The old man sifted through bargain bins, like a raccoon for its meal. He wore a collarless tan coat that went down to his ankles, and his eyes neither flinched nor blinked, at least not while I watched him. Instead he panted, like a dog, with each better price tag that he passed. I watched him the way I watched the black kids that came into the store after school.
“You mean I gotta pay you money, to make money?” asked another customer. He was staring at a sign that read Wage-slave 40-hour Work Week with free fake smile: $13.
“You have to spend money to make money,” I told him. “Besides, you’ll make that back in like, two hours. In this economy, it’s a steal.”
He pondered this purchase for a minute more while I watched that old Jew loiter. “Who’s Mike?” asked the customer, holding up my old Wawa uniform. I explained that it was me, clarified that he would literally be taking my job, and he was sold. I helped him suit up, gave him his schedule for the next three weeks, all the while keeping an eye on that Old Man. The customer was a little heavier than me, but I didn’t think the boss would notice.
“Alright. Looks like you’re ready to start,” I told him. “Just be sure to bend at the knees. A job like this weighs at least a thousand kilograms.”
He gave me thirteen rolls of quarters and was off on his way. After six steps, he turned back to me: “Hey, where’s that, uh, the free fake smile ya promised?”
I looked at him with tired, empty eyes — the only kind I could remember — and stretched the skin of my cheeks back, pulling them tight, and raised my ears slightly to upturn the corners of my mouth. My lips remained closed, except when I spoke, a sardonic, flatlined, “Have a nice day.”
He bobbed his head and smirked. A real one, you could tell, by the way it turned his eyes up, too. I watched him walk proudly to his first shift at Wawa and the Old Man tapped me on the shoulder like a Tourettic gnat, the kind you’d love to ignore but know will never go away.
“Ehhscuse me,” he interrupted in his little Yiddish whisper. “How much is eh this one?” His crooked vulture finger waggled towards a sign that said A Sense of Wonder (only slightly used): $8.50. It hung betweet Youthful Ambition: $10and A Laugh Too Loud & Too Long: $2.75, both of which wore stickers that proclaimed, “Buy One, Get One of Equal or Lesser Value, FREE.”
“You read the sign?” I asked him.
“Yes. I read the sign.”
“Says $8.50, don’t it?”
“Yes. $8.50.” And he looked to me like he was waiting for an answer.
“That’s how much it costs, then,” I said then, sighing. This was the 8th time that he’d asked me the price something that was clearer labeled with a price.
“Is, eh, buy one get one yes?” The bastard would not go away.
“No. Only the ones with the stickers on them. See the stickers?” I was short with him then, and decided to just walk away. But of course he called after me.
“Why no discount on this one, eh?”
“I don’t know. It’s not on clearance. It’s still worth something to me, at least. I don’t just want to give it away for nothin’.” Was it really worth haggling $8.50 for something you couldn’t get anywhere else?
“Why you sell at all then? Is valuable, no?”
I could see the pennies in his beady blue eyes, like cartoons dollar sign slot machines. I waited a moment, gathered my thoughts so as not to lash out. Swallowed several times. Finally, I found it and shrugged:
“Everything must go.”