Chapter 1.
Prolouge.
"You're not going to win, Abie." Edwin challenged, his eyes full of determination. I huffed and kept my eyes locked with his, the pain burning in the back of them. Edwin smirks and I growled slightly.
"Why can't you just accept the fact that I actually have a good chance this time?" I accused, using all my willpower to not just blink for a second.
As childish as it is, we were competing to see who would have to work the nightshift tonight. I was not going through that torture again, last time I had gotten stuck with the death shift, as most of us refer to it, an eight year old and his mother had come in to the bookstore wanting to return a due book and it took forever because we couldn't find her account anywhere. So, we told her son to go and play in the Children's section, which had a collection of easy-to-read books and a toy box which were full with most of my old toy's (Mandy, the manager, was really close to our family). If only the mother had warned me of the damage this little redheaded demon could cause...I would have never put him near anything that could possibly be breakable. When he had returned from what I had assumed to be a 'long play session', he very quickly whispered into his mother's ear and her face turned bright red.
"Um," She started, "It seems that my son," She sent a disapproving glare to the boy beside her, "has broken your shelf.."
And because I had always been taught that the customer is always right, I put on a smile and quickly made my way to the back.
Oh, he had broken the shelf alright...and a cut out of a Smurf, the roller we use to carry the books shelf to shelf, colored all over the bright red mini table we had in the corner, and thrown multipible books to the carpet. I told the mother not to worry about it and we'd get back to her problem with the book.
I had to clean up the entire mess by myself.
Worse than that, the woman hadn't even checked out a book with us..she had gone to the wrong store.
So, no I was not going to work that shift again even if I would get payed ten times the amount I am now.
"You blinked!" Edwin exclaimed, pure amusement in his voice. I groaned. Mandy walked by with a chuckle and shouted over her shoulder, "I hope the kid comes back!"
"That's a horrible thing to wish on someone!" I shot back and Edwin cracked up, his face turning bright red.
As Edwin started to calm down, a male that looked around a year older than me walked into the store. His eyes seemed to search for a specific person and when he saw Mandy, he visually calmed. I blushed when he turned to look at me and I suddenly remembered every bad thing about myself in that one second. He gave a friendly smile and I just blinked at him for a second, before shyly smiling back.
When Mandy noticed him she let out a squeel ("Randon!" Which meant that I now knew the stranger's name) and ran to wrap him into one of her signature bear hugs. As they started talking, I took this chance to study the male. His hair looked really thick and curly and it was pretty long, the back of it covered in a red beanie. His skin was fairly pale and he wasn't built very well, in fact he looked fairly awkward. He had huge black glasses and I admitedly thought, 'Hipster'. I chuckled to myself and thought, 'He's probably the most attractive hipster I've seen'. He had a loose black shirt on with a pair of dark demin jeans. His lips curved into a small smile as Mandy commented on how attractive he was becoming and red flushed onto his cheeks as she poked his stomach, going on about how he must have been working out. When Mandy pulled him into yet another bear hug, he smiled widely and dimples popped onto his cheeks.
