by J. L. Salter
The escaped oranges had attracted the attention of the male fruit-tender, who alerted the woman who stocked and moistened vegetables along the wall. She, in turn, signaled the meat man, farther along that wall at the butcher shop. His apron spotted with blotches of fresh blood and related gore, the meat man lumbered over. Looking burly and distinctly surly, Mr. Meat picked up the front of Amanda’s scooter and pivoted it on the back wheels until she was pointed away from produce altogether. Then, without words, he pointed toward the main aisle. A dab of pig intestine landed on Amanda’s forearm and she recoiled in horror.
It was her inaugural occasion to be pelted with flying butcher gore. Also the very first time a bouncer had tossed Amanda out of the fresh food section. She realized she’d been banished to canned goods, boxed meals, beverages, and snacks. Oh, hairy hell.
Slowly regaining her composure after that mortifying eviction, Amanda noticed a young girl complaining to her mother that she was thirsty. To get the child to shut up, her mom reached in the top of her basket and tore open a ten-pack of fruit-flavored punch pouches. She handed a pouch to the girl and resumed her own obviously frazzled shopping experience.
The child ripped off the attached mini-straw and began stabbing at the designated spot on the top of the pouch. To Amanda, it resembled the homicidal maniac from the movie Psycho during the classic shower scene. The straw finally made it inside, as a considerable amount of punch jettisoned from both the opening and the straw. The child’s eyes lit up with investigatory excitement.
Scientists have established that this particular model six-ounce pouch is capable of squirting over eleven feet when firmly squeezed by an adult grip. In the hands of an eight-year-old girl, it went roughly half that distance. The juice reached the rear thighs of a hefty woman wearing spandex shorts that were considerably strained by the flesh they attempted to encase.
That woman turned and glared. The mother promptly chastised the girl, who automatically put on her totally innocent mask and loudly slurped the remaining two ounces of juice from the pouch. The entire exchange had consumed only a few moments, but it further rattled Amanda’s composure and momentum.
Once the parties to the juice episode had moved away in separate directions, Amanda resumed her own interrupted shopping experience.
After maneuvering Ole Crotchity along the far side of the first aisle, Amanda concluded it was like trying to drive a recalcitrant bathtub. In the close quarters of a crowded grocery store after 11:00 a.m., a tub with a two-second turning delay and two extra feet of stopping distance could lead to disaster. Not to mention the flat spot in the jury-rigged front wheel.
Through superior mental discipline, Amanda was able to tune out the awful, grating, squeaky noise from the two rear wheels and the wobble-thump feel of the front one, but she didn’t realize the double-whammy significance of the other scooter flaws until she’d completed one full loop and reached the front end of the second aisle. She was distracted because Jason’s focused speed had him already halfway along the third aisle.
Hurrying to catch up, Amanda tried to effect a sharp right turn around the front end of the shelving which currently separated them. But the checkout lines ahead extended nearly back to the end caps, so there was precious little space available to maneuver anyway. When she saw her turn was developing too late, she automatically tried to overcorrect, with only her weaker left hand. By turning even harder on the yoke, the front wheel happened on its flat spot, then bounced up, and the scooter trembled like it wanted to tip over.
But with no brakes, she was still moving! Partly forward and partly to the right. What she’d intended as a 90 degree turn to the east actually became a 45 degree tendency to the northeast. With no brake to press, instinctive reflexes slammed her left foot onto the scooter’s worn and stained floor pad. In the absence of any pre-trained verbalization, Amanda hurriedly yelled, “Fore!”
She wasn’t even a golfer, so it was a mystery why Amanda selected that word. But the nearby shoppers instinctively understood its meaning and several scattered. One old woman, not as quick to react, was shoved backwards into the rack of quick-sale items which stuck out in the middle of the main fairway. Nearby, an enormous, prissy-looking man nearly tripped on the tall basket of four-dollar DVDs.
Amanda was already apologizing profusely before Ole Crotchity finally came to rest on the foot of Mr. Priss, the flustered heavy man with ugly leather sandals. He looked like he’d selected several words to invoke, but managed to restrain himself for the moment.
Jason appeared around the front end of the fourth aisle. He’d obviously heard none of the commotion because of his earplugs, but he could now see Amanda’s scooter had been involved in multiple collisions so he hurried over. “What happened?”
“Excuse me!” blurted Mr. Priss, nearly beside Jason.
Jason didn’t hear.
“Excuse me!” Louder. The persnickety man tapped Jason’s shoulder like he was touching a dead animal.
Jason turned that direction.
“Your wife is on my foot!” He pointed.
Jason didn’t hear his words, but he saw Amanda also pointing at the front wheel. So he lifted the front of the scooter and freed the fleshy foot. “Sorry.”
“You both ought to be. Menace!”
“What?”
Mr. Priss repeated himself and added invective.
“What?” Jason could not read lips, but he could tell the petulant expression included anger.
Checkers had stopped checking and baggers had stopped bagging. Several customers gathered and other staff appeared, including a young woman handing out samples of fried shrimp. Jason took two, which seemed to anger Mr. Priss even more.
The little girl, still holding the nearly empty punch pouch, stood very close to Amanda and began staring at her limbs. “Mommy, what are those little black things all over her legs?” Speaking loudly, as all eight-year-olds do when observing personal flaws in others, she pointed with great flourish.
The mother tried to shush her. “Hush, honey! Sometimes crippled ladies can’t shave.”
Suddenly Amanda realized that changing into jeans would have been worth the temporary pain.
At that point, the assistant manager zipped onto the scene. She tried to calm the effete Mr. Priss while also tending to the elderly woman with unwanted quick-sale items scattered in her cart.
Amanda tried to advise Jason on a joint retreat, but he still couldn’t hear. Finally she motioned for him to come closer. When he leaned way forward, she plucked out his ear plugs with a loud smop sound and said distinctly, “Get me out of here!” She pointed toward the back of the store.
After a long aisle of Ole Crotchity’s squeal-wobble-thump noise, Amanda coasted to a delayed stop in a small recess among the freezer units along the back wall. She shook her head in complete disbelief. What she’d intended as a structured teaching moment for Jason had turned into a major debacle. It was probably the single worst scooter collision in Verde Grocery’s nine-year history.
———
Jason felt right at home in the rear of the facility, because — he quickly realized — more shrimp were being deep-fried back near the seafood cooler. The table was temporarily abandoned, so he snatched two more samples on the fly.
As he returned from the beer section, Jason stopped to chat with a second shrimp woman — who handled the actual deep-fat frying at the temporary table — and obtained yet another sample.
A small crowd had formed in the near end of the pet food aisle, and all watched intently to see what would happen next.
Jason screeched his push cart to a stop next to Amanda’s idle scooter. “What’s up?”
“Everybody’s watching us,” she hissed.
Jason looked up. He figured they were actually watching Amanda individually, but he wisely didn’t point out that distinction.
The assistant manager also monitored the situation, from the seasonal candy section. She spoke quietly into a cell phone and pretended to fidd
le with large bags of marshmallow peanuts. The entire scene resembled a movie version of a very amateur stakeout.
Jason noticed Amanda’s concern. “She can’t mess with you — you’re handicapped. That old lady got some expired bread she didn’t want and the fat guy has another bruise on his ugly foot. No harm, no foul.” He sounded a bit like a verbose NFL referee.
Since Jason’s former earplugs were now tightly clutched in Amanda’s fist, she was able to whisper. “I don’t think I’m in the mood for a shopping experience after all.” She looked back toward the spectators in the pet food area. “I’ll just try to sneak past that lynch mob and wait in the front near the ice machine.” Amanda apparently didn’t fully realize it, but sneak was overly optimistic.
“What about all that orderly row-by-row stuff?”
“Let’s just use your in-grab-out method today.”
“Commando. Cool.” He smiled. “Uh, you want me to wrestle with that list?”
“No.” Her lips overformed that word. She then folded the page with theatrical deliberation and tucked it in the bottom of her purse.
Jason felt distinctly relieved.
“Just get four things: bread, milk, tuna, and chicken.”
“Chicken? You don’t mean a complete hen, do you?”
“Grocery stores don’t sell them with feathers any more, Jason.” Amanda gave him a look. “I just need some canned chicken.”
“You mean they squeeze those huge suckers into a can?”
———
Amanda’s stern expression was already so fixed that her attempt to count to ten only reached five. “Small portions of chicken meat are canned. About the size of large tuna fish cans, and probably on a shelf near the tuna.”
Jason closed his eyes. “Okay. Be-my-total-candy. Got it.”
“What did you say?”
“Be-my-total-candy. It’s a pneumatic device to remember bread-milk-tuna-chicken.”
She was too weary and disheartened to point out that air-powered equipment had nothing to do with memory, so she merely nodded. Big-mouth-total-cluck.
Jason watched her for a moment. “Are you waiting on me to leave first? Like in the movies?”
“Yeah, like the movies.” This particular film was probably Weekend at Bernie’s. She felt like Bernie.
“Okay, I’ll get bread-milk-tuna-chicken and meet you in front after I check out.” As he left, he repeated, “Be-my-total-candy.”
On his way to the bread, Jason veered again toward the roving fried shrimp samples. That young woman saw him coming and tried to scramble away with her platter, but Jason practically pinned her against the toilet tissue rack.
Amanda wondered if Jason’s zealous quest for free seafood would distract his mnemonic device from remembering the four items she wanted. She steeled herself for the short drive through the store to the front. In-grab-out, Jason. That would be the last time she ever spoke those words, even to herself.
Realizing her exit was bracketed, Amanda saw she would have to pass either the cluster near the pet food or the manager on her phone near the candy. Fearing the animal aisle with the clustered spectators, Amanda chose the manager’s direction and gently pressed Ole Crotchity’s throttle button. She covered the short distance quickly and didn’t even slow down. “Sorry… leaving… never drove these before… always looked so simple… sprained wrist.” Her words came out like an unrehearsed telegram as she sailed past.
The manager nodded warily and continued to narrate into her phone.
Amanda could only imagine who was on the other end of that call… perhaps the Tennessee State Czar of Grocery Security.
Every face turned as Amanda navigated Ole Crotchity toward the front of the store. It could have been because of the incredibly irritating squeal-wobble-thump noise, but she imagined they all expected her to collide into a cluster of unsuspecting nuns.
Having allowed two extra seconds for each turn and two additional feet for each stop, Amanda managed to arrive at the ice machine without injuring anyone else. From her vantage point, she could see outside as Mr. Priss obviously explained his delay to the prune-faced woman in his car — most likely Mrs. Priss. As he narrated the tale, he pointed several times to his fleshy foot.
Inside, Amanda could also see down two of the centermost aisles.
———
Jason was actually enjoying his shopping experience after all. He found the bread easily enough, but made three additional sweeps of the complete store width to locate milk, tuna, and chicken. Be-my-total-candy. On each pass, he collected another shrimp from the cute female with fine samples. On one of his circuits, the other young woman cooking the shrimp actually ducked behind the table and pretended not to be there. But Jason stood for a moment and shuffled his feet, which that employee could easily see below the edge of her stained white tablecloth.
Then he knocked on the tabletop like it was a horizontal service door. The harried teen rose slowly and smiled sheepishly. “Would you like to sample our fresh fried shrimp, sir?”
“You betcha.” He took three more. “Thanks.”
———
Amanda was definitely not enjoying her experience. By her rough tally, Jason had eaten enough seafood samples to represent a complete dinner at the local fish house. Might be some method to his madness.
She also noticed a moderately attractive woman was accidently goosed with the feet of the crutches, which extended like lances beyond Jason’s buggy front. Amanda monitored as Jason addressed the woman. Both smiled and they chatted for precisely 53 seconds before the vixen moved on.
Amanda watched as Jason finally made his way to the checkout line, waited his turn, and paid for the purchases. It was considerably more than his beer and Amanda’s four items. He’d also found several snacks which she knew were his favorites.
Jason approached looking completely satisfied with his shopping experience. Then he noticed Amanda’s consternation. “What?”
“Who was that hussy who backed into your buggy?”
“Oh, that’s Sally, from work. She’s a buddy.”
“Fairly attractive buddy. Did you have to impale her bottom with my crutches?”
“That was just a nudge. A little payback ’cause she pinches me on St. Patrick’s Day.”
“You don’t wear green?” Amanda didn’t like knowing other women pinched Jason.
“I don’t even own any green clothes.” He grinned. “Besides, I don’t mind her pinch once a year.”
“I’m about to pinch something clean off, if you don’t get me out of this store.”
“All right. What’s the rush? I’m going for the total experience today. Got to see a buddy from work and ate a dozen shrimp.”
The true count was closer to eighteen. “Plus, you cleaned out the snack aisle. I thought you were going for be-my-total-candy. This array looks more like be-my-total-candy-and-meet-me-in-Memphis-the-next-time-you’re-in-Tennessee.”
Jason looked over the selections as he silently mouthed her version. “Nah. Some of those letters are wrong.”
Before Amanda got off squeaky Ole Crotchity, she carefully drove the short distance to the customer service desk and announced loudly, “This scooter is terribly defective. It nearly killed two citizens inside your store and I may have whiplash. My attorney here was a witness to the entire unfortunate experience.”
Having formally shifted accident liability to the grocery chain, Amanda dismounted the scooter and accepted the crutches Jason held patiently.
On the way out to the car, Jason the new attorney pushed the cart slowly behind her and made no effort to disguise his study of Amanda’s derrière, which she could tell moved very nicely even with crutches under her arms.
On the way home, Amanda was mostly silent. She calculated how many months she ought to wait before returning to that store.
Jason asked if she would mind a short detour to his apartment for a change of clothes, since all he had at Amanda’s was a toothbrush. Amanda said she didn’t
but sighed heavily to clue him to her actual aggravation.
He managed the entire transaction in less than seven minutes. In-grab-out. As he got seated in his vehicle, he announced, “When we get to your place and I get stuff situated, I’ll rustle up some lunch in the kitchen.”
“What exactly do you plan to rustle?” She worried about his decidedly narrow culinary range.
“Maybe a sandwich of some kind.” Jason seemed deliberately vague.
Amanda pictured him trying to fry bacon for a BLT or grill a cheese sandwich. Simplicity is best. Besides, she didn’t have bacon, lettuce, tomato, or cheese. “Uh, how about tuna sandwiches?”
“Sounds simple enough.” He repeated his be-my-total-candy mantra. “We just bought some tuna fish.”
Amanda groaned heavily as she wondered what kind of wig would disguise her sufficiently to ever again shop there for groceries.
Arriving home, she preceded Jason into the apartment and went directly to her bedroom to lie down. Amanda’s shopping experience had been exhausting.
Chapter 23
Jason put the milk inside the fridge and situated his snacks. Everything else landed on the table until he could get Amanda’s particular guidance for proper destinations. He figured her closed door meant she was napping.
He went to the kitchen and leaned against the only dry expanse of the horseshoe-shaped counter. “Tuna sandwich — I’ve… got… you… covered.” Jason squinted at the small print on the squatty can. Hmm. No instructions. He picked up the canned chicken. No instructions there, either. “Guess they figure everybody’s a home ec teacher.”
To ascertain Amanda’s door was still closed, Jason peered around the corner down the short hallway, then flipped open his phone and called Margaret. “Mom, how do you cook tuna fish?”
“Speak up a bit. Are you whispering?”
“Uh, sore throat, I guess.” A bit louder. “So, how do you cook tuna?”
“Cook it?” Margaret acted like she’d never heard this question before.