Bob's Emporium

The rest of the drive passes in relative silence though it's oddly not uncomfortable. Bob's Emporium, which I have discovered is the place we’re headed, is a 30-minute drive back in the direction I first came from with Davis. Just like the way over the road is dead, we pass exactly one car.

Bob’s tucked in a little retail park just outside the city. Multi-purpose shops like these are rare, a city of adolescents doesn't exactly have a huge market for home improvement, our food is dropped straight into our mouths, and our accommodation is prescribed to us. All of our discretionary expenditure goes towards the entertainment sector or our weekend dates. The only people who frequent these places are those who never got out, who for one reason or another couldn't make it work with their girl, or at least couldn't lie to themselves long enough to earn their freedom.

I think about how depressing that must be and how that's a future I'm willingly choosing as we pull into the desolate parking lot. The smattering of cars already here must be for the business owners.

Emma parks the car and grabs me by the sleeve as I go to open the door.

"This is where you get to be useful. Go in ahead of me, ask the store owner for my prescription," she says.

"Any reason why?"

"I broke my glasses and the owner doesn't exactly like serving me, I'm hoping he might do it if you ask."

“You wear glasses?.”

“I need them to read things off the board in class.”

"Fair enough.."

I exit the car and head to into Bob's Emporium. The company slogan attached to their sign is ‘Everything you could ever not need and more’. I respect Bob's energy.

As soon as I enter the store, I begin my arduous search for Bob. The store is pretty large, it's sort of got everything you could want, everything I could think of wanting anyway. After canvassing the isles for a few minutes, I finally find a short man in a suit sitting behind a counter, watching something on a laptop.

"Uh, hello?"

The man, who I assume is Bob, pauses whatever it is he's watching and turns around to greet me. It feels bad to say this but I can see why things didn't work out for him with his girl. He's all of 5'3' with the face of a 40 year old on a full packet of cigarettes a day and early signs of male pattern baldness. This might be OK for a middle-aged chain smoker but since I was part of the fifth batch of ‘entrants’ I know for a fact he can't be older than 23. That's so fucking sad.

"Hello there. I'm Bob but please, call me Bobert."

"No."

"Hmm?"

"I won't call you that."

"I'm afraid I'll have to insist."

"Then I'll have to make sure to never address you by name. Ever."

"Works for me if it works for you."

I'm sorry you've been hurt like this Bob, one day we'll all die and your suffering will come to an end.

"Well can I help you with anything?” Bob asks. “This is your first time here right?"

"Uh yeah, it is but I think I can find my way around thanks… Oh, do you have a prescription for Emma by any chance?"

"What?! Are you messing with me? Did he put you up to this? Tell him the last time I tried to get it filled they nearly shut down my whole business! He's got some fucking nerve!"

"Yo, calm down man, don't shoot the messenger."

"You're right, you're right... Dr. Garfield told me I need to watch my temper..."

I'm so sorry Bob.

"For real though, they wanted to shut you down over some glasses?"

Bob begins his response with an earth-shattering snort.

"Did he tell you his prescription was for glasses? Hah! He doesn't wear glasses. What he wanted were prescription drugs."

For real? She wouldn't… would she?

"Tell him he's not welcome here anymore, would you? All he does is make fun of me....."

Well, you probably deserve it.

"Oh really? No way, you don't deserve that Bob."

"Yeah, I'm just trying to make a living here!"

"And what a living it is."

Please give me a discount, I don't want to pay full price for any of this garbage.

"Yeah, you're right... You know I like you..." He gestures toward me as if inviting me to offer up my name.

"Abel."

"I like you Abester, you're a good kid."

He goes to punch me in the shoulder but can only reach my upper arm.

"To celebrate your first day in the store what's say we give you the friends and friends discount?"

FUCK YES.

"My word, this handsome and generous? How are you still in this city?"

"Haha, yeah, never bring that up again, haha."

"Haha, OK."

I start heading back to search for Emma. I'm surprised she hasn't met up with me yet.

"You need help finding anything, Abe?"

"Nah, I'd like to get a feel for the place myself if I'm going to be back."

"Oh, OK. Well if you need anything I'll just be here, watching a sitcom. That's sort of my thing."

He's so proud of that, does he think that makes him unique. Well, I guess bringing it up is sort of unique? I guess?

Emma is found (after some effort searching) in the aisle filled with toiletries. She's stretching up to grab something on the top shelf but she can't quite reach it. The entire shelf is about to come down on her. That might be fun to watch in its own way but I can't pass up this chance to show my superiority be helpful.

The thing she’s trying the get is well within reach for me so I lean over her and get it. It's a bottle of blonde hair dye.

"Blondes aren't really my type you know."

"So you do have a type."

"Of course I have a type. Everyone has a type."

"What is it then? What makes the ideal woman for Abel?"

"First and foremost she needs to be easy to manipulate."

"OK, we're moving on."

She tosses the bottle in the shopping cart and turns away.

"Don't be like that, it was a compliment."

I keep pace with her as she tries to storm off without drawing attention to herself. A difficult task for her and an easy one for me.

"So what else do we need to get."

"Food mostly, any requests?"

"I'll just grab myself some noodles."

"No you won't. You're helping carry it so you can help eat it."

She pushes the cart weakly in my direction, handing over responsibility for it.

"I'm fine with noodles so don't worry about it."

"You're also paying for it."

"Excuse me?"

"Do you think I'll be allowed to?"

"I'm certainly not stopping you."

"Just pay for it."

Authoritative but not harsh, that's how she’s beginning to settle in my mind. It would be so easy to refuse in any other circumstance but for some reason, the words are getting stuck in my throat. Why is that? Maybe I've just stumbled upon a part of myself I would've been better off not knowing about.

"Step on-"

"Hm? You say something?"

"No."

That was close. Too far for a joke. I'm joking.

"Abel?"

"Yes ma'am?"

"Ma'am? Just how spaced out are you?"

"I just got lost in my own head for a second, don't worry about it."

"You do that often?"

"It's an interesting place to get lost more often than not."

"I see. I'll make it a goal to take a visit then."

"Please don't."

The last thing I want is for someone to look inside my skull, the very thought is unnerving. I don't usually like what I see, I dare not think what it would do to other people.

"Why not?"

"Why would you want to go in the first place, I thought you didn't like me."

"I don't right now, no."

"Right now? You think I'm going to change?"

"You don't have to change, I didn't like wearing skirts once upon a time. Skirts hadn’t conceptually changed by the time I started making them a staple of my wardrobe."

"Are you sure about that? What if they started making skirts with some sort of mind-controlling property?"

"I don't think that's right. It doesn't seem right."

"Maybe that's what they want you to think."

"Supposing it is how would I know?"

"Let's test it, don't you feel a lot freer wearing those jeans?"

"Do you even understand why I wear a skirt?"

"Not really. I imagine they make your legs cold, they seem unpleasant."

"Are you doing this on purpose?"

"Which bit?"

"All of them."

"In that case: Yes, yes, no, yes, probably. In that order."

She starts trying to work through that on her fingers.

"Um, which one of those was the skirt thing?"

"I'm not going to keep track of this conversation for you, I'm barely doing it for me."

Her glare (which once again is plastering her face) has become noticeably softer. Is this some sort of weird reverse Stockholm syndrome? Why do they call it that anyway?

"Stop derailing the conversation just when I'm about to make a point."

"And what point were you going to make?"

"You're like a skirt."

"You want to wear me around your waist?"

"Shut up for a second. I'm saying it's less that I dislike skirts and more that I'm not sure how to feel about them yet."

"And I'm 'skirts'?"

"Yes, you are."

We come to the end of the aisle and Emma comes to an abrupt stop.

"I need stuff from the next aisle."

"OK."

"I need you to get it."

"Why?"

"If he sees me we'll get kicked out."

She points a curved finger around the shelves on our right. I peak my head out and sure enough, there is Bob, sat down at his sad man counter chuckling at his TV show.

"OHMYGODRACHELYOUDIDNOTJUST-" Bob shouts and laughs and cries.

I can't bear to watch this continue so I turn back to Emma.

"OK, what do you need me to get?"

"How's your memory?"

"Not too bad, I know pi to 1 digit."

"That's not impressive, in fact, it's concerning if you don't know more."

"I'm not worried."

"I am."

"Look just try me."

"Alright fine, it's the fruit and veg aisle so I'll need apples, grapes, two mangos, an aubergine..."

"Emma?"

"Yeah?"

"What does a mango look like?"

"Jesus fucki-"

***

After explaining to Emma that I was serious about not knowing what a mango looks like, we began devising a plan to get her safely to the next aisle. We go simple, I'll wheel the cart and she'll hide behind me.

"Ready?"

"Ready."

I push the cart out of the aisle and Emma shuffles along beside me whilst making herself as small as possible to hide behind me. With the cart completely out of the aisle, I come to a stop. I check to see if Bob is looking this way. He sees me out of the corner of his eye and turns to greet me with a big meaty smile.

"Find what you're looking for?"

"Yeah, I'm good Bob!"

It seems those glasses he wears aren't just for show as he doesn't notice Emma's figure hidden behind me. Or maybe she really has just hidden herself that well.

"Ok well just let me know if you need anything."

"Will do."

Bob returns his attention to his laptop but it's clear that he'll notice if Emma just comes out into full view. I mentally begin phase two of the operation and very quickly encounter an issue.

"We're in trouble."

"Shit, did he notice me?"

"No."

"Then what's the issue?"

"How do I turn this thing without grabbing his attention?"

I gesture towards a display of beans in the middle of the aisle that is preventing me from simply dragging the cart to the side.

“Well, that’s not great.”

“I’ve got an idea.”

“What is it?”

“Get ready to run.”

“Wait, don-”

“WHOOPS!”

Now, I’m a man of many talents, but above them all is my unrivalled skill at Wii Bowling. Sometimes I didn’t feel like walking all the way to the basketball court on my days off. On those lazy days, I would head to my school’s common room and play with whatever they had to offer. For some reason, every school had a Wii with a copy of Wii Sports. One or two of the schools had other games but they were always scratched beyond the point where the console would play them. Not Wii Sports though. Wii Sports was always there for me.

**CRASH**

The cart rolls right through the centre of the stack of canned beans, knocking them all down. That’s a strike baby, 10 for 10.

“MY BEANS!” Bob cries.

Emma realizes this is her chance to dash to the next aisle and takes it. I rush to Bob’s side to comfort and distract him.

“Bob, I’m so sorry, my hand just slipped. I’ll get those beans back up for you in no time.”

Making sure that he doesn’t come out from behind his desk and potentially spot Emma, I leap and roll back towards the beans and start stacking them like I’ve never stacked before.

***

After what must have been another couple of hours and a dozen more shopping cart into produce display manoeuvres, Emma finally manages to find everything she needed and sent me up to pay.

Bob scans through the bottle of blonde dye last and gives me an odd look.

“Just in case,” I say.

I get the feeling I'm better off not mentioning I'm shopping for the girls, might lose my discount.

"Well that comes to 1056 credits, minus the 10% discount, Let's call it an even 950."

He waves the scanner towards me and I wave my credit code under it, debiting my person for 950 credits. Man getting this tattooed on me was so painful, why do they have to put it on the inside of the wrist?

"Well, you know what Bob-"

"Bobert."

"-it's been a pleasure. I'm sure I'll see you again soon."

"I look forward to your visit Abelnator, it gets lonely here sometimes."

It really is a sad existence for Bob.