I'm Your Girl (21 page)

Then go buy one, you cheapskate! They’re on sale at Best Buy!

“I need to check my e-mail.”

In my best teacher’s voice, I say, “You’ll have to wait your turn.”

He stands and grabs his coat from the back of his chair. “I’m out of here.”

“Do come back tomorrow, sir. I’m sure this one will be fixed.”

“Whatever.”

I had to do some damage control. “We don’t want any patron leaving in a huff,” Kim is forever saying. Though Jack left in one, didn’t he? I’ll have to call him, you know, just to get that LOC number…tonight…and to find out if I’m still a character in his book after being so nosy.

And as soon as the computer hogger’s greasy, dark-haired head bobs down the stairs, I boot up the computer, and, like he said, it
is
slow. Someone needs to clean out the cache file. I would do it, but I’m in a rush.

Once I’m finally on Amazon.com, I type in “Wishful Thinking” in the search box. Ten seconds later, the page finally loads. “Hi, Ty,” I say to the screen. “You miss me?”

And then…I see
Wishful Thinking
by D. J. Browning.

“Do you work here?”

I look behind me at a well-dressed white man with silver hair carrying a briefcase, an overcoat, and an umbrella. “Yes, sir.”

“There’s a problem with the copy machine.”

Do I look like I care about the damn (sorry, Lord) copy machine? “What seems to be the trouble?”

“It won’t copy.”

“Did you put in exact change? Sometimes it runs out of change.”

He blinks. “You mean I have to pay?”

No, well-dressed white man. Only
you
have to pay. “Yes, sir. Fifteen cents a copy.”

“You’re kidding.”

I shake my head.

“But this is a
public
library!”

We have to pay for toner and a service contract just like anybody else. “I’m sorry, sir. If you need to make change, go to—”

He waves his hand at me. “Never mind.”

Normally, I’d be mad at someone like this man, who has been waiting all day to be rude to someone, and I just happened to be the lucky woman.

But today I’m too confused.

I
’m sitting in space #38 in the All-Rite Parking lot having yet another conversation with myself.

I have no life.

Why did you leave?

You heard what she was saying about Noël and Stevie. It was too much for me.

She was just starting to get interested, and you just…left. What kind of a man are you?

Look, I know you’re the part of me who wants to start a new life—

And you’re the part of us who wants to live in the past. You’re taking this “divided man” idea too far. She asked for your phone number, Jack! Diane, a woman you just met, asked
you
for your phone number.

So she could get the ISBN and LOC numbers to make it easier—

You don’t believe that, do you? You saw her hand shaking. You know she was excited.

Only because I told her I was basing a character on her.

Come on, Jack. She kept trying to keep the conversation going, and most of it wasn’t about the book. She wouldn’t let you go.

Maybe she wanted some intelligent, adult conversation.

She was trying to get to know you, Jack. Why didn’t you just spill it all?

I didn’t want to depress her.

No, you didn’t want to depress yourself. Get over it. It’s been six months. Life shouldn’t end because two lives ended. They wouldn’t want that.

They were part of me. They made me…
me!

I don’t know what to do with you, Jack.

I don’t know what to do with me either.

My mind is quiet for a while, which is strange. Of course, it’s strange to see a man sitting in a car arguing with himself, too.

Her eyes light up, don’t they?

Yeah.

And you know she’s going to call you, maybe even tonight.

I doubt it.

You won’t know if you don’t get home.

I have to get some groceries.

And more Kleenex, right?

Not this time.

Really? You’re thinking with your stomach for a change?

I want my clothes to fit right.

To give Diane something to hold on to.

I don’t answer myself right away.

Maybe.

I don’t normally shop at this Kroger, but I know I have a Kroger-Plus card on my key chain. Noël collected those things. I even have one for Harris-Teeter, though I don’t even know where one is in Roanoke. All I know is that I’m going to save money.

You paid twenty dollars to park for five hours.

Time well spent.

I pick up a basket inside Kroger, then cruise the aisle shopping a la carte without a cart.

You should have been a poet.

No money in that. Yet, people respect poets more, because they’re better able to distill life into a few words and phrases.

As I pass the Lunchables—Stevie’s favorite lunch—an old poem creeps into my head, something about my best work is under the snow. Something like that. Robert Lowell? I think so. Yeah, Stevie was my best poem, my best work.

The signs read “3 for $7,” so I take three ham and cheese Lunchables with Spiderman on the front. He would have liked these. He went as Spiderman at Halloween last year. He didn’t scare anyone, but at every house—

“Ah, he’s so cute,” they said.

Yeah.

You didn’t give out candy this year.

I will next year.

I walk a few more aisles until I decide to make Noël’s famous Crock-Pot chicken.

You don’t even know the recipe.

Ah, but I know what’s in it. I buy a pound and a half of skinless chicken breasts, the largest Vidalia onion in the bin, a package of dry onion soup mix, and a can of mushroom soup. Is that all?

What are you going to put it on?

Oh yeah. Rice. I know we have a few boxes in the pantry.

Don’t forget the spices.

The pantry is full of those.

Oh yeah. Noël was always experimenting with different spices. Remember the time she asked you for the paprika, and you handed her the cayenne pepper instead?

It was the same color.

What a disaster that would have been.

So, her egg salad would have had a little more kick.

You liked her egg salad.

She made it look so easy.

A woman pushing a small boy in a cart catches my eye in the frozen-food section. She has dusty blonde hair—

Another brunette having an affair with bleach.

Shh.

I sidle closer to her and the boy, acting as if I’m looking at…frozen turnips?

They freeze everything these days.

And then, I listen…. He wants to ride in the cart. She says, “Not now.” He wants to ride on the side, hanging on like a fireman. She says, “No.” He wants to push the cart. She says, “Sit still.”

He wishes he were older.

Yeah. He wants to help. He wants to be a big boy.

Just like Stevie.

Noël and I indulged Stevie’s every wish on our infrequent shopping trips together. We made him an active part of our shopping experience.

Saying “yes” more than saying “no.”

As it should be.

If it had Spiderman on it, it went into the cart.

Yeah.

She’s looking this way. Check out the rock on her finger.

I look back at the turnips, listening to the boy. They roll by behind me, and I look again.

Right into her eyes.

You’re not very sneaky.

She smiles, her eyes soften, and she moves on, looking back once or twice.

Flirting with a married woman in the frozen-food section of Kroger?

I wasn’t flirting. I was looking.

Looking at a ready-made family.

No, I was just being the sponge that I am.

Too skinny anyway.

And too mean to her child.

Instead of having a cashier overanalyze my purchases—at least I’ve heard they do that to customers—I try out the U-Scan for the first time.

“Welcome to Kroger. Press the touch screen to begin.”

I press the “start” button.

“Do you have a Kroger-Plus card?”

I press “yes.”

“Scan your Kroger-Plus card now.”

Why does she have to be so loud?

I don’t know. I scan my card and hear a beep.

“Welcome, Kroger-Plus-card member. Scan your first item, and place it in the bag.”

I scan one of the Lunchables, hear a beep, and put it in the bag. It comes up as $3.29.

I thought it was three for seven bucks.

So did I. Maybe it will recalculate at the end.

I scan the other two Lunchables and the rest of my purchases. But when I get to the onion, I’m stumped.

You can’t scan an onion.

I know.

I press the “produce” button.

“Key in the number on your produce item.”

There’s no number.

Why couldn’t I just type in “onion”?

The world is number driven.

Don’t I know it.

I look up at a plastic roller filled with numbers for asparagus, carrots, green peppers, lettuce, onions…but “sweet Vidalia” isn’t listed.

“Key in the number on your produce item.”

I look at the attendant, a sweet-faced teenaged girl. “I’m having trouble finding Vidalia on here.”

She steps over, picks up my onion, puts it down, then goes to her computer. In a few moments, I hear, “Place your item in the bag.”

You filled only one bag.

Hey, that’s three lunches and at least three dinners right there.

What about breakfast?

There’s cereal in the pantry.

There’s some really
old
cereal in the pantry
.

Cereal never decays.

I press “finish” and hear, “Do you have any coupons?”

“No.”

Press the button, Jack
.

I press “no.”

So now you’re talking to computers.

She…it…whatever asked me a question.

A new screen with payment buttons appears. “Select your method of payment.”

Geez, there are eight different ways to pay.

What, no “give blood” button? Your total seems high.

Yeah, it does.

I press “debit.”

“Do you want any cash back?”

I press “no.”

“Insert your card into the card reader, and follow the instructions.”

I slide my debit through, punch in my password, and wait for the total to change.

It doesn’t.

“Take your receipt, collect your bags, and thank you for shopping at Kroger.”

I pick up my bag and analyze the receipt. The “3 for $7” didn’t take effect for some reason. I approach the attendant. “Something’s not right here.”

I hand her the receipt.

“The sign back there says three for seven dollars,” I say, “and I don’t see it reflected on the receipt.”

She smiles. “There’s nothing I can do here. You’ll have to go to customer service.” She points to a counter at the front of the store.

I take my receipt. “Thanks.”

I walk to the counter, only there’s no one behind the counter. After a four-minute wait, a woman with short hair and a tattoo on her neck shows up. I hand her the receipt and explain what happened.

She grabs a phone, hits a few numbers, and says, “I need a price check on ham and cheese Lunchables.” She hangs up. “It will only take a moment.”

Several moments pass. Then several more moments pass.

Moments shouldn’t take this long.

Shh. I’m about to save three dollars.

Finally, the oldest living Kroger worker, a woman wearing a plastic cap on her head, sidles up to me at barely a stumble. “Those aren’t on sale,” she heaves. “Those are full price.”

“But every sign back there under every Lunchable says three for seven.”

She shakes her head. “Not under those.”

“But I saw the sign.”

“Did you read the numbers under the sign?” she asks.

“No, ma’am. I just assumed that what was above the sign meant that the Lunchables above the sign were three for seven dollars.”

She leans on the counter. “Every other one is three for seven, just not the ham and cheese.”

You know how to pick them.

Shh. I’m getting my Irish on.

“Then there shouldn’t be a sign under the ham and cheese proclaiming that they are three for seven when they aren’t three for seven. It’s deceptive.”

“They weren’t under the ham and cheese.”

She’s calling you a liar.

“But they were!”

“No, they weren’t.” She looks at the customer service woman. “Long day, huh?” She looks back at me. “Want me to go back and show you?”

She may even be calling you a blind liar.

“So, you’re saying that the customer is wrong.”

The customer service woman steps closer. “We can give you a refund, sir.”

“I don’t want a refund” I say. “I’m hungry. Perhaps you can fix your signs so you don’t have to tell another Kroger-Plus-card member he or she is wrong.”

The old woman rolls her eyes. “The signs aren’t wrong. You are. Those signs are clearly marked.”

“So clearly marked that they confused a valued customer?”

“You must not have been reading closely enough,” she says, with a smile.

I hate it when they smile
.

Especially when they don’t mean it.

“You want your money back?” the customer service woman asks.

I look from the old woman in the smashing plastic cap to the bored customer service woman. “No.” I put my Kroger-Plus card on the counter. “I won’t be needing this anymore.”

“But, sir—”

I stare hard at the old woman. “I paid the wrong price.”

“Oh,” she says, “listen to him.”

I stare harder at the old woman. “You know I paid the wrong price. I’ll bet you didn’t even check the prices.”

Ask her if she went to school with the original Mr. Kroger.

This isn’t about age. This is about justice.

She’s old enough.

Shh.

“I checked the price.” She flutters a withered hand in my face. “You just can’t read.”

I step around her, saying loudly, “I know, I know, the customer is always wrong. Thank you for shopping at Kroger.” I stop and turn. “I paid the wrong price.”

And as I leave Kroger, I realize that I’ve been paying the wrong price for a long time.