Dyscountopia (2 page)

4)
      
Injuries attributed to avoidable accidents

These items will no longer be treated as work-related.
 
This change will be retro-active to the beginning of the year.
 
All accident reports currently on file from the beginning of the year should be adjusted to reflect this change.

REMINDER:
 
Don’t forget that next Friday is Fun Friday.
 
Remember to jazz up your wardrobe with a little extra purple.

Thought for the Day
:
 
There is no ‘I’ in Team.
 
Or in Safety.

 
“Wow.”
 
Victor folded up the memo and stuck it back into his vest pocket.
 
“That means Square 711 hasn’t had a single accident all year.
 
Tom Beaumont will be thrilled to hear that.”

Albert took a thoughtful bite of his sandwich.
 
“Where is Tom?”

 
“The hospital.
 
He fell off a ladder, remember?
 
Stocking those new Happy Huggy Bears.
 
Completely avoidable.”

“Really?”

“Sure,” said Victor, sucking soup out of a plastic spoon.
 
“He didn’t
have
to be on that ladder.
 
I mean, nobody put a gun to his head or anything.”

Albert really admired Victor.
 
At only 27 years of age, he was on the fast track to success, already a floor manager and moving up quickly.
 
His purple vest was always immaculately pressed, he always had something positive to say, and he always wore a bright purple tie with a picture of Ollie the Omega-Mart Otter on it.
 
He was a real team player, ready to do whatever he was told without question, embracing a splendidly simple model of the universe in which Omega-Mart was firmly at the center.

“Is he okay?” Albert asked.

Victor shrugged.
 
“Guess so.
 
It wasn’t a work-related accident, so … hey, did you catch
Bowling for the White House
last night?
 
It was a new episode.”

Albert shrugged.
 
“No, I guess I missed it.”

 
“You sure did!” Victor scolded.
 
“Alfonse Wang bowled a perfect game – again!
 
And he was real humble about it, too.
 
Said it was really all up to God and that he felt lucky just to be there and everything.
 
Very presidential.
 
That guy’s got my vote, for sure.”

Bowling for the White House
was the hot new thing on FOX this season, following up last year’s stunning success of
Presidential Pizzeria
.
 
It involved twelve men and women who lived in a house together and bowled competitively against one another.
 
Each episode, viewers would vote their least favorite bowler out of the house until there was only one person left; and that guy (or gal) got to be President of the Entire Planet for a year.
 
Being President was a great honor; you got to toss out the first baseball at the World Series, and pardon a turkey at Thanksgiving, and dress up like Santa Claus at the Winter Day parade and hand out presents with the CEO of Omega-Mart herself.
 
It was an important job, too, because the President was responsible for instilling the appropriate values in today’s youth; things like ‘don’t huff paint’, and ‘listen to your parents’, and ‘do what Jesus would do’, and ‘don’t be gay’.
 
Being President was a lot of responsibility.

Albert exhaled noisily.
 
“Who in their right mind would want to be President?”

“Somethin’ bothering you, Al?”
 
Victor sometimes called him Al.
 
Albert didn’t know why; nobody else called him that.

“Not really.”

“What is it, pal?”

Albert put his sandwich down.
 
“Have you seen Javier’s teeth, lately?”

Victor gave him a blank stare.
 
“Who?”

“You know – Javier.
 
Short guy, bad teeth.”

Victor’s eyes lit up.
 
“Ohhhh, the Mexican guy?”

“I don’t think he’s Mexican,” said Albert.

“Really?
 
Anyway, what’s his problem?”

Albert sighed.
 
“All his teeth are brown and shriveled.
 
They look really bad.
 
It must really hurt.”

“So?”

“Well, he’s been working for me for eight years,” said Albert.
 
“Working hard, not like a lot of the kids we get now.
 
Seems like we could do something for him.”

“We?”
 
Victor wrinkled his forehead.
 
“You mean the company?”

“I don’t know,” Albert mumbled.

“Sure!” Victor laughed.
 
“Why don’t you go on up to Mr. Edd’s office and ask him to fix Javier’s teeth?
 
In fact, why don’t you ask him to fix everyone’s teeth in the whole quad, while you’re at it?
 
Then everyone will be walking around here with big, shiny smiles while they’re paying twenty bucks a pop for cantaloupe.”

“Sssshhhhhhh!” Albert’s eyes darted around the cafeteria.
 
“I didn’t mean it like that.
 
I just thought, you know, this one time.
 
It couldn’t be that expensive.”

“Come on, Al, it’s like you’re speaking English and I’m speaking Chinese.”
 
By this, of course, Victor meant that Albert wasn’t making any sense.
 
“You can’t go giving things away to people without making everyone else pay for it in the long run; plus, it makes people lazy.
 
If Omega-Mart gives them everything they want, then what will they have to work for?”
 

“I know, but I don’t see why….”

Victor smirked.
 
“Poor Al.
 
Always asking why.
 
You’ll burn out quick with that attitude.”
 

Albert flinched.
 
Burnouts were common among middle management types in Albert’s age bracket, and Victor knew it.
 
One day, for no reason, a grid supervisor or floor manager would come to work and just flip out, start throwing eggs at customers or strip naked and splash around in a kiddy pool.
 
Albert had seen it happen to some of his friends, and it wasn’t pretty.

“What’s wrong with asking ‘why’?” Albert asked, a little defensively.

 
“We don’t need to ask why, Al.
 
We’re only Level 77 floor managers; it isn’t our job.
 
Only Level One’s need to ask why, and they don’t really need to ask because they already know.
 
Anyway, I gotta run.
 
Maybe I’ll catch you at the symposium.”
 
He gave Albert a wink.
 
“Whatever you do, don’t mention the Albert Zim Free Dental Plan there.
 
They’ll lynch you.”

Albert chewed thoughtfully, watching Victor as he walked away.
 
Victor was right.
 
Everyone had a job to do, and it wasn’t any good worrying about things that weren’t your job.
 
He abandoned the half-eaten sandwich on his tray and made his way back to Produce, whistling half-heartedly as he went, his hands thrust deep into his pockets, his eyes fixed on the floor.
 
He ran his tongue absently over his smooth, polished teeth.
 

“Not your job, Albert,” he muttered to himself.
 
“Not your job.”

There was a large rectangular bulletin board hanging on the wall as he rounded the corner into Produce.
 
He came to a stop in front of it, studying the battered green sign posted there.

THIS DEPARTMENT HAS HAD
 
 
3
 
 
WORK-RELATED

INJURIES THIS YEAR

The number “3” was handwritten in purple marker.
 
Albert picked up the foam eraser that hung from the corner of the sign, erased the 3, and drew in a zero, perfectly round like a donut.
 
He nodded his head.

“Perfect.”

He continued on, strolling beneath the light drizzling rain of the automatic misters.
 
To his right, tiny airborne teardrops gathered like morning dew on the deep purple skins of the swollen eggplants; gently kissed the warty, waxy surfaces of the carefully stacked cucumbers.
 
To his left, a pomiferous pantheon of flawless, genetically enhanced titans – the fierce and mighty Fuji, the tart and sassy Granny Smith, the sweet, exotic Pink Lady, the bold Imperial Gala – exulted in the rainbow haze.
 
The familiar
boop
-
boop
-
boop
ing of the registers sounded from ahead, sending happy customers on their way.
 
Somewhere in the back, the muffled
thump
-
thump
-
thump
ing of crates filled the air as they dropped from never-ending conveyor belts, filled with bananas and kiwis and radishes waiting to be carried to the floor; to be unloaded, stacked, and priced by the many associates that worked there, the hard-working men and women of Produce.

“Hello, Mike.”

“Hello, John.”

“Hello, Marsha.”

Albert recited their names from a mental laundry list, nodding to each one of them as he passed, possessed by the peculiar, unsteady confidence of a man who, through no great ability or distinction, finds himself responsible for the direction of others.
 
The associates returned Albert’s greetings with quick, distracted glances and warm, disinterested smiles.

“Hey Mr. Z.”
 

The high-pitched salutation caught Albert unaware, shattering his confidence like safety-glass.
 
He spun to face his assailant.

“Howya doin’ today, Mr. Z?”
 
A tall, gawky young man peered down at him, his long, cratered face rimmed by the scorching white lights above.
 
It was that new kid, the new assistant manager –
what’s-his-name
.

“I’m glad I caught up to you.
 
I needed to talk to you about the….”
 
Everything about the kid invited Albert to stare impolitely.
 
The sides of his head were clean shaven. A bright orange, heavily-moussed tower of hair shot up from the middle of his skullcap like a granite pillar.
 
A large chrome fish-hook dangled from the side of his face, inserted through his left cheek.
 
Something was tattooed across his throat in a wavy, cursive script.
 
Andy.
 
That was it –
Andy
.

Albert nodded his head involuntarily, watching Andy’s lips move eagerly as they mouthed out random syllables.
 
How long had this kid been out of school?
 
A week?
 
Did he know how silly he looked?

“… so I told them to go ahead and put it down in 3-F, but they said that …”

No.
 
Not silly
.
 
Andy was the future – a casual reminder of Albert’s looming obsolescence.
 
At first glance, it was easy to see him as a dull and simple creature, caught up in the ridiculous fads of his own fading youth, but his eyes were bright and cunning.
 
Someday he would replace Albert, and then Albert would be at his mercy.