Always Running

Chapter One - The customer is always right

Hey! Wait!
I've got a new complaint
Forever in debt to your priceless advice

Heart Shaped Box- Nirvana

It was handsome at the auction
Oh but when we got it home
It grew up into something
we could no longer contain...

By now he could be anywhere
And after all that training
And after all that training
Was something we could no longer contain

Pigeon Camera - Tragically Hip

+ + +

"Always running, never jogging," the saleswoman corrected, "hence the name of the store." She laughed as if this was a joke and smiled. The smile didn't reach her eyes.

"Isn't the customer always right?"

"In this case, no." She certainly didn't look like a runner to him. Stocky with a too tight blue shirt stretching across a belly that was protruding over her black sport pants. She didn't look like she could make the sprint to the front door. She had a matronly look despite being younger than he was but felt himself defer to her.

"Fine. I'm looking for some 'running' shoes." Even as Dennis said it, he regretted agreeing with her. Looking back he thought he should have told her "I'm just looking" or "Go fuck yourself" or something equally biting to this retail whore.

+ + +

He was walking through a gentrified region of Gottigen Street in Halifax. Past a wave of retail failures like that pita place that popped up everywhere only to be replaced by bagel shops, or was that a Quiznos?

Grey painted plywood covered the windows of some failed ventures. Other failures had Manila coloured paper taped inside the windows. Store names scratched off but still leaving faint semi-legible traces that could be read over top of the realtor signs.

"Make Your Bed " declared the ghost of a furniture store over : "Now leasing 900 sq ft of prime retail space. Douglas MacKay - RE-Max". He'd never seen a park bench with Douglas MacKay smiling his vacuous smile on it. Douglas doesn't like picturing homeless people sleeping in front of his name. The association would be catastrophic for business.

Not looking for anything particular, Dennis glanced into one storefront after another as he walked past. Fall's weak sunlight reflected him pale in the windows.

Bridal shops, comic book stores and African markets catered to their mixed clientele but not him.

The store front that made him stop was generally bland, unassuming and banal enough to be inviting. The store's logo proclaimed in yellow uppercase collegiate font: ALWAYS RUNNING.

The walls inside were lined with floor to ceiling slats of alternating wood and mirrors. The illusion worked to make the small space seem larger. Standing between them he saw himself reflected to infinity. A thousand men stood there, each one a once-divorced, overweight male in his early forties with mommy issues.

The music playing was chill and downbeat. The muffled heartbeat a fetus hears. The saleswoman was busy helping a slightly overweight redhead woman. He watched mesmerised by the saleswoman's abrasive manner.

"Now you need roll up the cuff on those yoga pants, walk halfway across the store, turn and then come back to me." The redhead followed her instructions. Stopping halfway to adjust her cuff as it unfolded.

"Don't stop walking," she bellowed. "Leave that pant leg alone and just walk naturally. I hope you don't plan on wearing those stupid yoga pants when you're running. You'll spend more time pulling up your pants than running."