Down But Not Out

Chapter 10

Surprisingly enough the weather had been forecast to be quite warm today, unsurprisingly that forecast was wrong. The wind was blowing, and so my cherry red hair whipped across my face while I shivered since the wind was so cold. As much as I loved my denim jacket it didn't offer much protection, then again I hadn't buttoned it up since my hands were carrying coffee for Josh and I.

Even though the weather was unsurprising, this morning was a different matter since it was a little after nine and Josh wasn't here yet. Okay I admit that I was slightly early today but even so he should have been here by now, and I was getting a little bit worried.

I sighed but grinned when my iPod played Dearly Departed by Young Guns. I liked the band of course, but there were a few songs that I wasn't keen on, this song though was one of my favourites. I tapped my foot along to the drum beats before looking around for any sign of Josh, but of course I couldn't see anything yet. I bit my lip and looked through the see through screen again before smiling at the fact that the box with the new stock was still sitting there.

The way the shop locked up was strange. There were two sets of shutters which automatically opened or closed using the key that Josh had. The first set of shutters were strong but translucent showing the floor, where I'm assuming letters were posted through. Although how the box had gotten here I'd never know. After these set of shutters and a few inches of floor, stood the normal blue shutters that most shops had. These covered the doors to the shop and were also automatically operated by Josh's key.

I huffed a sigh and glanced up to see that Josh was walking towards me. I let a small smile play along my lips before I realised that it looked like he was limping slightly. As he neared I saw that he had a split lip which was bleeding slightly and I had a feeling that if he removed his glasses for once, I would see he had a black eye. He smiled at me and went to insert the key into the lock. He turned it and the shutters trembled before rising.

"The stock's here" I said, pointing out the obvious and Josh nodded, but kept silent as the first set of shutters finally rose. He inserted the key into the next lock to open up the final set of shutters before he turned to the box. I saw him wince at the movement before I sighed and handed him the coffees. He hesitantly took them from me and I bent at the knees before picking up the box.

By the time it was balanced in the right way the second set of shutters had risen and I was able to walk into the shop, so I hurried down to the employee's room where I just placed the box on the small space of open floor. I guessed that Josh always placed the box in the storeroom, but I would do that later once I'd finished stocking up the racks.

I walked back into the shop to see Josh sitting down at the counter nursing his coffee. Glancing around I saw that we had done really well yesterday. There were only the odd few items remaining since the rest had been bought by customers, both regulars and new people. I smiled before turning my attention back to Josh, who I could tell was feeling miserable. He kept swiping at his lip and I picked up the pack of baby wipes off the shelf beneath my till. I kept them here in case the counter got sticky or just for random things like wiping hands. Josh had scoffed at this, but now it would be a good thing.

Dragging my chair forwards, I sat down next to Josh and he looked up at me. I ripped out a baby wipe from the pack before holding his chin between my thumb and forefinger to keep him from moving his head while I dabbed at his lip using my right hand. I felt his stubble pressing into the skin on my fingers, but it wasn't an uncomfortable feeling. I quietly dabbed away at his lip before removing the wipe and studying the cut to see that it had finished bleeding. I nodded and threw the wipes back onto their place on the shelf before scrunching up the used wipe and throwing it into the bin in the little recess behind where we were sitting.