Life in the Fast Lane

3/24/06

"Oh you have got to be kidding me," Josh said, wiping the salty moisture out from under his eyes before it had a chance to pool and form actual tears. He laughed a sort of choked, dry chuckle. "C'mon!" he said to the empty store, "it's the Captain and fucking Tennille."

The only response from the 24-hour convenience store with a logo outside that matched the one on Josh's irritatingly red polo shirt was to continue playing "I'm All Out of Love" softly from the radio behind the counter. Could Josh really miss her so much that squishy 80's pop songs made him misty? It seemed so. The pot of coffee he'd been brewing agreed that, yes, that was pretty fucked up.

"I should just join the Peace Corps. Or maybe the Army," Josh said as he wiped off the coffee station and wandered back behind the counter. It was nearing two in the morning and the stampede for beer before the cut-off had ended almost a half hour ago. This was the beginning of the four hour block of slow time—slow, hell it's dead—between two and six a.m., when the morning crowd would start rolling in.

There was a list of some twenty things he had to do before the first shift showed up to relieve him at seven, but Josh barely glanced at it anymore. He tried not to think about how sad it was that he'd been working at a FastLANE! convenience store long enough to have memorized the job.

Four hours, Josh thought, four hours to kill while my mind just wanders around thinking about that woman and how she--

Whoa. Best to cut that off right there. It was funny—funny or soul-crushingly depressing—how ones thoughts could careen away in the wee hours of the morning when customers never wanted anything other than tobacco.

The electronic bell on the door went off and three girls entirely too young to be dressed like that strolled in from the breathless, humid outside night.

"Hi," Josh said, as per the official corporate script. The girls didn't answer but one actually deigned to make eye contact with him.

They look like slutty pixies, Josh thought, wondering what fresh hell this giggling gaggle had to bestow upon him. He watched them for a moment and was disturbed to find a tingle in his balls when the dark one bent over in the candy aisle. They were doing it on purpose, this sort of aggressive flirting with older guys, no matter whether they were interested or not. It always struck Josh as more of an act of hostility than lust; as if they were getting off on riling up dudes too old for them and pissed off about it at the same time.

Deciding they weren't going to be quick in finding anything to buy, Josh turned his attention to the little advertisement that sat on the counter next to the cash register that offered horoscope scrolls for a mere dollar. He didn't want to look at it; the devilish thing just drew his eye like a junkie to the needle. One would think that register jockeying a glorified gas station at two a.m. would be a place devoid of melancholy, but there really was no place like that, was there? Maybe a coffin. Surely it was Josh's imagination that the smiling blond on the horoscope display looked like "she who shall remain nameless." It had never reminded Josh of her before, had it? This betrayal of his emotions was unacceptable.

"Can I get a pack of Marlboro Ultra Lights?" said a high voice that mercifully broke the back of Josh's thoughts. He turned to look into the face of the girl—sweet mother she must put that lipstick on with a pain sprayer—that he'd caught bending over. Up close like this, if she was a day over fifteen he was a tap-dancing gorilla.

"Sure," he said, actually managing a smile, "could I see your ID?"

A brief expression of disappointment crossed her face, but it was quickly replaced by petulance, like a spoiled child who feels perfectly justified in stealing that cookie.

"Sorry," she said, opening a smile, "I forgot it. C'mon, I'm old enough."

"I'm sorry, I can't do it. Company policy, you know? Cameras and everything…" Josh trailed off, vaguely gesturing toward the security cam behind his shoulder as if the device had ever been used for deterring underage purchase.

The girls wiggled out without buying anything.

An hour later Josh was filling bags with seven pounds of ice each for the cooler outside when the door chimed for the first time in forty-five minutes. Just as well; he was starting to weaken in his resolve not to call her.

"Is it too late to buy beer?" the guy fidgeting in front of the register said in a voice that would have been better suited to a reptile.

Josh glanced at the clock. 3:32 a.m. "Uh, yeah," he said, coming in behind the counter. "We stop selling at 1:30."

"Right, right," the man said, not looking at Josh and not seeming to particularly hear him. Josh had an idea the fellow was on meth, or its equivalent; the dude was vibrating in place like a paint shaker. Now that he was closer Josh thought the man smelled as if he had just smoked six packs of cigarettes while sitting inside a bread box.

"Tell you what, man," the guy went on, "just gimme a pack of GPC's, yeah?"

"It's $3.26," Josh said, flitting the little box across the scanner with a comforting beep.

The man pushed a hundred dollar bill across the counter at Josh as if it physically pained him to do so.

"Uhm, I can't take this," Josh said, pushing it back.

"Why not? Ain't you got change?"

Josh sighed. "Well, yeah, but I can't take it because of this," he said, pointing to the president on the bill. It was obvious even at a glance. This amateur forger had cut the corners off a hundred and taped them to the note, apparently neglecting to notice the fact that George Washington still stared back from the face of it; the words "one" stamped out in large, green letters. It would have been funny if it hadn't been so pathetic.

Without a word the man pocketed the bill and turned away. He stopped and gave a quick little glance back at Josh, as if sizing him up. Pausing only for a second the meth-head abruptly grabbed two 12-packs of Budweiser from the pyramid display in the center of the store and breezed out the door with the pace of a mall-walker. Josh watched him go, sighed again, and picked up the phone to call the police. What a hassle, he thought, purposefully avoiding the gaze of that evil little blond on the horoscope ad.

Exactly when the sun rose Josh couldn't properly say; he'd been too busy selling coffee and newspapers and a staggering number of PowerBall tickets. The jackpot must have been at that critical tipping point when seemingly intelligent people are willing to part with their cash for astronomical odds. The only good thing about the morning rush was that it made the last hours of his shift fly by and finally he was off the clock, his manager having taken the register reins.

"Ring me up for a twelve of Bud Light, would you?" Josh said, taking the item in question out of the cooler. There was something surreal about purchasing beer at seven in the morning; something even stranger about getting drunk while the rest of the world was just waking up, but working here, Josh's life had become one long night with fragments of daylight jammed in between like railroad spikes. The radio sang something about not taking your love to town as Josh left the store, daring his eyes to just try and well up, you bastards.

On the way home Josh wondered if twelve beers would be enough to sufficiently numb him. Sober Josh gave a warning to the future, Drunk Josh not to call her. Just fifteen hours and he'd be right back at the FastLANE! to start the whole mess all over again. Maybe tonight he'd just throw away that horoscope display.