Mall Rats (reposted)

September 8th - StopNShop

"Welcome to StopNShop!" Mona gestured into the beaten down store. 

It was a pretty sad sight with its broken windows and toppled shelves, but he clapped when Mona bowed because of the sheer ridiculousness of it all. No less than five minutes ago he would have sworn she was going to kill him.

He could tell she appreciated the applause.

Passing up the broken front door for the broken front window Mona hopped the short metal piece that remained of the window pane and trucked up to a line of shopping carts. Despite the complete disarray around them the shopping carts were neatly parked and stacked.

Priorities, Matthew guessed.

Completely sure he would cut himself on glass if he followed Mona's lead, Matthew opted for the broken door instead of the broken window. While he struggled to push the rusted contraption open Mona struggled to yank one of the carts free. Maybe she was the one who had stacked them together. Maybe she entered through the window because she couldn't get the door open.

They achieved their goals simultaneously.

Mona smiled and shoved the cart in Matthew's direction. The wheels locked less than a foot away from away her and the vessel went askew before it could reach its destination.

"Pick an aisle." She gave another wave around the store. "Any aisle!"

Matthew wanted to pick every aisle. There was just so much stuff. It was overwhelming.

Most grocery stores were cleaned out well before Matthew came across them. They were either emptied before the zombie outbreak or picked bare by stragglers who grabbed any and every thing they could.

Gripping the cart's handle Matthew struggled against the urge to run and toss whatever he could into it. He could eat and eat and eat and still not manage to make a dent in the supplies.

Of course that would help no one. He'd been running on almost empty for so long his stomach threatened to collapse on him here just thinking about all that food. If he stuffed himself he'd probably just throw it all up. He'd gain nothing and would have only used up items Mona could have had for another time.

"Soup?" he asked.

Soup was good. Soup came in cans. A chicken noodle was probably exactly what his stomach needed. His mom always used to give him chicken noodle when he was feeling sick or had an upset stomach.

"I think I would have eaten most of the undented cans," she warned him.

"As long as it isn't black and green inside it's all cool."

An hour or two ago Matthew might have considered chowing down on a mildly moldy soup but it was better to keep that comment to himself. Now wasn't the time to come off as absolutely desperate. He'd already done that part hauling his ass over to here tailed by what was possibly all of the zombies in town.

"Alright, unmoldy soup. Follow me."

"Do I really have to wheel this thing around?" he asked.

He followed behind obediently but struggled to move the cart forwards in a straight line.

"Yeah. I want to pick up a few stuff so I don't have to keep walking back and forth between camp."

Camp. She really was living here in this mall. Alone. It was unbelievable.

She took his silence negatively and began to reach for the trolley.

"I can push it. I've done it plenty of times."

"No, I'm good. I got it."

Matthew pulled the cart out of her grasp.

She was letting him stay here, giving up her resources, and providing him with security and safety. The least he could do was wheel around some rusty shopping cart full of grocery in repayment. It really was the least he could do.

Their trip around the store was quick but the cart was quickly burdened by the weight of canned and packaged foods. Mona would reach a shelf and ponder its contents before sweeping half of it into her arms and then dumping it into the cart.

"Chicken noodle," she announced when she found the flavour among the many, many cans of soup. A lot were dented, like she had promised, but she wiggled a pristine can of chicken noodle at him like one would a carrot in front of a donkey.

Matthew smiled.

"I guess that's everything," she concluded once they reached the health and hygiene section. She threw in a box of toothpaste. "We could head back to camp unload all of this. You got that, dude?"

Matthew, in fact, did not have it but he nodded anyway. The cart weighed thirty extra pounds, the wheels locked every ten seconds, and they refused to get traction on certain parts of the floor. He was trying his best to push the loaded cart without complaint but it was getting pretty hard. He was fighting both the weight and the mechanics.

Mona took pity on him and grabbed the front of the basket, dragging it behind her with both hands. The dumb thing moved ten times better under their joint efforts.

"I can't believe you do this alone."

Mona shook her head.

"I actually don't. When it's me I just load up a hand basket every time I pass by. The carts are for when others pass through. I make them push it for me. It's always 'the least I can do'."

Matthew laughed alongside her, glad to have kept that statement to himself.

"Free labour in exchange for free food."

"First of all, there's no such thing as a free lunch. Second of all, it's a win-lose situation. While I can bring a whole lot of stuff back to camp this way I now have to provide for more people than just me one."

Matthew felt bad about that one. He didn't want to be a burden on Mona. He didn't want to be a burden on anyone. He could provide for and take care of himself. Sure right now he was in need of assistance but soon he'd be out of her hair and on his way.

Feeling more fired up his began to push the trolley with vigor and ran it into Mona's feet. She stumbled but thankfully didn't fall.

"What the hell!"

"Sorry!"

I'd like to formally apologise to Steph. I hope she's happy out there.