The Horror of Aisle Seven

Sometimes coworkers can be real bastards. I should know, because one of mine is most likely trying to kill me. The whole business began about a month ago, with a rash of horrific nightmares and periods of depression. These symptoms gradually escalated into a series of bizarre and near-fatal accidents. A week ago during my lunch break, I began to choke on my sandwich. Yesterday, I fell off a ladder and nearly cracked my skull on a can of paint. So, that afternoon, after work, I went to my doctor and explained the problem. His diagnosis was that I had become the victim of some kind of curse, probably cast on me by a fellow worker at the supermarket due to its specificity and area of influence. Curses were a tricky thing, he explained. There was no known medical cure, but if I were to find the person who cast it on me, I might persuade this person to remove it. He suggested that I hurry, as it looked to him like the curse was getting more and more potent. He was quite right. On the way home, getting into my car in the hospital parking lot, an errant automobile swerved to miss a kitten and in the process came within an inch of running me over. I decided right then that I had had enough and that tomorrow I would go to work to confront my destiny.

My destiny’s name was Fred. He was a sinister walrus-like man, a stocker like me. When I got to work this morning, I had noticed him watching me from afar with an expectant look on his face. I looked into his eyes and I knew it was him. No doubt he was waiting for me to meet my doom and fulfill his death curse. All day I waited for a chance to confront him, but it was Friday and we were pretty busy with the weekend rush. Finally, as the two of us were closing up, I saw my chance and lunged at him in the produce aisle. He was a lot bigger than me, but I had surprise on my side and I knocked him flat on the ground. The confrontation had begun.

“Alright you fat fiend, I know exactly what you’re up to.” I was full of righteous fury, my hands wrapped around his flabby neck. His face was unreadable.
“You know… you figured it out… how?!” He managed to choke these words out. I loosened my grip on him and grabbed a carrot from a display. This I wedged, business end, in front of his throat.
“You disgusting wretch… Call it off. Call the curse off or I’ll have to hurt you!” I jabbed at his neck menacingly. His mouth began to quiver, his monstrous face welling up with tears. A very clever tactic.
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry… Just don’t hurt me,” he whimpered. I hadn’t planned on using anything but hard violence to achieve my goal, so I was taken quite aback. I decided to let him sit up. As long as I had that carrot, we both knew who was in charge.
“Look man. I’m not here for blood.” I smiled at him despite the situation. “Just call that death curse off and we’ll call it even, huh? No hard feelings, I promise.”
“I can’t… please don’t hurt me, but I can’t call it off.. hurting me won’t do any good.. please!” The tears were coming down a little faster, his words getting harder and harder to understand. I finally had to put the carrot back into its display just to get him to shut up.
“Alright, let’s calm down a little. What exactly are you saying… you can’t take that damned thing off once you’ve set it up?” We were finally getting to the bottom of things, and his constant blubbering was making this frustratingly difficult.
“Listen. The curse… it’s simply a manifestation of my unnatural hatred towards you… nothing that I can throw on or off.”
“Unnatural hatred, you say? What the devil for? I hardly know you.” At this he seemed to get his resolve back and I could sense anger forming on his brow. I began to wish I hadn’t gotten rid of that carrot so quickly.
“Martha. My eternal queen. I love her. And she desires you, you loathsome ass. How can I help but hate someone like you?” Martha was a cashier who I went out with a couple times. Apparently Fred liked her quite a bit.
“Sweet Jesus. You want me to die because of Martha? For god’s sake, take her, man. She’s yours..” She was important to me, but not that important. “I’m dealing with all known laws of probability bending to arrange my death. No girl is worth that!”
“Yes, I’m actually surprised you lasted this long. The last fellow didn’t make one week.”
“What? You’ve done this before? How many people do you hate anyway?!”
“Just one, right before you began here.”
“Martha again, huh?”
“No, Martha wasn’t involved. He was an arrogant jackass, belittling me at every encounter. I cursed him, and finally he tripped on his mop. Right over there.” He pointed to a spot on the floor a few feet away. I shuddered. He gave me a grin, like a schoolboy with a perfect report card. “He had to go to the hospital. It took them two hours just to remove the mop. By that time, belittling me was the last thing on his mind.”
“Jesus.. “ I stared at the spot he pointed out and gulped. I could swear I saw a faint crimson stain. “Jesus… I hope we got rid of that mop.” He grinned again, and I started to laugh, at first a nervous giggle but then heartfelt laughter as I contemplated the ridiculous severity of the situation. “Man, you’re some piece of work. Remind me not to get on your bad side.”
“So.. you now know everything I know.. what are you going to do with me?” He looked at me again, his face serious.
“ I dunno.. it seems to me that your diabolical hatred is the key to this whole thing. Like I said, you’ve got my blessing on taking Martha out. Make her your Eternal Queen, or whatever you fancy. I think we can both see that you really have no reason to hate me..” I just kept on smiling. We were all friends here.
“I see.. yes, I believe you’re right… Already I feel less and less malice towards you. I think you’ll live.“ These were comforting words.
“That’s good to hear, man. Good to hear…” And then light bulbs flashed. I’m never one to pass up a good opportunity, and all of a sudden I saw a doozy. “Yeah man.. its funny that we never really talked before. I mean neither of us really fits in around here. We need to watch out for each other, those assholes’ll bust our chops for anything…” He nodded knowingly.
***
I waved to Fred and Martha as the automatic door whooshed to let them enjoy another evening of freedom after a hard day’s work. They were a cute couple. Being friends with Fred sickened me from the inside out, but it was better to have him on your side than against. I turned my attention back to the store. There was an irate customer walking up to me. He complained about one of my employees and told me she was an idiot. I made the usual apology, and he walked off, satisfied at having made a difference. He was totally right. My employees were a slack-jawed bunch of idiots, but to be fair, Fred and I were working hard to teach them all we knew. God knows we weren’t the best managers around, but after the slew of accidents, we were the only ones left who knew anything at all about the store. As my thoughts drifted back to pleasant reflections of past accomplishments I noticed a shiny quarter on the floor. I picked it up and smiled. Yes, things were looking up.