Shoelaces

Sushi Rolls and Coffee Beans

The rest of the school day goes by pretty monotonously. Nothing special happens other than my stomach growling and disrupting my history class while we were taking a test. That was great. Such a cool, totally not embarrassing moment. I should have just eaten lunch. Luckily, the final bell just rang, which means I get to walk back to the bike rack and ride home.

Students walk around me in groups, chatting with each other, laughing loudly. I keep my head at my feet and pick up my pace, hoping to get to the bike rack as soon as possible. Please, just get me out of this place. My head stays down, yet I can feel the stare of my peers burning into the back of my head. Why do these people love to stare at me so much, anyway? I'm not interesting. I'm not the talk of the town. I'm just a loser walking to the bike racks by myself. At least let me do this humiliating act in peace.

I finally get to the racks, opening the gate and trudging over to my bike. My skinny fingers soon turn the passcode into the padlock, and soon I am shoving the cable into my backpack. I unclip the helmet from the handlebars and squish down my hair as I place it onto my head. Before getting on my bike, I reach into my backpack to pull out my headphones and phone so I can listen to music on the way home. My hand glides into the small front pocket, and I grasp the two devices. But then I hear the beautiful crinkle familiar to anybody's ear. The heart-warming crinkle of money. I pull out the bill, and it's a ten. I could cry right now. Truly. Honestly, I think I cry too much. For example, I cried when I saw a squirrel jump from branch to branch because I thought it would fall. And I cried when the same squirrel found a nut. And I cried when the little guy ate that said nut. Yeah. Anyway, the reason why these ten dollars is able to bring tears to my eyes is because it's the perfect amount of money for sushi and coffee beans at the local supermarket. I've purchased this odd combination of products enough times to know that the total comes out to $9.87, with the extra thirteen cents going into the donation bin on the cashier stand. With a newfound confidence and motivation that is unusually nonexistent in my life, I hop onto my bicycle and start pedaling in the direction of the store.

Before I start to move too fast, I pull out my phone from my pocket to turn on my music. Just to do that. Definitely not check if I missed a text message.

Just for the record, I didn't miss any.

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I pull into the parking lot of the grocery store and navigate myself to one of the two bike holders. They are the cool ones that have little indents for your wheels, which makes it really easy to pull in and pull out. And the metal bars on the side are perfectly aligned up with the middle bar of the bike, so locking it up is super easy. And — I think I like these bike locks a little too much. I wish it a wistful goodbye, like a sailor leaving for sea promising to return, and start to walk towards the entrance of the supermarket.

There are a few different supermarkets, all around the same distance from my house, yet this one, Roger's Groceries, has always been my favorite. It's just big enough to have anything and everything you are looking for, but it's small enough that the workers remember their regular customers, aka me. The Roger of Roger's Groceries unfortunately passed away a few years ago. The whole town was sad for weeks, with piles of flowers constantly building up outside of the store. Afterwards, his daughter took over ownership of the store, and she's been running it ever since. Her daughter, I think her name was Rebecca, used to work at the store until she went to college. Every time I went into the store, I saw Rebecca. She's around eight years older than me, I think. Whenever I went to the store with my mom, I would go over to Rebecca to talk about my day. Despite being an annoying eight-year-old, Rebecca would be so patient and listen to my stories and give me some candy from behind the counter. Then, one day, I saw Rebecca talking to another girl who seemed to be her age. Rebecca was wearing her overalls she always wore, and the other girl was wearing this gorgeous floral dress that swayed back and forth with the air conditioning. I remember I told my mom I loved the dress before my ten-year-old self ran over to Rebecca and her friend. I talked to the both of them for a little bit, before Rebecca introduced me to the girl in the pretty dress.