Taking Stock

by Scott Bartlett

  “And what’s your strong opinion?”

  “A self-diagnosis?” I paused. “I think I have ‘I don’t need other people.’”

  “What if you had to diagnose the entire human species?”

  “That’s easy. OCD.”

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “Did you think that if you died, you’d get to see your Mom?”

  I shook my head. “Mom is gone. She’s not anywhere. She doesn’t know about what’s happening with me. She doesn’t know how I felt after she died. She doesn’t know anything. I envy that. I don’t want to know anything, either.”

  “You’re jaded.”

  “Is that what I am?”

  “Yep. Like the rest of your generation. Nowadays, the average age for becoming jaded is around 20. Humans grow accustomed to high levels of pleasure fairly quickly, and these days, young people are inundated with pleasure. Binging is the order of the day. If you binge enough, on food or media or whatever, you become desensitized. Nothing satisfies anymore.”

  “What about, like, my Mom dying? Think that might have something to do with it?”

  “It’s just an excuse. You’re jaded, Sheldon. Nothing unusual. It’s sort of boring.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Yeah. Whatever.” Sam stood up. “I’m gonna go home and feed your cat. At least he eats the food that’s put out for him.”

  *

  The temperature drops immediately.

  Jack. He must have snuck back after he left the warehouse. How long does he plan to leave me in here?

  There’s a camera that points right at the freezer door. All I have to do is ask Frank to watch the recording tomorrow, and Jack will be fired. Maybe even charged.

  It’s so dark.

  For some reason, this reminds me of standing on that stool, in the shed I share with Sam. I was able to see in there, of course, and I could have left if I wanted. But I was trapped all the same. In a sense, Sam came and let me out. I don’t think he’s coming, this time.

  I knock on the door again, and yell. I knock for at least five minutes. My knuckles begin to hurt, and I switch to my left, but it becomes sore even quicker. My throat feels raw. I’m already shivering. I stick my hands in my armpits, and start kicking. Eventually, someone will walk by and see whatever’s keeping the door shut. Someone will hear the banging.

  I don’t know who, though. I’m the only one on in Grocery, and other than Produce the only ones with any reason to come into the warehouse are Meat employees. And who’s working in Meat tonight?

  Eric.

  Could he and Jack be in on this together? Maybe. Or maybe this wasn’t Jack at all—maybe Eric saw me enter the freezer, and acted alone. He seemed to be trying to send me some sort of message, with the story about the soldier in Afghanistan. Perhaps this is another message.

  Jack, or Eric? Or both?

  Will they let me out? Would either of them actually let me die in here?

  The longer I’m trapped, the more likely it seems. My teeth are chattering. When I try to knock it’s like 1000 needles being driven into my knuckles. I feel like I’m standing outside in the middle of January with no coat on.

  I fumble in the dark until I find my cart, and I slam it against the door. I bring it back, and slam it again. I have to stop—my fingers are sticking to the cart’s handle. Normally there are gloves in Ralph’s desk, but I couldn’t find any earlier. Maybe Jack took them.

  “Help!” I scream, but I’m hoarse.

  I’m crying, now. Sobbing. The tears leave frigid trails down my cheeks, and every breath feels like I’m inhaling ice.

  “This is your chance, Sheldon,” I say out loud. “This is your big chance to die and not know anything, ever again.”

  But I don’t want to die.

  I say that out loud, too: “I don’t want to die.”

  I start running on the spot. Stamping my feet. Rubbing my hands up and down my arms, my legs.

  I try kicking the door again, but it’s too painful.

  I try to yell: “Let me out!” It comes out a whisper. I sob again.

  My heart is beating very quickly. In the dark, I see a parade of detailed images. I try shutting my eyes, but it makes no difference. Casey, heaving product onto his cart, slurping coffee, jittering. Jack, smirking. Tommy, eyes wide, ranting about impending apocalypse. Gilbert, wearing Ernie’s nametag, his head thrown back, laughing. Eric, standing with Joshua near the trash chute.

  Blood dribbling from Joshua’s chin.

  How long have I been in here? A long time. The store’s closed, now, I bet. Everyone is probably already home. Asleep.

  Sleeping is the last thing I should do, right now.

  But I could sleep.

  I try running on the spot again, and stop. Moving requires such effort.

  Sleep would mean escape from the cold.

  I’ll have to, eventually. Everyone gets tired.

  I sit down, just for a moment.

  I try to stand.

  I lay my head on a case of juice cans. Something crunches under my ear, and I realize it’s frost.

  I fall asleep. And I know nothing.

  *

  “Sheldon,” someone says. “Wake up!”

  “Mm.” I open my eyes, and see Cassandra.

  “Get up. Come on!”

  She’s leaning over me. Her eyes are wide.

  “Hi,” I say.

  “Sheldon, you need to move. Your lips are blue.”

  It’s still dark in the freezer, but there’s light coming from the warehouse. Cassandra crosses her arms and hugs herself.

  With Cassandra’s help, I stand and walk out of the freezer. There’s a cart nearby, and I sit.

  “Is this what was blocking the door?” My voice still isn’t very loud.

  She nods. “Someone wedged it under the handle.” She glances toward the punch clock.

  I look, too. A few cashiers are gathered, peering over at us. An elderly lady, Marilyn, drops her punch card, and it flutters from her hand. She walks over and touches my forearm.

  “Like ice,” she says. “Are you all right?”

  “I guess I am.”

  Cassandra touches me, too. “Are you sure? Maybe you should go to the hospital.”

  I pull away, and stand up. My limbs are stiff. I shuffle past the desk, to where my coat hangs from a nail.

  I pull it on, walk to the clock, and try to grasp my punch card. I can’t.

  “Sheldon?” Cassandra says.

  Marilyn takes my card and drops it in for me. “Cassandra noticed the cart blocking the door. Thank heaven she did.”

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “You don’t drive, do you?” Marilyn says. “My husband will drive you home tonight.”

  “My bike is locked up out front.”

  “You can come back and get it tomorrow. You’re in no shape to bike home. You need to get home and wrap up in some blankets. Who will answer my pages if you lose your fingers?”

  I smile. Marilyn reminds me of my grandmother.

  “You’ll tell Frank about this, won’t you?” she says.

  “I will.”

  I glance at Cassandra, who’s still standing near the open freezer door. She returns my gaze, blank-faced.

  “Bye,” I say.

  *

  Frank’s office door is slightly ajar, and I push it open the rest of the way. He’s sitting at his computer. “Can I speak with you?” I say.

  He looks up at me—looks me in the eye, for the first time—and then his gaze flits back to his computer screen. There’s a flurry of clicking. “Don’t they train you to knock in Grocery?”

  “Um, I think that would have been my mother’s job.”

  “She didn’t do it very well.” More clicking. If I were to guess, I’d say Frank is using his work computer inappropriately.

  “I need to speak with you,” I say.

  “That’s convenient. Because Ralph and I want to have a talk wit
h you.” He picks up the phone and punches a button, making the store intercom beep. “Ralph Thompson to the store office please. Ralph Thompson to the store office.” He hangs up.

  “Did you watch the camera footage from last night?” I say.

  “I didn’t need to. It’s pretty clear what happened.”

  “So you know who did it?”

  He looks out the narrow window overlooking the cash registers. “Nobody did it. When we got here this morning, it wasn’t done.”

  I decide to wait until Ralph gets here.

  “Sheldon,” Ralph says when he arrives. “You’re not scheduled to work today. Why are you here?”

  “I came to speak with Frank.”

  Frank emits a dry hybrid of a cough and a laugh. His eyes swivel to the floor. “I hope you brought your letter of resignation, after last night.”

  “Easy, Frank,” Ralph says.

  “Wait,” I say. “What do you think happened last night?”

  Frank laughs again. “Not very much.”

  “The frozen order was only half done this morning,” Ralph says. “It wasn’t much work—between you and Brent, there should have been time to spare.”

  “Slackers aren’t tolerated,” Frank says, which is so funny I could puke.

  I recount the events of last night, which doesn’t take long.

  Ralph’s brow is furrowed. “Where was Brent during all this?”

  There’s no covering for him. They’ll see he wasn’t there on the cameras. “He didn’t come in for his shift.”

  “Then we need to know why.” Ralph picks up Frank’s phone. He calls down to the Customer Service counter and gets Brent’s number from Betty. But there’s no answer when he dials it. He hangs up and tries again. This time, after a couple seconds, he says, “Brent? This is Ralph. Why weren’t you in for your shift yesterday?” He listens. “I see. All right, then.” He hangs up. “Brent says he called to see whether he was scheduled for last night, and Donovan told him he wasn’t.”

  Ralph calls Donovan, who says he must have misread the schedule.

  “It happens,” Ralph says once he hangs up. “Sometimes people look at the wrong day. It’s just bad luck.” He shakes his head. “You should have called Brent, and then called me if you couldn’t reach him. You should never be the only one working in Grocery.”

  I nod. “Next time, I will.”

  “Let’s check the video feed,” Ralph says. “That’s the next step. There’s a camera pointing right at the freezer door.”

  Frank looks down at his computer mouse. “That won’t be possible.”

  “Why not?”

  He clears his throat. “The cameras weren’t on last night.”

  Ralph speaks slowly: “Why wouldn’t they be on?”

  “The cameras are never on.” Frank pauses. He looks across his office, at the wall. He clears his throat again. “The cameras are fake.”

  *

  As I exit Spend Easy’s sliding doors, a yellow Hummer pulls into the nearest parking spot—a handicapped spot. Gilbert sits in the driver’s seat. I walk over, zipping my coat as I go. It’s getting cold.

  “Is this yours?” I say.

  “I’m driving it, aren’t I?”

  “Wow. You sure know how to make a stock boy’s salary go far.”

  “I have multiple income streams.” His left hand is resting on the steering wheel, and he’s twisting his gold ring with his right. “I hear you chilled out for once last night.”

  “Oh, that’s really good. You definitely don’t deserve to be punched for that.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Who told you?”

  “Cassandra. How long were you stuck in there?”

  “Almost three hours. You talk to Cassandra?”

  “Occasionally,” he says, shrugging. “Guess I can’t call you a rookie anymore. If almost getting hypothermia isn’t an appropriate initiation, I don’t know what is. Who do you think did it?”

  I hesitate. “Well, I saw Jack before I got locked in—less than a minute before. But there’s no way to know for certain. Gilbert, the cameras are fake. They don’t work.”

  He raises his eyebrows. “Are you sure?”

  “Frank admitted it. Me and Ralph asked to see the footage from last night, and he told us there is no footage, because the cameras don’t work. Ralph didn’t know. He was pretty pissed when he found out, actually.”

  “Jack is Frank’s golden boy—maybe the cameras do work, and Frank is lying to cover Jack’s ass.”

  “You think he’d cover up attempted murder?”

  “Sure.”

  I shake my head. “I don’t even know for sure it was Jack.”

  “Who else would it be?”

  Eric. But that’s little more than a hunch.

  “I don’t know.”

  “It was definitely Jack,” Gilbert says. “He hates Grocery—and he hates that we have someone now who outshines anybody in Produce. He’s afraid you’ll usurp him as Frank’s favourite.”

  “So he locked me in the freezer?”

  “He’s a zealot, man. A crazy person. He wanted to intimidate you into quitting.”

  I pause. “He did say something weird, recently. When he asked me to work in Produce. He said Frank’s planning to replace the entire Grocery department, and that switching to Produce would have been my last chance to keep my job.”

  “Jesus Christ. We need to stand up to them, Sheldon. Jack and Frank. We need to give them a taste of what they’ve been dishing out.”

  Suddenly I’m concerned someone from Spend Easy is within earshot. I check behind me, but see no one. I turn back to Gilbert.

  “What do you have in mind?”

  He opens the glove compartment, takes out a pen and notepad, and scribbles a number. He tears off the sheet and gives it to me. “That’s my cell number. Call me tonight, after 10:30.”

  “What are you planning?”

  “Just call.”

  He starts the car, and the Hummer’s engine roars. He drives away.

  *

  I’m standing by the side of the road with my hand in my mouth, wiggling a tooth. It’s a molar, and it’s loose.

  It comes out. I look at it, lying in the palm of my hand. I try to fit it back into my gums, but it won’t stick there.

  I look up, and see my mother standing across the road. She’s watching me with a hand over her mouth, her head tilted to the right. She walks toward me.

  Out of nowhere, a yellow Hummer appears and runs her down.

  I wake up to the phone ringing. I walk out to the kitchen.

  “Hello?”

  “You didn’t call.” It’s Gilbert.

  “I fell asleep on the couch. How’d you get my number?”

  “I called the store before it closed, and Cassandra gave it to me. She said it’s so nice of me to hang out with you. She thinks you really need a friend right now.”

  “That sort of makes me want to vomit. Listen, what sort of revenge are you planning? I’m having second thoughts.”

  “You don’t think they deserve it?”

  “I’m not even sure who ‘they’ are. And I’d like to know what ‘it’ is.”

  “‘They’ are Frank and Jack. And you’ll find out the other thing shortly. I’m coming to pick you up. What’s your address?”

  I sigh. “Foresail Road. 37a.”

  “On my way.”

  Gilbert screeches into the driveway around 11. I get in, and he glances in the rearview, slams the gearshift into reverse, and darts into the road. We take off.

  We park next to a Cart Corral, which is the same yellow as Gilbert’s Hummer.

  “How do you expect to get into the store?” I say.

  “With my key.” He holds up his key ring, jingling it.

  “How do you have a key to Spend Easy?”

  “I borrowed it from Ralph’s coat, one time. Got a copy made and put it back a couple hours later.”

  “We could get arrested.”

 
; “We won’t, though. Spend Easy doesn’t have security guards. And no one checks up on the store during the night. Anyway, if they did, we’d tell them Ralph called us in for an emergency overnight shift. They’d believe it—how else would we have gotten in?”

  “Tell me what you’re planning.”

  “It’s a surprise. Come on.” He opens his door.

  “But what are we doing?”

  “You’ll see. This is our one opportunity, Sheldon. Frank might have working cameras installed as early as tomorrow.”

  When we left Frank’s office, Ralph said he planned to stop posting the schedule in the warehouse, where anyone can read it. He’s going to get everyone’s email address, and start sending it electronically. From now on, only Grocery employees will know when Grocery employees are working.

  Gilbert and I walk to the sliding doors, which don’t slide open, of course. He inserts the key into a lock halfway up the door. We enter. Something starts to beep, and my heart rate speeds up.

  “Shit. The alarm. We forgot about the alarm!”

  “We didn’t forget about anything.” Gilbert walks to the panel and punches in four numbers. The beeping stops. He looks at me, eyebrows raised.

  “All right, then,” I say.

  He leads me past the cash registers. With only one strip of fluorescent lights on, and no customers, the store seems larger. It’s quiet, too. I didn’t realize how noisy Spend Easy gets until now that there’s no music, no talking, no cash drawers opening and closing.

  We walk up the stairs and enter the room next to Frank’s office. Near a computer monitor sits a row of four black scanning guns, all nestled in a battery charger. I remember them from my second day at Spend Easy, when Ralph used one to scan Dairy products. Gilbert grabs the one labelled “PRODUCE,” and we go back down the stairs.

  “Jack is responsible for placing the Produce orders,” he says. “He placed one just this morning, using this order gun. We’re going to make a little adjustment.”