Purge

I’ve worked here at the Star-Mart for about five years, since I was eighteen. That’s only as long as the town’s has been wet. Before that I worked at a grocery store and everyone had to drive outside of the city limits to buy their booze. Then when the ordinance was changed, overnight, all of these stores opened up and put the steel bars on their windows. The custom framer shut down and put in a walk-in cooler and now he runs a commercial on the radio with the same song as the one he ran for the frame shop. Except every time they used to sing the word “frame,” they sing “beer” now instead. I guess it’s supposed to be a joke.  Star-Mart is on the other side of town. The owner is an Indian man named Hameed Patel. When I was in school, we learned about the world’s major religions and the teacher said that Hindus don’t drink alcohol, so one day I asked him why he owned a liquor store. He said that his religion was business. I like him a lot. I run the noon to six shift and it’s usually pretty slow.

         That’s not to say that sometimes it’s not exciting up here. We were robbed once. This guy came in with a handgun and held it about eight inches away from my face while I opened the cash drawer. I don't know much about guns, so I'm not sure what kind it was or anything. I know I was supposed to be scared, and I was, but I was mostly just getting more and more mad. The guy was just being a dick about the whole thing. He called me a pussy and whatever. I was cool about the whole robbery thing, I mean it’s not my store and as long as he didn’t shoot me, then it’s cool. I know the guy’s got to hustle. I just don’t like being called a pussy at work when I’m getting you the fucking money. That guy was wearing a hoodie and a black ski mask but I could tell he was black by his voice, his hands, and the skin showing through holes around his mouth and eyes. He had really long finger nails and a faint tattoo of a smiley face on his left middle finger. I told the cops about that, but I didn’t tell him the really odd thing about him. He had light blue eyes. Not blue like he was wearing contacts, but really blue eyes. I had never seen anything like it, but I went online that night I found out that happens sometimes. Only it’s really rare and if I had told the cops they probably would have caught him. I figured I’d cut the guy a break but if I ever saw him again I would tell him not to call me a fucking pussy again since I did him such a huge favor.

         Mostly though, we just get our regulars. We got this guy named Raymond that comes in a lot. He’s homeless I guess, but he usually sleeps down at the library. He used to hold a sign for this video game store, but he was fired because one day he passed out on the corner when it was really hot, and he pissed the dragon costume that they made him wear. They told him it cost $300.00, but it’s not like he could really pay for it, so they just fired him and held his last check. He still comes in here, though. He gets his money all kinds of ways. Sometimes he holds his own sign and people give him money because he takes his shirt off and they can see his Marine Corps tattoo on the top of his left arm. Those Marines must really know their symbol because Raymond’s tattoo just looks like shit to me. It’s all faded and his skin is so dark from standing out in the sun you can barely see the black lines in it anymore.  He shows it to me every time he comes in like it’s the first time I’ve seen it. Sometimes, he sells newspapers on Sunday, but mostly he just holds signs for furniture stores and stuff. When he doesn’t have any money I’ll give him a fifth of Crystal Palace anyway. I know if he had the money, he would pay. If I were homeless I would probably need a drink, too.

         There’s a university here in town, too, and we get a lot of frat boys and sorority chicks buying gin and tequila or ordering kegs for their parties. They always have a theme.  Sometimes it’s the one where all the guys dress up like hunters and the girls dress up like animals and sometimes they all dress up like Disney characters, but their favorite are the flapper parties. It seems like every other weekend some pledge is coming in asking for what they need to make martinis because they are having a flapper party. At first I didn’t know what the hell a flapper party was, but then I found out it was a party where all the girls dress like little 20s dancers with short fringed dresses and hair tied around the forehead with a headband. The funny thing is the twenties were prohibition times, and if they really wanted to have a flapper party I guess they’d need to make some damn moonshine in their dorm bathtubs. College girls aren’t so smart. They’re real cute and they always flirt with me and stuff when they come in, but usually it’s just because they aren’t twenty-one and they want me to sell them their green apple Smirnoff Ice. I’m not a frat daddy. I have shaggy hair that hangs in my eyes and down to my shoulders. I wear black t-shirts from mostly heavy metal bands from the eighties and baggy black Jenkos with silver chains around them. My face is clear now, but when I was in high school it was covered in pimples, and now there are little round indentations all over like a mouse walked across my face when it was still wet clay. My chin is long and it has two knobs on the end of it like camel humps. I’m not particularly bad looking I guess, the marks are only visible really close up, but I’m just not those girls’ types. Those girls date the guys who wear the neon wayfarer sunglasses and yellow polos. Or worse, the really narrow strapped tank tops with most of the sides cut out so that their abs show when they turn to the side.

No matter what’s inside, they all leave with the same brown paper bag. We have to conceal the contents and protect reputations. When the town voted to start selling alcohol within the city limits, ninety-six percent voted in favor of it. Now, all the same people that voted to have alcohol in town are embarrassed to be seen with it, so we have to cover it up with these brown paper bags. Only nothing else comes in paper bags anymore, so everyone knows anyway. If we really wanted to hide to it, then we should put it in a plastic bag or maybe have the customers bring their own reusable bags each time they come. That’s what all the hippies and organic families did. Then they had me load them into the carts on the back of their bicycles when I worked at the grocery store.

Except today, this guy comes in and he isn’t shopping at all. I can tell that he isn’t really here to buy because of how he looks.  He is wearing jeans which are just long enough to be tucked behind the tongue of his white tennis shoes. Only they aren’t white anymore. They are mostly grey with brown red dirt caked in the treads around the side and on the toe.  He has a camouflage t-shirt on that says “GOD’S ARMY” across the chest and “JOHN 3:16” underneath it. The lettering is gold, and I think that is probably the only color that would really stand out on camo. He’s wearing narrow rimmed glasses and has a stack of papers in his hand. Based on the t-shirt, I think maybe he is handing out flyers for his church, or maybe for a new gym that he is opening because the guy is actually in really good shape. Even under the camouflage, I can tell he has pretty big pecks, and his arms are really bulky. So, since I’m not really interested in either enlisting in his regiment or joining a gym, I take my time ringing out the customer in front of the Christian soldier, hoping that maybe he get impatient and leave before I finished. Or even better, maybe he would get all pissy with me and the next time someone tried to get me to go to church with them I would have a good reason for saying “no.” He didn’t, though. He just waited there behind patiently behind the guy in front of him who is trying to decide which bottle opener to buy with his six-pack of Coronas. He finally decides on the one shaped like the state of Texas over the one shaped like a revolver and from there he is out the door pretty quickly. So, now it’s just me and Command(ment)o and I can see that there’s a picture of a girl on his flyers underneath the word “MISSING.” He holds out the stack to me and lets me get a closer look.

“Do you think it would be alright if I put up one these in your window here, or maybe on one of the coolers?” He says while he taps all five of his finger tips on the top page around her face.

“I don’t know.” Patel doesn’t usually let people hang advertisements in the store, but I guess this isn’t really selling anything, so maybe it would be ok.

“Well, how about I hang them, and if your boss gets upset I’ll come back and take them down.”

I nod and he walks over to the window and pulls out a little pack of Scotch tape from his jean pocket.

“What happened to her?” I ask because I don’t really watch the news.

He shrugs. “Nobody knows. She said she was walking to a friend’s house, but she never got there. But her mom’s boyfriend, who was the last to see her, is kind of shady and the friend said that they didn’t ever make plans, so it looks like the guy’s lying.”

“She from here?”

“No, a little town about two hours away, but they think maybe she ran away. Probably hitched a ride from somebody and might be hiding out here.”

“What do you think?”

“Well,” he pauses. “I don’t know. I kind of think maybe it doesn’t matter where she is. Because I think maybe it’s better than where she was, you know?”

“So why are you looking for her?”

“Because I got a daughter her age. And her Daddy isn’t.”

“What’s her name?”

“Hailey.”

“How long has she been gone?”

“About a month.”

He finishes hanging the paper on the door and walks over to the beer cooler and puts one up there. I don’t say anything else, because I already have all of the information, but to change to subject to the weather or something would seem rude. Back over to the register, he hands me another copy. I don’t really know what he wants me to do with it, but I guess he just wants me to look at it. He leaves and gets into his Toyota pick-up and drives down the road. He still has a lot of flyers, and a lot more liquor stores with bars on the window to go to.

I look at the flyer he left for me at the desk. Hailey has brown hair and she is wearing a cheerleading outfit. She is pretty, except I feel weird thinking that because she is only thirteen. I mean I’m not a creep or anything, and it’s kind of like when you say a little baby is beautiful. It’s not sexual and you wouldn’t hurt them and everyone knows you just are admiring the life that's in their new eyes. It’s just the time in between infancy and adulthood when guys aren’t supposed to say a girl is pretty because people think they are a pedophile. But she is pretty, though. She looks really happy.

Two guys come in. They are about forty and they both wear baseball caps to hide their hair which is probably getting thinner in direct proportion to the rest of them getting thicker. They walk over to the cooler that Hailey’s flyer is on and pull out a thirty of Coors Light. They don’t even notice the picture on the cooler and I think that maybe I should move it over to the specialty brews because people tend to spend more time in front of that one, looking at all the different flavors and weird names. Maybe they would notice it there. They guys pay and leave and I see them empty the cardboard box into their cooler. Behind their truck is a big red fishing boat on a trailer and I guess they were just in a hurry to go fishing.

Patel stops in a little bit later and he has a box full of these dried fruits with this sauce that is most similar to caramel, but mostly just unlike anything else I’ve ever tasted. He waits to see if I enjoy mine, and then takes one after I tell him how delicious they are. He leans back onto the counter and closes his eyes when he puts it in his mouth. He clicks his mouth a little bit and makes weird sighs that sound like he’s probably enjoying it. When he opens his eyes again some fifteen seconds later, they fall on the flyer on the counter.

“What’s this?” he asks, not accusatory yet, but obviously apprehensive.

“Oh, nothing. This guy just came and dropped them off. The girl’s been missing for a while. He thought maybe-“

“Thought what? That our customers are obviously the kind of people that would kill a little girl?”

“No, just that maybe someone might recognize her.”

“Take them down. We sell good times here. Nobody wants to see a sad picture of a little girl and then buy a keg. Okay?”

I know he’s right. I know that people get uncomfortable about it. I know because I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since the guy brought the flyer by. So I slip the flyer off the counter and into the trash. I walk over to the door and take down that one, which really no one can see anyway because of the bars on the outside.  I crumple it up and shoot it toward the trashcan. I miss, of course, but I don’t bother to go over there and pick it up.

When I get to cooler, I take another look at her. Still smiling. And I think that maybe she is looking back at me, and she doesn’t know what I’m about to do. I think that she might float of the glass and slip underneath the refrigerator where I can’t get her and she will be safe.  I want her to get away this time. She doesn’t, though, and I grab the paper and carry it to the bathroom.  I lean over the sink and stare at her under the fluorescent light. It says she was last seen on December 27, and she was wearing a t-shirt and flip flops. I think that maybe that guy was right and that she probably is better off because who lets their kid leave the house like that with just flip flops on in December.

I’m angry now. I’m angry like I’ve just been hit and I can’t reach the guy and hit him back. A lump,  a bubble is rising up inside of my throat and I feel it slip out of my tear duct and splash into the sink. I guess I am a pussy. Crying here in the bathroom at work. But I am mad, and I’m breathing really hard and heavy. My teeth are clenched tight, but the tears keep coming and little whimpers escape through them.  I turn on the water so that Patel doesn’t hear me.

I’m so fucking mad. I’m mad at the guy for bringing this stupid paper in and getting me in trouble and making me cry like this. I’m mad at the fishing guys on their way to the lake with their beer in their blue cooler who didn’t even notice how pretty and straight her smile is. I’m mad at Patel for being such a dick, but I’m mostly mad because he’s right and nobody wants to see it. Especially me.

So, I tear the paper in half, and then stack the pieces. Tears are rolling down fast and even now and running into the sink and mixing with the water. Even though I don’t see them, I’m still embarrassed because I know they’re there, and I can feel more coming. I keep tearing and stacking and eventually all of the pieces slip out of my hands and land in the inch of water in the  sink. The water splashing over them and the red and black ink spilling off the paper and turning the puddle a dark grey purple color. Still, under the water a sliver of paper with just her eyes is staring up at me. And then as I watch through my stinging tears, the water washes her face down the drain, and now all the color in the water is gone, and the paper pulp is mostly just white now.

I pull my hands to my face like I am going to wipe the tears, but then I just hold them there and let my tears fill them up like a pair of goggles. And then I smell it. Faint, but distinct. Ugly and delicious.

Blood.