Tortus Bay

1.13: Rambles and Brambles

Henry learned several important things the next day, at his brand new minimum-wage job. Some of them came hard and fast, like the exacting intricacies of Mrs. Fevra's monstrously long monthly grocery list, and others came over time, like the reason the position of cashier at Horizon Foods had been so long vacant. Howard, the manager, met him in the morning with a wary look, and proceeded to treat him more like an adversary than an employee. Relevant details came out of the man like food from a starving dog's mouth, while anecdotes streamed out like water from an open tap.

"I've lived in Tortus Bay my entire life," Howard said, "and I've never been one of the chosen ones of the Brihtes or the Gauthes. Never had money. I've watched a lot of people like me fall flat on their faces. They pump gas; they take tickets at the Plex; they wipe tables down at the bar. I run a grocery store. The only grocery store."

Later, he went on. "What are you, twenty years old? Did you do a couple years at a Community College, or did you figure you'd skip it altogether? Normally a job like this would go to a teenager, you know. How do you feel about achieving as much as a thirteen year old?"

And later, still more. "A lot of people get excited by a new face, kid. Something to stir the pot. But trust me, the cheese will settle eventually. It always does. And you got to choose if you want to end up sitting on the top of that pot, or the bottom."

While Howard talked, he ran his fingers through his thick auburn hair, until it lay flat on his scalp and his fingers shone with grease under the florescent light. Henry was the only other employee in the store, and the man seemed to never run out of things to say. It was unfortunate that not a single one of those topics related to instructions on how to operate a cash register. Questions in that line were met with suspiciously narrowed eyes, and indecipherable grumbles.

So, he rang people up on a notepad. Howard watched, leaning against the wall, shaking his head like a disappointed father. Henry had worked his fair share of lousy jobs in the past. The repetition, boredom, and the constant low-level humiliation; it was like slipping on an old pair of gloves. But he thought he'd left that behind. He never imagined he would be back. There was so much about his life now that he never would have imagined.

People trickled into the store in a slow but steady stream, and Henry realized that he recognized a majority of them—even if he might not be able to recall any specific name. Such was the power of the AM Bazaar. From the way their eyes widened at his presence behind the register, he suspected they recognized him as well. The story of his new job would be known to everybody by the next morning. Would that finally convince them that he was an ordinary person?

By the end of his shift, no matter his composure, Henry was ready to pull his hair out of his head and stick it onto Howard's slimy dome—and he might have, if a familiar face hadn't walked through the door.

Kara's hair was pulled back, and dark black smudges lined both of her bare arms, as if she'd recently been working with ink, or charcoal. None of her tattoos were visible, hidden by clothing or the necklace she wore. She grabbed a box of cheese crackers and a case of beer from the fridges in the back, and jumped up on the counter while he ruefully readied his pencil. "You hit the green button to start a new transaction," she said.

He jabbed the button, and the machine sprang to life.

"From there you can enter the price of the products, one by one. There are codes to tell it what you're selling, but you don't have to worry about that."

"How do you know how the register works?"

She shrugged. "Worked a lot of jobs around the village, and there aren't that many to go around. I'm guessing inHale fell through. What happened?"