Beer Run

Braden lifted his head, peering over the half dozen racks of candies, chips and pretzels. At the other end of Bailey's Drugstore, Sandy, Mr. Bailey's daughter who had been away at university the last few months, leaned over the counter, lazily chewing a piece of gum and chatting with a pair of boys a few years older than Braden, the neck of her eggshell tank top tantalizingly low. The boys shuffled side to side, one scratching the hair at the nape of his neck, the other bobbing his head in a way that showed he didn't even realize he was doing it. Braden couldn't see their expressions from where he stood but could imagine them well enough, slack jawed, wandering eyed and clearly not hearing a word Sandy's was saying.

Braden grinned to himself. They probably thought they were the luckiest guys in town, or that Sandy was interested in them, but Braden, who had heard about her from Mark, whose older brother had dated her, knew her game. She teased and flirted until her victim was wrapped around her finger, then left them frustrated and confused. Turning to the freezer, he eyed the rows of beer. Every day for the past two weeks, Braden and three of his friends had taken turns coming through Bailey's, always on their own and never at the same time as the day before. One or two beers wasn't a party, but four a day, collected for two weeks sure as hell was.

Glancing back at the register, he made sure Sandy was still occupied with her new toys before slipping a bottle into either of the two holes he'd cut on the inside of his winter coat. Pushing the freezer closed, he looked at Sandy, freezing when he found her gaze fixed on him. Whether it lasted a few seconds or a few minutes, Braden couldn't tell, only that when she finally smirked and returned her attention to the pair of freshmen, now blatantly staring down her shirt, he found himself covered in a cold sweat with his heart hammering so hard he almost felt the need to sit down.

Drawing a few deep breaths, Braden calmed himself as much as he could, thumbing through some of the pouches of seasoned jerky, and cheese coated crackers. None of their group had been caught yet, and besides if she'd seen the beer, he was sure she would have said something. He milled around the store for a bit, choosing a bottle of pop and a candy bar as he waited for the luststruck freshmen to leave. When they finally did, he walked the dozen steps to the counter and, calm as possible, placed his candy and drink on the counter.

Arching one perfectly manicured brow at Braden, Sandy stared for several moments before breaking the awkward silence. "Braden, right?" While decently popular among his schoolmates, the idea that an older girl, especially Sandy, of all people, would know who he was, left him speechless. "You ran around with Teddy's little brother."

Finally regaining some composure, Braden managed a dazed nod.

"You know," she began, the smirk he'd seen earlier curling her crimson lips. "I saw him in here yesterday, also wearing a winter jacket. He accidentally opened the beer freezer too, before realizing the pop was in a different one."

"Crazy," he said, his voice thin, almost to the point of breaking.

"Yeah." Her ruby fingernails danced over the register keys. "Crazy."

Pressure hammered in Braden's temples, his face burned, and he had to remind himself to breathe. He was so focused on trying to appear at least mildly natural, even if bright red, that he barely registered anything that happened over the next few seconds as Sandy rang up his items and slipped them into a bag. Fishing through his wallet, he pulled out the twenty he'd gotten for allowance earlier that week and paid, pocketing his change and nearly running out of the store. He'd gotten three blocks before realizing that Sandy had only given him back a five. Pausing, he fished out the receipt, sure that the candy and pop couldn't possibly add up to fifteen dollars.

The fire that had been pumping through his veins a moment before cooled as he read the note she'd scrawled just beneath the printed three dollars and seventy two cents total:

Enjoy the beer.