The Store

by Bentley Little

  Shannon frowned. "No. Why?"

  Sam's face reddened. "I just thought . . . we're sisters, you know. You can talk to me if something's wrong."

  No, I can't, Shannon thought, but she said nothing.

  Sam took a deep breath. "We both share the same bathroom, you know. I can't help noticing if things . . . change."

  Oh, God. She'd noticed that there were no maxi-pads in the wastepaper basket! Shannon felt a sinking in the pit of her stomach. "There's nothing wrong," she said.

  Samantha's blush deepened. She almost stood, almost left, then changed her mind and started to say something, but only ended up clearing her throat. She looked away. "I know your period hasn't come," she said.

  Shannon felt her own face grow hot. She didn't want to talk about this with her sister.

  "Does Jake know? Have you told him?"

  "There's nothing to tell," Shannon said. "I was just late. God, do I have to discuss every aspect of my body with you? Do you want me to tell you when I have to blow my nose? Do you want to know when I have diarrhea?"

  "No!" Sam's face was now completely red. "I was worried, that's all."

  "Well, worry about yourself! Don't worry about me!"

  Samantha stood, strode out of the room. "Sorry I was born!"

  "So am I!" Shannon hurried after her sister and slammed the bedroom door shut behind her. She stood there for a moment, shaking, then sat back down on the bed, leaned her head against the pillow, and closed her eyes.

  It was a long time before she fell sleep.

  2

  "Check."

  Bill watched as Street McHenry moved his rook down the length of the board to steal Bill's bishop.

  He thought for a moment, then picked up his knight, started moving it to capture the rook, but saw that that would leave his king undefended and allow Street's queen to take his king. Slowly, he moved his knight back into place.

  Street shook his head. "What a pussy."

  Bill grinned. "That's exactly what I said to your sister last night."

  "Before she burst out laughing?"

  "Laughing? She was gasping. In awe. My length is my strength."

  "Just make your play," Ben said. "Christ, if you two spent as much time playing chess as you did napping your gums, we might get out of here before midnight one of these evenings."

  "Midnight?" Bill said. "It's only eight o'clock."

  "Just play the damn game."

  Four moves later, the game was over.

  Street won.

  As always.

  Bill had won the computer match the night before.

  As always.

  "Record unbroken," Ben announced.

  The three of them stood, stretched. Street finished off his beer, gathered up all of their cans and carried them to the kitchen.

  Bill turned toward the editor. There'd been an article on The Store in today's paper, a fairly long feature describing the chain's history and plans for the Juniper store. The article had quoted Newman King, founder and CEO of The Store, extensively. "I read your Store article," he said. "You actually interviewed Newman King?"

  The editor snorted. "Hell, no. They sent me a press release, quotes included, and I stole liberally from it."

  "I was wondering. I thought he was like a Howard Hughes character, didn't like to appear in public and all that."

  "Them's the rumors," Ben said. "To be honest, I did try to call corporate headquarters and get my own quotes, but if King ever did deign to speak with the press, it'd probably be to Barbara Walters or Jane Pauley, or Dan or Tom or Peter, not to a lowly podunk reporter like yours truly. I was told, politely but firmly, that King speaks to his customers through press releases and that those were the only quotes I'd be getting." He shrugged. "So I used them."

  Bill nodded. "I should've known it was something like that."

  Street put away the board, and the three of them walked out of the house and down the road to the cafй as they always did after these chess matches. The night was clear, the air cold and brisk. It felt good, and Bill exhaled as he walked, trying to blow smoke rings with the steam of his breath.

  "Saw your article on Bill," Street said. "You made him sound almost articulate."

  Ben grinned. "That's my job."

  They laughed.

  "I'm not too keen on The Store, either," Street admitted.

  Bill shook his head. "That building'll totally fuck up the character of the town."

  "Not just that, it's going to cut into my business. The Store sells electronic equipment. Stereos and radios and tools and wire and adapters. And they can probably sell it cheaper than I can. I'm not exactly rolling in dough as it is. I don't know how I'll be able to survive once they come in." He glanced over at Ben."I was thinking maybe you could do some type of story on how The Store will affect local merchants, try to drum up some support for us. I know the town council and the construction companies are all gung ho for this, but none of us in the chamber of commerce are thrilled. A lot of us are just hanging on by a thread. The Store might finish us off."

  "Sure," Ben said. "I don't know why I didn't think of it myself."

  "I won't shop there," Bill said.

  "You never shop in town anyway. You always go down to Phoenix."

  "I shop at your place."

  "That's true," Street conceded. "That's true."

  "Maybe I'll start shopping here more."

  "It's about time."

  They reached the cafй, walked inside. A family was seated at one of the booths next to the window, a teen-aged boy and girl at another. Buck Maitland and Vernon Thompson, the two old men who seemed to live at the cafй, were sitting on stools at the counter, full coffee cups and empty french fry dishes in front of them.

  Street waved to Holly, the waitress behind the cash register, and the three of them sat down in the booth closest to the door. Holly stopped by, menus in hand, but they said they just wanted coffee, and with a look of annoyance she retreated behind the counter to pour their orders.

  Street and Ben were already talking about something else, some suspense movie they'd both seen on cable, but Bill wasn't listening. It had taken him only a few seconds to determine that the two old men at the counter were talking about The Store, and he tried to tune out everything else and zero in on their conversation.

  "Yeah," Buck was saying, "my son's working on that project."

  "How's it coming?"

  Buck shrugged. "Don't seem too happy."

  "Why not?"

  Buck took a sip of his coffee. "Don't rightly know. But it seems like a hard job. You know how some jobs just go smoothly? Everything kinda flows together? Well, this ain't like that."

  "I heard there's been a lot of accidents," Vernon said. "My brother-in-law knows the blaster on that job. He's a powder monkey from way back, worked on Boulder and Glen Canyon, and he said the same thing. Said they've had more accidents on this job, which should've been a cakewalk, than they had on that stretch of highway they blasted through Pine Ridge. Said this is the toughest blast since the canyon."

  "You heard about Greg Hargrove, didn't you?"

  "Yeah," Vernon said. "The cliff road." He shook his head. "Guy was an asshole, but he didn't deserve to die that way."

  "That's why I'm not real happy with my son there. Like you said, a lot of accidents."

  _Accidents_.

  Bill felt cold.

  "Earth to Bill, Earth to Bill."

  He turned to see both Ben and Street staring at him.

  "Are you back on this plane?" the editor asked.

  He laughed. "Sorry. I was thinking about something else."

  "Everything all right?"

  "Yeah," he said. "Yeah."

  But he still felt cold.

  3

  Ginny stopped by the farmer's market after work.

  She did most of her shopping at Buy-and-Save, but the store's produce was consistently poor and she preferred to purchase her vegetables from the local growers who sold at the farme
r's market. The prices were a little higher, but the quality was a hundred times better and she would rather her money go to local farmers than to some anonymous produce supplier.

  She bought tomatoes and tomatillos, lettuce and onions, then drove home, where Shannon and Samantha were both lounging around the living room, watching TV. "Where's your father?" she asked as she dumped the sack of vegetables on the kitchen counter.

  "Music store," Samantha said. "He told us to tell you he was bored and restless and needed some new tunes."

  Ginny sighed. "He must be in the middle stretch. He always gets antsy when he's halfway through a manual. Did he say when he'd be back?"

  "No."

  "Well, we're having tacos for dinner. If he's not back by the time I finish chopping the vegetables and cooking the hamburger, he's on his own." She started unloading the produce sack.

  Samantha sat up, then stood, walking over to the kitchen. "Need any help?"

  "No. But change the channel. I want to hear the news. If you guys want to watch something else, do it in your rooms."

  "Mom!" Shannon said, but she switched the station.

  Samantha pulled out a stool, sitting down at the counter, watching her mother fold the sack and put it in the cupboard under the sink. "I think I'm going to go to ASU next year," she said.

  "I thought you wanted to go to UC Brea or New Mexico State."

  "Well, unless you or Dad win the lottery, chances of that look pretty slim."

  Ginny laughed. "Glad you finally see it our way."

  "The thing is, I'm going to need money. Even if I get a scholarship -- and I probably will -- my counselor said that'll only cover tuition. After that, there's books, room and board. I'll need transportation, too." She glanced out the window. "I figure if I start saving up now I'll be able to afford to afford a used car by the end of next summer."

  Ginny nodded. "Your father goes to that car auction in Holbrook during the summer. Maybe you could find something there."

  Samantha nodded. "It's worth a try." She paused. "The thing is, I want to work at The Store --"

  In the living room, Shannon laughed. "Dad'll love that."

  Samantha looked at her mother. "That's why I was hoping you could sort of smooth the way for me. Maybe if you brought it up . . ."

  Ginny held up her hands. "No. This is between you and your father."

  "Come on, Mom. Please? You know his brain snaps on that subject. And if I bring it up he'll automatically say no and that'll be that. You can pave the way for me, get him used to the idea."

  Ginny opened the top drawer, took out her chopping knife.

  "Mom?"

  "He's not going to want you to work at The Store."

  "But you could hint around about it, soften him up."

  "Why can't you work someplace else? George's? Or Buy-and-Save? Or KFC?"

  "There aren't a lot of jobs in this town, in case you haven't noticed.

  Besides, I heard The Store pays better. Five bucks an hour, part-time."

  "Wow," Shannon said. "That is pretty good." She walked up to the counter.

  "Maybe I can work there, too."

  "If your grades don't improve, you're not working anywhere."

  Shannon leaned across the counter, grabbed a piece of lettuce.

  Ginny blinked, feigned shock. "Are you actually eating voluntarily?"

  "Of course."

  "Shannon Davis? This can't be true. Are your eating disorder days actually over?"

  "They were never here. Except in your mind." Shannon stole another piece of lettuce and retreated back into the living room.

  "So what do you say?"

  Ginny looked at Samantha, sighed. "All right," she said. "I'll give it a shot. But I'm not promising anything."

  "You're the most wonderful mom in the world."

  Ginny laughed. "Just remember that when your father turns you down."

  FIVE

  1

  There was a light layer of frost on the ground, but Bill awoke early as usual, put on his sweat suit, put on his gloves, put on an extra pair of socks, put on the knit ski cap Ginny called his "homeless hat," and went out for his morning jog just like he always did. He knew he was being a bit of a fanatic, but he'd made a promise to himself when he'd started exercising that, rain or shine, sleet or snow, he would jog at least three miles every day.

  It was a promise he had kept.

  He quickly sped through his stretching exercises, then ran down to the edge of the drive. He jogged up the dirt road, through the trees, down the hill, but when he reached the paved road and Godwin's meadow, he continued straight rather than turning into Main.

  He had stopped jogging on the highway.

  He ran past the trailer park into Juniper's residential area, careful not to slip on the frosty asphalt. He had not varied his jogging route in the ten years that they'd lived in Juniper -- partly out of habit, partly out of intent.

  He was not the type of person to arbitrarily change his routine. Once he found something he liked, he stuck with it.

  But he had changed his routine now.

  He thought about the site of The store, the stretch of land that had been his favorite but was now the area he specifically avoided. There was something about the razed trees and flattened ground that did not sit well with him. It reminded him of Orange County, the place where he'd been born and raised, where he'd seen orange groves and strawberry patches give way to peach-colored condos and cookie-cutter shopping centers, and it depressed him to see the cleared earth, the demolished hillside, the chain-link fencing surrounding the heavy machinery. It upset him, angered him, and it ruined the mood of his morning jog.

  But it wasn't just that, was it?

  No, he had to admit. It wasn't.

  It had been disconcerting at first to realixe that he was not the calm, levelheaded rationalist he'd always believed himself to be, but he had made the adjustment to the new instinctual Bill Davis much more easily than he would have thought possible. It had been a basically painless transition, and he now found himself, without apology, looking for unseen and nonlinear connections between unrelated events in the same way he had previously searched for the logical reason behind every occurrence. It was strangely liberating, this reliance on gut feeling rather than hard fact, and in a way it required more intellectual acumen, more comparative analysis, more of the mental disciplines usually associated with the scientific method than did a strict adherence to a preconceived mind-set.

  But that was intellectualizing.

  The truth was that he was frightened of The Store. He might be able to come up with reasons for his feelings, but whether or not he could rationalize them, whether or not he could explain their existence, they were there, his natural reaction to the site, and that was why he had changed his jogging route.

  The last time he'd been by, the previous Tuesday, when he'd had to drive up to Flagstaff with Ben to buy a water pump for the Suburban, he'd noticed the framework of the building already going up. They weren't wasting any time.

  Ordinarily, construction projects dragged on for months around here -- the local contractors were notoriously slow -- but The Store must have offered some sort of early completion bonus, because it had been less than a month since he'd found the body and already the ground had been graded, the unusually deep foundation dug, the cement poured.

  There was something creepy about that.

  He turned onto Granite, jogged down the street a mile or so to where the houses ended, then took Wilbert back up to Main. His cheeks were burning with the cold, the brisk air harsh in his lungs. The sun was rising but was little more than a bright spot in the uniform gray cloud cover that filled the sky.

  Turning left onto Main, his back to the highway, Bill jogged up onto the sidewalk that ran the length of downtown. Instantly, he slowed his pace. Across the street, there was a banner hung in the window of the empty storefront between Yummy Ice Cream and the Video Barn:

  NOW ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR THE STORE.


  Even in this weather, at this hour of the morning, a line of people stood on the sidewalk. Not just teenagers but adults. Well-dressed women and able bodied men.

  He stopped in front of the newspaper office, pretending to tie his shoe but glancing across the street instead. It looked like a recruiting office, he thought. There was something vaguely militaristic about the setup of the empty storefront, about the precise lineup of people and the stoic manner in which they were standing. He could see their breath in the cold air, but he could hear no voices, and he realized that no one was talking.

  That was odd.

  What made it even odder was that he recognized most of the people. Many of them were neighbors -- hell, many of them were friends -- but they were all grimly, uniformly silent, staring fixedly at the empty storefront, not even engaging in the polite, idle chitchat of strangers.

  Paul Mitchell, the KFC manager, glanced across the street, caught his eye, and Bill straightened, smiled and waved, but the other man did not respond and refocused his attention on the banner.

  Bill began jogging, heading quickly through downtown Juniper. The sweat was cold on his skin, and his heart was pounding. He was more unnerved by the waiting applicants than he wanted to admit, and he could not help noticing that there were large shadowed sections of the street, dark areas untouched by the dim, cloud-shrouded sunrise where night still held sway, and he did not relax until he had turned off Main and was heading past Godwin's meadow toward home.

  2

  Christmas was not the holiday it should have been.

  Ginny surveyed the damage in the living room as Bill gathered up all the boxes and wrapping paper and carried them to the trash can outside. Christmas vacation had started late this year, and she hadn't had much time to go shopping for presents. They'd gotten up to Flagstaff but hadn't made it down to Phoenix, and they'd had to choose from what was available, making compromises on their gifts for just about everyone. Next year, she thought, it would be easier. She'd be able to shop in town, at The Store, and they wouldn't have to worry about traveling to a bigger city in order to buy presents.

  Both Samantha and Shannon were in their rooms, listening to the new CDS they'd gotten, looking at or putting away their other presents. For the first time, none of their grandparents had been able to make it -- Bill's parents spending the holiday with his sister in San Francisco, her parents visiting her brother in Denver -- and both girls had obviously missed their presence. The mood this year had been subdued, and they'd all unwrapped their gifts rather perfunctorily, without the usual greedy gusto.