Fluke (7 page)

My God, was that really just ten hours ago?
 
It hardly seemed possible.

Her long brown hair hung off to the side, draped over my right shoulder, her green eyes looked alive and focused on me.
 
What I noticed most about her face, though, was that it was looking right back into mine, our eyes meeting in the mirror.

“We look good, right?” she asked.
 
It was probably a rhetorical question, but I answered, “Yes, we do.”

It was true, we did.

I yanked my head up at the sound of the launderette door flying open and hitting a metal trash can, which was followed by the sound of kids yelling at each other, playing what sounded like some sort of space-ranger-versus-evil-alien game.

“You are a
Zargonian
and you will pay for what you did to my people!” screamed the space ranger.

“Never!
 
You will die like the rest of them!” yelled back the
Zargonian
.

Shit
.
 
Relaxation time was over.

I got up from my chair, eager to finish the laundry, before the
Zargonian
decided that I should die like the rest of them.

5.

It was a couple minutes past 10 when I parked right at the front door of Perry’s Pizza Palace, across three spaces (a big no-no for employees), and climbed out of my car.
 
I said another silent prayer to myself that Perry wouldn’t be in today, something I had done a half dozen times already on the drive over.
 
I walked around to the trunk, opened it up, and began loading items crazily into my arms.
 
I came up with two “Palace” T-shirts (unwashed), a matching ball cap, one pizza bag (keeps your pizzas oven fresh!), money bag jingling with the change it held, and, finally, the magnetized sign for the car door.
 
The heap in my arms was balanced precariously, but I thought I could make it without dropping anything.
 
I glanced one last time at how I was parked and thought of what Perry would say if he saw this.
 
I had tried to explain to him that nobody ordered pizzas at 10am, but this little fact wouldn’t deter him from hollering at me about parking in the front spaces, much less three of them at once.
 
I could just hear him saying, “The front spaces are for customers, Fluke…how many times do I have to tell you that?”
 

I walked over to the door slowly with my heap of things, hooked my pinky—my only free finger—into the front door handle and was able to open it just enough for me to squeeze through.
 
I was concentrating deeply on the task at hand, though I was aware of the fact that Heather was at the counter smiling a greeting at me, while I jumped through the doorway.

And, as I should have expected, in one not-so-fluid movement, the corner of the sign caught the frame of the door, and I immediately lost control of everything and watched it fall to the floor.
 
Coins from within the money bag rolled across the floor in each direction, and I looked up at Heather and just shook my head.

She giggled and said, “Well, hello, Adam.
 
Does the root of all evil lack even the most basic form of motor skills?”
 
She giggled harder as she said this, and held up a cigarette with her left hand.
 
“Smoke?”

I darted my eyes back and forth, a silent question:
Is Perry here?

“Nah, he went to the district office today.
 
Probably to kiss up to Mike some more, in hopes of a raise.”
 
A sigh of relief escaped me.
 
That meant he was going to be out of the Palace for most of the day, if not all of it.
 
Mike was the district manager, and his office was in Pensacola.
 
He was a nice guy who always had a good joke for us when he made his visits.
 
Even though Perry was able to slap his own name on the building he was still franchised out from a bigger company.
 
He enjoyed talking about the day he would "own this place.”
 
I couldn't imagine sweating my entire life away in the kitchen of a pizza shack, dreaming of the day that it would be mine.
 
There had to be something better, right?
 

“Do you think we could lobby to have Mike and Big P swap positions?” I asked her, smiling.

“Jesus, Fluke, what’s wrong with you?
 
Do you actually want happy people working here?
 
All that smiling and laughing couldn’t be good for business, or else Perry would have tried it already.”
 
She held up her cigarette and asked me again, “One more time: smoke?”

“Sure,” I told her. “Always time to smoke.”
 
I picked up Perry’s items, tossed them on the counter and followed Heather.

“Always,” she agreed, her ponytail swinging from side to side as she walked ahead of me towards the rear of the kitchen.
 

We went to the back door and propped it open with a large gray plastic trashcan that was set on top of a metal frame with wheels.
 
The can was empty now, but by the end of the night the thing would have an awful reek emanating from it due to old pizza, empty olive cans, and other unused food items and waste having been in it all day.
 
I normally got stuck emptying the damn thing.
 
Never again.
 
Well, at least not for Perry, never again.

“What were you talking about back there?
 
The ‘root of all evil’ thing?” I asked her as we both exhaled from our first drag on our respective smokes.

“Oh, yeah,” she said and giggled.
 
“Perry’s little joke this week has been ‘Adam bit the apple, and now YOU pay for his sins.’
 
He blurts it out every time he tells somebody about a change he’s made in the schedule involving that person, ‘because of Adam’.
 
It’s kind of sick; he’s really holding some weird grudge against you.
 
He laughs when he says it, and you can just see the threads strain on his shirt when that big stomach starts bouncing around.”
 
She laughed more as she said this, and, not able to help myself, I laughed too.
 
She really was a funny girl, but we had never hung out together aside from our talks at work.

Why is that?
I wondered.
 
She was a good-looking woman with a good sense of humor, and she seemed to be into me.

The laughter subsided, and she went on: “He left you an envelope we’re supposed to give you if we see you.
 
Oh, yeah, and we’re supposed to tell you that you owe him $19.88 for a pizza and delivery change.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.
 
I brought Perry his damn money.
 
What a schmuck.”
 
I laughed a little at the thought of how his itty-bitty mind must work and flung my cigarette butt against the side of his building.
 
Heather stepped in front of me and flung hers against the side of the building also, imitating me quite well, and causing me to laugh more.
 
We walked inside dragging the oversized garbage can with us, and let the self-locking metal door swing shut behind us with a loud clunk. We made our way to Perry’s office, and Heather looked over his desk and handed me a small manila envelope with A. FLUKE written on it.

I ripped it open and found my check for 18 hours’ worth of work and a handwritten note, which read: “Depending on your attitude, and
sincereness
, you might get your job back if you ask.
 
You can pay the $19.88 you owe to whoever is on shift.”

“Dumb prick,” I sniggered, smiling at Heather

“What?” She leaned towards me to get a glimpse of the note.
 
I smelled on her a hint of some fruity perfume, mingled in with the unavoidable smell of pizza sauce.
 
It was impossible to work here and not carry the scent of pizza on your body, in your hair, and, if you delivered them, in your car.
 
Sara had mentioned it at the pub on our first date, that my car smelled like pepperoni.
 
"Just a little bit," she had told me, giggling, and confidentially, as though people were
listening in on our conversation, as she hovered on the border between drunk and very drunk, "It's okay…it's cute.”
 
It was a curse, but cute!
 
It sure wasn't cute when she drove me to pick up my car the next morning.
 
The essence of poached eggs was all through my nose and mouth, and with a quasi-hangover, I did not enjoy getting into my car that day at all.
 
The rising sun had made it miserably hot inside, and if not for immediately rolling my windows down and speeding up to whisk the odor away, I might have lost the poached eggs and toast on the dashboard.
 

But, I’d still take the pizza smell over the curse of working with Perry any time.
 
Any time.
 

“He offered to take me back depending on my ‘
sincereness
,’” I said, pointing at the word on the paper.

“
Sincereness
?
 
That’s not even a word,” she laughed.
 
Boy, she liked to laugh, and she had an understanding of basic vocabulary too.
 
I liked those things in a woman.
 
But, mostly I liked the laughter.

“I know,” I said, and we giggled together.
 
Sometimes I pitied Perry.
 
I fell to my knees in a melodramatic enactment of my begging Perry for my job back.
 
Hands clasped together in front of my face, fake crying, I wailed:
 
“Please, oh please, King Perry, could you please let me have my job back?
 
I’m so sorry I got out of line; it’ll never happen again.
 
Please!
 
I am swollen and fat with
sincereness
!”
 
A few loud, fake sobs later, and Heather had tears coming out of the corners of her eyes.

Boy, just give me an audience, and there’s no stopping me.

“Hey,” Heather said, grabbing my arm, standing me back up.
 
“I’ve got a great idea.
 
Let’s celebrate your dismissal from the Palace staff. How about you and I go to the carnival that’s in town tonight?
 
We can ride the rides, eat cotton candy, and laugh at this place!”
 
She seemed really excited at the thought, and I felt bad as soon as she finished.

“Umm, well, I, uh, can’t, Heather.”
 
I stammered.
 
Wow, you’re so convincing, Adam-boy.
 
“I, uh, have some things that I’m working on right now,” I lied.

Why did you do that, bonehead?
 
I asked myself.
 
I didn’t have an answer because I really didn’t know.

“Oh…well, okay, Adam,” she said, looking away from me.
 
Was that a twinge of disappointment in her voice?
 
“But, if you change your mind, give me a call, okay?”

“Okay, Heather.”
 
I felt like a jerk, knowing good and well that I was going to spend the evening with Sara.
 
I couldn’t find the will to muster up humor for this uncomfortable situation; I had to leave.
 
“I really have to get going.
 
I have a busy day ahead of me.”

“Okay. Bye, Adam,” Heather said as I made my way to the front door.

“Bye, Heather.
 
And, thanks for the invite, really.
 
Tonight’s just a bad time.”
 
I managed to make it through the door without hurting myself and jumped into my car.

Nice job, dipshit
, I thought.

Sometimes I just lied to women.
 
It’s as if it were ingrained in my way of thinking to always keep some sort of edge by not sharing everything.
 
I guess that part of me just wanted to keep the "Heather Option" there, too (that is, of course, if it was an option and I wasn't just reading into a non-existent situation).
 
Something.
 
I don’t know.