Am I Right or Am I Right? (9 page)

Now, you need to understand something about the family vehicle. I believe it is the custom in some households to regularly polish and wax the exterior, vacuum the interior, buff the rearview mirror and generally maintain an atmosphere of cleanliness and hygiene. The Fridge treats the car like a giant trash barrel. There are potato chip packets, battered cups from McDonald’s, copies of the local newspaper with screaming headlines like “Titanic 0, Iceberg 1,” and other assorted detritus. You could hide an elephant seal in the back of the car and be confident the Fridge would never notice.

I tucked myself down and pulled an old curtain over my head. Don’t ask me what it was doing there, all right?

Fortunately, I didn’t have to wait long. I heard the Fridge slam the front door and felt the car dip as she got behind the wheel. The engine spluttered into life and the car lurched into reverse. We were on our way. I hoped it wasn’t going to be a long trip and not just because I only had an hour to get there, trail the Fridge, and make it back to Crazi-Cheep in time for my shift. You see, the car doesn’t have AC, unless you count a faulty front window liable to slip down, and it was a hot day.

I risked lifting the curtain a little, just to get some air. It didn’t help much. It was still like being in the waiting room for Hades, but at least I could see. In fact, I discovered a plastic doll I had lost when I was five years old.

I’d always liked that doll.

Twenty minutes later, the car came to a halt and the engine cut out. I was relieved, I can tell you. The Fridge gathered her stuff from the passenger seat. Then the car door slammed and the key turned in the lock. This was the tricky part. How long should I wait before I got out of the car? If it was too soon, the Fridge would spot me, but if I left it too long, then she might have disappeared and the whole exercise would have been futile. Judgment was vital.

I waited until the clack of her shoes faded and then counted slowly to ten. I slowly pushed open the rear door and slipped into a pool of sunshine. Snapping the lock down, I pushed against the door until I could feel the mechanism engage. Only then did I search for the Fridge.

I was in the parking lot of the casino. Of course. Just my luck. The one time the Fridge actually goes to work was bound to be the day I followed her. I looked toward the entrance of the casino, about two hundred yards away, but could see no sign of her. She couldn’t possibly have walked that distance in the time.

I couldn’t believe it. Had the earth swallowed her?

I pivoted around, a dangerous maneuver in high-heeled shoes, and just as I was about to despair completely, I spotted her. She was standing in the middle of the parking lot, talking to a man. He was holding my mother by the arm, in a curiously intimate way, just by the elbow. She was looking up into his face and smiling. It
had
to be the same man I’d seen last night. I couldn’t imagine the Fridge made a habit of romantic assignations with different people. Even though I couldn’t get a good view because he had his back to me, it cleared up one concern. It wasn’t my dad. This guy had hair. Lots of it, mostly gray. But who was he? I started to walk toward them and that’s when the first disaster happened.

The man dropped my mother’s arm and opened a car door for her. She dipped her head and got in. He walked around to the driver’s side and got behind the wheel, and there was a throaty roar from a powerful engine. They were driving off! I tried to walk faster. I would have broken into a run, but the high heels were a danger to life and limb. How do women wear them and steer clear of hospital emergency rooms? I kept tottering to the side and my ankles bowed alarmingly. My call-girl persona now had the additional refinement of apparent inebriation. I watched helplessly as the car, a long, sleek beast, swept past. The Fridge and the driver were gazing into each other’s eyes, so they didn’t notice me. I doubt if they would have noticed if Elvis had materialized on the hood.

The car disappeared down the casino’s driveway and headed away from town, fading into a dim twinkle of brake lights. I hadn’t even had the presence of mind to get the license plate.

Sweaty, irritated, and feeling completely dispirited, I staggered into the casino. I needed the ladies’ room. There was a bloke standing guard at the entrance, all done up in formal gear, but looking like a hulking slab of muscle. You know the kind. Squashed nose, perpetual stubble, and a brain the size of a pea. He leered as I approached, his piggy eyes glued to my silvered, sparkling bust.

“Not a bloody word, mate,” I said to him, “or you’ll find the business end of these stilettos giving you a rectal exploration.”

I left him struggling to find a response and crashed open the door of the ladies’ toilet. Haunted, black-rimmed eyes stared back at me from the mirror. I was exhausted. And it was then, when I was at my lowest, that the second disaster broke into my consciousness.

I had left the bag with my change of clothes in the car.

The locked car.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, my purse and house keys were in it as well. I contemplated the half-hour walk back to Crazi-Cheep, in high heels, in the blazing sun, dressed like a hooker, and I started to cry.

It did absolutely nothing for the mascara.

Chapter 15

From harlot to heroine

If it’s all the same to you, I’ll let the details of my long walk to work remain in oblivion. Maybe deep hypnosis could resurrect the grisly experience, but some things are best left buried.

I’ll tell you one thing, though. It was not a happy, carefree Calma Harrison who finally staggered through the doors of Crazi-Cheep on Saturday afternoon. It was a Calma Harrison in the mood for violent confrontation with any pensioner who glanced at her sideways. I burst through the automatic doors looking like Sexually Deviant Barbie. Mothers grasped small children to their bosoms as I clicked toward the staff changing rooms. I couldn’t see Jason. That was the only bright spot in an otherwise bleak situation.

At least I had the opportunity to clean myself up. Typically, the store only provided cheap Crazi Brand soap for its employees, but it did the trick. The mascara was stubborn, though. By the time I’d finished scrubbing my eyes with gritty soap, the redness around my face made it seem like I had been sobbing hysterically for a large portion of the millennium. For once I was grateful for the outsized uniform. I stripped down to my underwear and unless a freak tornado careered down aisle twelve and lifted up my uniform, I would remain decent. The wig had to go, as did the high heels. Those things were spawned from a mind of pure evil.

I marched from the changing room straight to Housewares, where I picked up a multicolored dish towel and folded it into a bandanna. With my red eyes and a tea towel on my head, I resembled the late Yasser Arafat, but I didn’t give a stuff. From there, I went to the section that had flip-flops. My transformation from
Penthouse
Pet to middle-aged housewife complete, I fronted up to Candy at customer service to inquire about my duties for the evening.

I was hoping she would say something about my appearance. I was in that kind of mood—the sort where if someone says, “Good evening,” you’re liable to give them a stiff-fingered poke in the throat. But she just assigned me to shelf stacking again.

That didn’t improve my mood either. I wanted to say,
Oh, I was good enough for the registers when you were desperate, but now the brain-dead zombies you call your staff have returned, I’m back to the chorus line, is that it?
I didn’t, though. It was just another small flame under my simmering anger.

I plunged through the plastic curtains out the back and loaded up a cart with sundry items apparently in short supply on the shelves. I grunted at one of the men when he smiled and said
hello.
Provocative bastard!

I was slamming cans of something onto a shelf and cursing softly under my breath when there was a tap on my shoulder. I resisted the urge to slam a can backwards into a rheumatic ankle and got wearily to my feet.

It was my father. Of course it was. How could it be anyone else? Maybe the Grim Reaper, but frankly that would have been preferable. I narrowed my reddened eyes and tried to get his head to explode through sheer force of will. I saw a film where that happened once.

“Calma,” he said. “You look different.”

“Unfortunately,” I said, “you look exactly the same. Please rearrange these words into a well-known phrase or saying:
off, piss.
”

“Please,” he said. “I’ll leave you alone. But first there’s something I need to tell you. Come on, Calma. Please.”

“You haven’t a clue, have you?” I replied, the steel in my voice getting harder and sharper by the moment. “Not the vaguest idea of what you’ve done to Mum and me. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here. Well, matey, if you want to know the cold, hard facts of the matter, you lost your chance to talk to me when you walked out five years ago. I remember. I remember sitting on the stairs, listening to you shouting. And you stormed past me as if I wasn’t there and the next thing you were gone. Talking wasn’t of any significance then, was it? Why should I believe anything’s changed?”

“Calma,” he said, “I
have
tried to talk to you. I have. But you…Listen, isn’t it possible you might have lost perspective on this?”

“No, but it’s certain you’ve lost my interest,” I replied. “Please go. Stop haunting this store like some sad ghost father of Christmas past. Stop following me. Just stop everything. Breathing included. Keep out of my life!”

His eyes widened. I had difficulty myself believing what I’d said, but this was not the best time to engage me in even casual conversation, let alone a heart-to-heart with someone I wouldn’t pee on if he was on fire.

“But Calma, I’m your father. You might not like it, but that doesn’t change the fact we have a bond. A blood tie. And it isn’t going to go away.”

“Look,” I said, “get fifty cents and call someone who gives a shit about your clichés. I have to work.”

I turned back to slam more cans into empty spaces. Ironic, really, since empty spaces seemed to be all I was composed of at that moment. When I looked up, he had gone.

For a brief moment, I couldn’t be sure if what I felt was relief or regret. But I readjusted my towel and turned my attention to the pressing matter of button mushrooms in brine. Life, as I knew only too well, had to go on.

My mood did not improve when I took my break. Jason was smoking in his usual spot round the corner, and at first he didn’t see me. He didn’t see me because he was busy talking to a blond girl who was giggling in a moronic fashion. She had big blue eyes, a wide mouth, and flawless teeth. I couldn’t decide which of these features to punch first. She kept brushing back her hair whenever he said anything. Now, if you’re male, you’ll probably find this an entirely innocent mannerism. If you’re female, however, you’ll understand it’s akin to shouting from the rooftops,
Come on, big boy. Let’s get it on.
I hated her. I hated Jason.

Apparently he didn’t understand this because when he saw me he gave me a big smile and came over to where I was slouched in abject depression against a wall.

“Hey, Calma. How’s it goin’?”

“Who’s your friend?” I replied in a tone of voice that could strip paint. Jason glanced back at the blond bimbo, who was fluttering her eyelashes and practicing her hair smoothing.

“Her?” he said, somewhat redundantly, since we were the only ones out there. “She’s the new girl. We were just chatting.”

“Happy days,” I said. “It’s not often chatting can produce that kind of effect on the female of the species.”

“What are you on about?” he said, sounding genuinely puzzled.

“Oh, come off it, Jason,” I said. “It was like watching the Discovery Channel. A few more minutes and she would have adopted a mating posture. The air’s thick with pheromones. Or it could be the cheap perfume she’s wearing. What is that, Canal Number 5?”

Jason smiled, which was entirely the wrong approach to take.

“Are you jealous, Calma?”

“Jealous?” I said. “Oh, please. You flatter yourself, my friend.”

His smile broadened and the twisting sensation in my gut grew accordingly.

“You are,” he stated.

I spluttered something incoherent as an encore and stormed back into the store.

I couldn’t remember when I’d had a better day.

I decided to lose myself in my work. I careered around the store like that Tasmanian devil in the cartoon, all whirling shapes and blurs. Shelves were stacked in such a way that if you were an innocent bystander you’d swear time-lapse photography was going on. There is a theory, often espoused by the mindlessly optimistic, that physical work is a perfect antidote to pressing personal problems.

It’s a crap theory. Maybe because the work
was
mindless and purely physical, I found myself focusing more and more on the problems besetting me. I was still no nearer a solution to the Fridge puzzle, Vanessa was off somewhere and miserable for reasons still unclear, and my boyfriend was oozing pure charm at a brain-dead blonde. At least she
had
hair she could fondle provocatively. I just had an expanse of stubbly scalp. So it was all I could do to remain reasonably polite when some guy tapped me on the shoulder to ask directions.

He was a runt, with the complexion of an avocado. A small wisp of hair on his top lip gave him the look of someone desperately trying to appear older than he was. I guessed he couldn’t be much older than me. He had spiked his hair with gel and looked like the kind of bloke who tied cans to the tails of dogs and thought the height of sophistication was farting during science lessons and shouting, “Who cut the cheese?” Don’t get me wrong. I don’t normally judge on appearances, but I was in a bad mood and prepared to make an exception in his case.

“Excuse me,” he said. “Could you tell me where you keep stockings?”

“Stockings?” I said, aware I sounded irritated.

“Yeah, pantyhose. You know, the things women wear on their legs.”

I was tempted, believe me. It was with a conscious effort of will that I stopped myself from telling him I was aware of the meaning of the word “stockings” that if we were going to compare vocabularies, I’d outscore him by a factor of three thousand. But I didn’t. Instead, I sighed and replied as reasonably as I could manage.

“Aisle fourteen, sir. Would you like me to show you? On the grounds I’d be surprised if you’ve mastered figures beyond ten?” Actually, I didn’t say the last bit. He sounded relieved, though.

“Yeah. Would you?”

“This way, sir.”

He followed me across the store and seemed nervous, glancing all over the place as if expecting an ambush at any moment. He couldn’t stop talking, either.

“They’re for my girlfriend,” he threw in, apropos of nothing.

“Really, sir?” I replied. “That is a relief. I’m not sure we’ve got any in your size.”

“No. They’re for my girlfriend. I’m buying them for her.”

I could see that the conversation, having hit this dizzying height, was unlikely to soar beyond it.

“She’s a very lucky woman,” I lied outrageously. She was also going to be a very hot woman, I thought. I didn’t know anyone who wore pantyhose. In the heat of the tropics, wearing stuff like that was a recipe for disaster. You might as well put up a neon sign saying,
WELCOME. FUNGAL INFECTIONS, THIS WAY
.

“Here we are, sir. What denier do you want?”

“Huh?”

“Thickness. Darkness. That sort of thing.”

“Thick and dark.”

A little like yourself,
I thought.

“Well, these are the darkest we have. One size fits all.”

“Great. Do you sell toys, too?”

“A present for yourself, sir?”

He shifted uncomfortably.

“Er, no. It’s for my nephew.”

“Well, we don’t have a toy section as such, but near the checkouts you’ll find our Bargain Buy area, where the products of billions of Chinese can be found in various shades of thin plastic and nothing is priced above two dollars.”

“Thanks.”

He scuttled off in pursuit of quality merchandise and I returned to aisle ten, where assorted tins of fruit awaited my expert ministrations. I was just wondering why anyone would ever purchase lychees in vinegar when a scream from the customer service desk echoed through the store. This was immediately followed by shouting and the crashing sound of displays falling. Given a choice between lychees and front-of-store drama, I think you’ll agree there is little competition, so I went to see what the commotion was about.

It was the runt. He had the pantyhose on his head, and under other circumstances I would have applauded his sense of civic duty. This was a face best kept under wraps. However, he was also leaping around the checkouts, waving his arm about. His hand was hidden by something—it might have been a dish towel similar to the one wrapped around my head—and he was yelling at the top of his voice.

“I’ve got a gun, motherfuckers,” he screamed. “Get down on the floor, all of youse. I want the money from the registers. No funny business, or I’ll blow your fuckin’ heads off.”

I had time to admire the look on Candy’s face. She had stopped chewing, for one thing, and panic was struggling to emerge. Then she slowly sank beneath her desk. It was a bizarre sight, as if she was standing on a trapdoor that was being cranked by degrees down into the bowels of the building. The other employees, Jason included, dived beneath their registers.

There was silence. The store was nearly deserted, which explained why we had five people on the registers instead of one. The runt was capering about, brandishing his loaded towel.

Then he stopped and, even with stockings over his face, I could tell he was wearing a puzzled expression.

“The money!” he yelled. “Where’s the fuckin’ money?”

Candy’s voice came faintly from beneath the desk.

“We can’t stay on the floor
and
get the money from the registers. You’ll have to make a choice.”

I tell you, if brains were explosive, you could put Candy and the runt together and not have enough to blow your hat off. Or your towel. Or your pantyhose, come to that. The runt looked around as if for assistance and then strode over to checkout four. Jason’s checkout.

“Okay,” he yelled. “You! Get up and get the money out of your register. Stash it in this pillowcase. Then do the same for the other registers.”

At least he had had the presence of mind to pick up a pillowcase from Housewares. Aisle thirteen, if memory served me correctly. Jason got up from the floor. His expression was sickly.

“I can’t,” he said.

“Just do it, motherfucker. I’m not kiddin’. I’ll blow you away. I swear to God.”

“I can’t open the registers. You need the supervisor’s key.”

I don’t know how long this little farce would have continued, but I was getting fed up. The way things were going, we’d be stuck in Crazi-Cheep for hours, until somebody got their act together. Plus I was pissed off.

I strode along the front of the aisles, stopping to pick up a stainless-steel frying pan (aisle twelve, $19.99—pretty good value, actually), and then headed toward checkout four, where the runt was twitching like a headless chicken. He saw me coming from afar.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doin’?” he screamed. I was beginning to despair of this guy. Granted, he was in a pressure situation, but that’s no reason not to vary the decibel count. I mean, after a while, being yelled at becomes passé. You need to mix it up. That’s my theory, anyway.