, actually. Makes me hungry too.”

Aldo laughed, giving him a side look as he pulled away towards the store.

“So, how are you actually liking the job? Still getting a feel for it?”

“A bit. Honestly it hasn’t been all that much one way or the other, you guys have been great. The customers are pretty nice too. Can’t say I’m looking forward to cashiering though.”

“Really? I would have thought you’d enjoy it, you’ve got a good personality type for it.”

Now David was the one looking at him.

“What? What makes you think that?”

“You’re friendly and well spoken. The two parts people usually struggle with and you have a knack for it.”

“I’m not all that friendly.”

“Man, you just can not take a compliment can you?”

David sighed as they pulled into the parking lot.

“Yeah, I know. Sorry, I’m okay with a few people at once but all the customers? That’s just a lot of socializing that I didn’t think about when I applied.”

“You’ll do seriously great man,” as he parked, Aldo turned to him and smiled, “and if not, we always need cart pushers. Now get out.”

“Thank you for the ride.”

“Don’t mention it, what’re co-friend workers for.”

Parting ways at the door, David spent the next thirty minutes or so shopping and occasionally talking to coworkers. Ms. Adams was there today, as was Jez and Lena.

“Well hey there stranger.” Lena walked over and surprised David with a cookie.

“What’s this?”

“I’m pretty sure it’s a cookie.” The deadpan way she said it was almost ruined by the slight crack of a smile on her eyes.

“Oh really? Sure it isn’t a cupcake or something?” David said between a bite.

“Could be, if you play your cards right,” she winked at him and laughed, “no, I brought in a bunch to celebrate my birthday and graduation.”

“Oh, hey congrats. College?”

“Wow uh no, high school. You thought I was in college?”

“I thought everyone here was older than me. Hold on, how old are you?”

“Just turned 17.”

David finished the cookie and brushed off the little bit of crumbs that had happened to fall on his shirt.

“Oh you missed some.”

Reaching over, Lena touched David’s face and started when he grabbed her wrist without thinking. Just as startled, he let go and wiped it himself.

“Sorry. Just kind of a reaction, I’m not used to people touching my face.”

“Oh…. Sorry myself. I didn’t think about that. I’m used to my brothers not noticing stuff like that and just helping them.”

“It’s okay, I don’t usually mind the idea of a pretty woman touching my face.” The comment slipped out without much thought, his mind on his reaction more than her own.

“Oh, I’m pretty ?” Her grin was well humored.

David looked at her like so much a deer caught in headlights that she giggled.

“Relax, I’m teasing. Still nice to hear though. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, I guess.”

The moment, such as it was, shattered with the sound of the door to the back vaulting open and the form of Jez walked through. He looked at David, Lena, then David again with a different expression garnishing his face.

“Hey new guy. You work today?”

David confirmed with a headshake that he didn’t.

Putting a hand on her and moving Lena, who looked disgruntled but otherwise said nothing more than a huff, he leaned over to David.

“Then don’t bother the workers man. Lena here has to get to work too, she can’t just rely on being privileged to get her places.”

That one actually pissed David off and it showed when he stepped in and leaned in himself. Jez’s eyes widened at the suddenness and leaned back before he could help himself.

“Don’t you ever fucking say that again.”

His spine seemed to straighten at that.

“Or what?”

David just stared at him. It had worked with bullies and assholes before. Just keep staring and if they move, move. Jez stared back, his beady eyes going from hostile to worried to calm.

“Whatever. Lena, you still have to get back to work.”

“Oh bite me Jez, you aren’t a manager. Don’t boss me around like that!”

Puffing out a breath to accompany his eye roll, he stormed off muttering about this bull and that bull straight back the way he came.

Turning back to Lena, who was starring at him with some confusing amount of emotions on her face, he shrugged his shoulders.

“Is that an issue? What the hell was that?”

“Jez is just…. Jez. Sorry, I’ve known him for a few years and he isn’t normally like that. He’s been different for the last couple of months.”

David debated mentioning his last few encounters, but decided against it.

“Maybe he’s into you?” The face she made in response made him laugh.

“No. I mean, he’s hit on me but the guy hits on a lot of people. I think he just has a stick in him about stuff. I’ll talk to him about it.”

“Don’t bother on my part. If he wants to be a jerk, I’ll let him be a jerk. He won’t get in my face again. Also, wait he’s how old? And hitting on you?

She stared at him.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just weirdly mature from the guy like four years younger than him. You’re more confident than I thought. And it’s harmless. Nothing I can’t handle.”

“Not really. I’ve just had some experiences with bullies and that, that was what they do. Get hostile, make comments, then back down when they can’t get the fear they want. Never had much trouble with them after they figured that out.”

“Wow.”

“What?”

“You can’t take a compliment can you?”

The laughter from David was enough to make him a little teary eyed.

“Yeah, so I’ve heard.”