The Prospective Client

            Singleton woke late on a Wednesday morning. He had the song ‘One Night In Bangkok’ running through his head. There seemed to be no reason for that particular song to run through his head, and that wasn’t very important. What was important to him is that he craved Blueberry Pop Tarts. This wasn’t a strong craving, so he didn’t feel particularly deprived, but Singleton thought it would be nice to acquire some.

            Although he may have looked grumpy venturing around his apartment, pouring coffee, checking the television to make sure the world hadn’t disappeared during his nap, Singleton wasn’t. His face just reflected a baseline skepticism that belied his inner, sunny disposition. But he was very particular. He had Pop Tarts on his mind, but not so much the brand. He had blueberry in mind as the flavor of the toaster pastries he craved, but it wasn’t a hard and fast flavor in the negotiation in his brain. Strawberry, for example, would also be nice.

            And, the best place to get cheap, flavorful toaster pastries, Singleton understood, was at a dollar store called SenseWorth. This all flitted through the barely conscious part of his mind as he drank cold coffee and watched television. There were many smiling faces and bright fabrics.

            Singleton tuned out the chattering television and considered other things before he began his pilgrimage to SenseWorth. He was good for shoes, and had still a plentiful supply of sinus pills. He also had plenty of Tylenol. He didn’t need more sinus spray because it wasn’t allergy season. He considered buying jeans, but vetoed that because he was low on money. He didn’t need laxative, because. He wasn’t scheduled for a shift that day. So, why not? He would take a twenty minute bus ride to SenseWorth for toaster pastries alone. Eccentric options had always been options for Singleton. The eccentricity was a plus.

            So, he shut down his apartment and grabbed the Solzhenitsyn biography he was trying to finish. His mission: Before the day was out, he would secure a ton of toaster pastries and return safely home.

            He went out the back door and down the alleyway to the busy avenue. Walking along it, he ignored a kind soul in a car who slowed to a standstill, waving him across the road. People sometimes freaked out when seeing him walking, and thought it best to direct him this way and that from the driver’s seat during their busy day. The car raced off after rolling alongside him for awhile. The fact that he knew where he wanted to walk made Singleton a trouble pedestrian.

            The bus stop was just two blocks away. Singleton paid his dollar, sat toward the middle of the bus and began to read his book, settling in for the otherwise boring ride. A few blocks up, going south, a man boarded the bus, and Singleton felt the pulse of an attention-seeker. The man sat close by, and mumbled something to another rider. Something like: “I look like I had a fun night, don’t I.” Singleton glanced up and watched a young woman respond to the man’s self-observation. He continued reading. The man settled in a seat in front of his.

            “Whatcha reading? I’m curious.”

            Singleton looked up, and saw that the man certainly had had a night. His face was speckled with cuts.

            “It’s about a Soviet dissident writer.” Singleton told him.

            “Oh,” the man said. “I know about that.”

            Singleton continued reading, and over the next few minutes, caught the man’s story, as told to others he buttonholed on the bus. He’d been hit with a bottle. Then, a group of older youngsters got on the bus and there was a dual panel discussion which never joined forces with that of the original man’s, although it was also about bottles from the night before. Some were being thrown, police were called, some were guilty, some were culpable; others were completely innocent.

            In the twenty four hours before Singleton began his Pop Tart run, bottles had obviously been flying. 

            Singleton squinted though the window, through the glare on it, past the sidewalk, towards a lawn as it whizzed by. There was a small patch of brown there. An anthill. And, there, the ants lived their life, not just in an orderly manner, but with a calm that comes from knowing what to do, and just that. If you looked close enough, you could see trails leading from the hill, both abandoned and used. And, in a few holes at the center and periphery, dabs of what looked like dark brown sugar come to life, seeming to melt through its own friction, but the ants were healthy. The ants gathered and tended, and there was no apparent conflict, no- “Well, if you have a problem with how I’m carrying this gnat wing, you’ll have to take it up with Sherry.” or, “I’m not going to let you borrow my phone to continue your three-day argument with your girlfriend. And, besides, you’re drunk.” End of conversation. Singleton realized something. Ants just play dumb.

            Some riders got on, others got off, and the bus beeped constantly and knelt at times. The tone in the bus changed, or sometimes, stayed sadly the same regarding assault-with-bottle stories. Then, the ride out ended.

            Although the bus stopped at a corner near the strip mall where the SenseWorth was, Singleton knew that getting to the store itself would involve some hoofing it. At least, within the store, he knew he could go cartless. That was an advantage in such a place. He worked his way through the parking lot the store shared with a restaurant and hair salon, weaving among cars that were working toward the closest spot, but not the handicapped spot, but, sometimes even that.

            Entering ungreeted, indeed, no one was at the counter, Singleton was thrown off with how the store had changed since his last visit. He headed toward where he thought the pantry section was in the small store, working through the maze of aisles, and found himself in Cough and Cold. He found this exasperating. He fled Cough and Cold, and found himself slipping. Now he was near Floral. Floral in SenseWorth is completely synthetic. What Singleton was slipping on was all the glitter. Passing by along a feeding aisle, he looked down Floral and saw an associate who had the right idea, using a snow shovel to scoop pounds of swept glitter into a trash can.

            Singleton thought too much, and this was just the situation to make his mind race. He considered an archeological expedition, years in the future, where a master’s candidate would discover the floral section through the glitter in the dig. There had to be a future treatise footnote somewhere in the fresh glitter, so it all was good for something.

            About fifty feet away, at the registers, he heard a customer complaining.

            “I can’t believe you don’t have tennis balls.”

            There was some placating tones coming from the front of the store, those ended, then:
           

            “Chair!”

            A man was yelling “Chair”, and Singleton ran to the front of the shop, wondering if the man was yelling because of, or for, a chair.

            “Chair!” A man hollered again, one in white, painter’s overalls, over by the end of the counter where they kept the expensive shampoos. The associate grabbed a small lawn chair nearby, opened it, and placed it near the man, who was pacified. He sat down in it and began playing with his phone. The associate ran off, and phones, including Singleton’s, began beeping here and there throughout the store. The lights went dim, and he looked up, realizing that the fluorescent light had been replaced by emergency lighting. There was as much light as there had been when it was from a regular source, but now the store was dim in spots, with plenty of shadows.

            He looked to his phone, and read the alert:

            'Flash Flood Warning. Jefferson County'.

            But, the sky had been clear on the ride over. Singleton looked at one associate who was passing; a tallish, well-kempt young man. He just waved to him and said: “Keep shoppin’!” Through that, Singleton also found confidence, and continued on his quest to get out of the Cough and Cold aisle. He could still see his way, and heard other customers go through theories for the power outage. Like, solar flares. Which sounded as plausible as anything else, as he picked his way through the store.

            Singleton pointed himself toward where he thought Pantry was and heard others voicing information and theories near the front of the store, which is where most theories are offered in these small places. It turned out that phones and GPS were also down. By then, he had formed his own opinion, covering the possibility of microwave devices, but he didn’t say anything since he didn’t want to cause panic. Then, he heard another customer complaining up there:

            “Can’t believe you don’t have Cabbage Patch Dolls!”

            Singleton decided that if the store was functioning well otherwise, he might as well find the Pop Tarts and hope that the registers were working. If not, he would take them back to the shelf from where they came. Easy enough. There was an advantage in shopping light. He turned down an aisle and discovered that he was back in Cough and Cold.

            Shocked, he made a plan, and began to implement it. Pantry would most likely be along an edge of the store, so he would find the center, and work from there. The situation in the store contributed to his anxiety. With the shadows and glare in the store, it felt to him like he was in a science fiction film, and he’d been sent from a flagship to look for survivors.

            “No,” a customer was saying from the front of the store near the counters, which was now a main source of light, “Quick and Delirious Two! The one with Sherry Weathersfield, where they jump from the roof of one skyscraper to another!”

            His outburst was followed by a placating, female voice. But, the customer continued.

            “I can’t believe you don’t have that!”

            You can’t blame Singleton for not thinking straight under such conditions. He vowed that if he couldn’t find Pop Tarts, he would keep his mouth shut, buy something else small and get the heck out of there. He went to the center of the store, and found Décor. Which was a step up from Cough and Cold. But what he had done was gotten himself lost to an even higher degree. Now Singleton found himself doubly distracted, because, beneath a display of hangings with a wood-grain print, which featured the phrase ‘Made In The USA’, but which were made in China, was a low shelf of rough wooden blocks, painted a dusty, one could even say dirty, pastel. Each sold for $12.99.

            Then, Singleton saw an associate in a side aisle. He approached her.

            “Um,” he said, “I was wondering where the Pop Tarts are.”

            She looked at him like he was a bug.

            “I don’t work here.”

            “Oh! Sorry…” He looked again and saw that she was wearing the green SenseWorth shirt, and nametag. He knew that there had to be a reason he asked her.

            “Oh, this!” She pointed to her nametag. “I don’t work here. I work in the one in Armond. Just visiting a friend.”                       

            “Okay,” Singleton answered, and darted away clear to Cough and Cold.