Not Your Average Nerd

Chapter Five

5

 

 

“I need you to go to the store to buy some things for the family.” My mother announced, busting through my door as if privacy wasn’t a word in her vocabulary. Normally something like that wouldn’t have bothered me because I knew my mom and I knew that she was a very… straight-forward person. That wasn’t the first time she burst through the door, but that was the first time she came though at eight in the morning. Good morning to you too, mother.

“What?” I asked groggily, rubbing my eyes with the palms of my hands.

She tossed me the keys to her black Lexus, which landed on top of my stomach. I wanted to tell her no, but at the same time I really wanted to take the Lexus for a spin. Plus, I could always get Anica to go with me, right? My mother stood at the doorway, clapping her hands and chanting for me to get up. If I were a cat, I would have hissed at her.

Once she left, I got up to get dressed. I didn’t plan on being up this early on my spring break, but apparently I had no choice. I had a chore to do and, knowing my mother, she would continue to pester me about it until I got it done. Why not get it over with? I still had the whole day ahead of me… a good long nap was likely.

Instead of picking the best outfit that I brought with me to wear to the store, I grabbed the first thing my hands could grab. You’d figure that I’d want to look nice to go out to a public place that was probably crawling with old classmates that would remember me, right? Nope. I walked out of the house, keys in hand, wearing knock-off grey Chuck Taylors, simple blue jeans, and a grey v-neck top. My hair was tied back into a braid. I looked like some sort of stereo-typical move depicted law student ready for class. Perfect.

In Texas there were no such things as Safeway Grocery Stores. HEB was the big place to go shopping for our every need. It felt funny to walk through the automatic doors of the Safeway again. I grabbed a cart, took the list out of my pocket, and began walking forward. Each time I needed to go through an aisle I poked my head in to make sure it was clear, like some sort of turtle. I was the vulnerable and nervous turtle and everyone I knew before was the huge hungry hawk, perched waiting for me to come out. I wanted to avoid getting chewed up and spit out in the middle of the grocery story.

“Hand-soap, shampoo, conditioner, dog food,” I ran through the list quietly one last time, making sure I picked up everything listed. “Beans, corn, cabbage… two packages of steaks,” I looked down from the list and locked my eyes on the plastic wrapped cuts of beef sitting in a pool of blood. My nose wrinkled. How people found that appetizing was beyond me. Hunks of raw meat sitting in their own red juices. Oh, yum, how delicious. I pushed a bag of frozen peas on top of the cuts so I didn’t have to look at them any more. The blood was getting to me. I’ve always hated the sight of blood. If it wasn’t for that, I probably would have gone into the medical field, but the thought of having to see blood so much was a complete turn-off. At least as a lawyer I could still help people, no blood involved.

Since it was eight in the morning on a Monday there were no lines at the check-out registers. Thank god. I managed to collect everything I needed without bumping into any familiar faces. With no lines to wait in I could easily check out, get out, and get back home to my bed—er, I mean family.

I rolled up to the first line and emptied the cart onto the black conveyer line. There was so much crap that had to be run up I actually considered apologizing to the checkout girl. ‘I’m so sorry for making you work this hard. Even though my family’s small, they still eat like starved goats.’ Once everything was up and I picked a package of Spearmint gum, I stepped forward in front of the cashier to awkwardly stand there as she rang things up before telling me my whopping amount of money that was due.