The Store

by Bentley Little

  He walked inside, ignored the smirking director who offered him assistance, and headed directly toward the aisle containing computer, printer, and typewriter accessories. He glanced around the other rows as he walked. What had happened to all of the myriad choices The Store had offered? Where had all the products gone? The shelves were still filled with plenty of items, he noticed, but there was no variety. There were no nationally known names, no recognizable packaging.

  There was only The Store brand.

  For all items.

  His feeling of dread intensified as he walked down the aisle where the printer ribbons were supposed to be.

  Were _supposed_ to be.

  Instead, the shelves were packed with small boxes and plastic bottles. He looked carefully at the products facing him: Sneezing Powder, Itching Powder, Magic Toadstool Dust.

  Comic book products.

  Masturbation Lotion. Hot Love Oil. Breast-enlargement Gel. Penis lengthening Creme.

  He frowned. What the hell was all this?

  "We're reorganizing."

  He looked up to see the smirking director he'd bypassed on his way in.

  "You'd know that if you'd accepted the help I offered you."

  Was there belligerence in the director's voice? Was there a threat implied in his space-invading stance?

  "You're looking for printer ribbon, right?"

  How could he know that? Bill felt chilled, but he kept his face unreadable, met the young man's eyes. "No," he lied.

  The director seemed surprised, caught off guard. "Then what are you looking for?"

  "Oh, nothing." Bill smiled at him. "I'm just browsing."

  Before the director could respond, Bill moved away. He did not know whether the young man was following him, but he would not give the bastard the satisfaction of seeing him check. He kept his eyes focused straight ahead, and when he reached the extra-wide middle aisle that dissected The Store and ran from the Automotive to the Lingerie departments, he hung a right and began walking purposefully toward the opposite end of the building.

  In the center of The Store, where the two transverse aisles met, a booth had been set up, a flimsy, temporary counter with an overhead sign that reminded him of Lucy's psychiatrist stand in the old _Peanuts_ cartoon strip.

  JOIN STORE CLUB, the sign announced.

  Two people he recognized, Luke McCann and Chuck Quint, were standing before the booth, and Bill slowed down as he approached them.

  "Store Club?" Chuck asked the salesman manning the booth.

  The salesman nodded. "If you become a member, you will be able to purchase goods at cost, without paying any sales tax. There are also numerous other benefits." His voice lowered. "Improved health, greater life expectancy, increased sex drive . . ."

  Bill moved away, not wanting to hear any more.

  He took the opportunity to glance surreptitiously behind him. The director was nowhere to be seen, and he relaxed, looking around, trying to figure out where they'd moved the printer supplies. A freestanding sign on the edge of the aisle touted EXCELLENT DEALS! NEW AUTOS AT FLEET PRICES! Beneath a picture of a red Saturn taking a mountain curve, the text said that The Store would be selling cars-to-order through a new catalogue, agreements with all of the major automakers allowing the vehicles to be sold at outrageously low prices and delivered directly to the buyers' houses.

  There goes Chas Finney's Ford dealership, Bill thought.

  He looked on the back of the sign, saw an offer for The Store's Discount Travel Bureau.

  There went Elizabeth Richard's travel agency.

  There was still no sign of printer supplies, but from a row halfway down the center aisle emerged a boy holding what looked like a mouse pad, and Bill immediately headed in that direction.

  The row did indeed contain shelves and stacks of computer and typewriter accessories. He walked to the end of the section and scanned the packages of printer ribbons hanging from pegs on a recessed display. All were the generic Store brand, but there was an accompanying book attached by wire to the center of the display, and he cross-referenced his printer to find the ribbon that would be compatible.

  "Do you have any naked-children videos?"

  Bill looked up, shocked.

  "Videos of children playing outdoors and having fun in the sun?"

  The voice was coming from the next row over, and he quickly moved to the end of the row and peeked around the corner to see who the speaker was.

  Reverend Smithee, the Baptist minister, was standing next to a Store clerk.

  Smiling, the clerk shook his head and clucked disapprovingly. "Reverend.

  I'm surprised at you."

  Smithee reddened but refused to back off. "I was told you did."

  "Is that what you like?"

  "No. I just --"

  "Those videos are illegal, you know."

  The reverend's face grew redder. "They shouldn't be. Everybody's naked under their clothes. It's natural. I've never understood why you can show people being killed, but you can't show a body without clothes. Killing's much worse."

  "We have snuff videos, too," the clerk said.

  Smithee licked his lips. "Snuff videos? Where?"

  The clerk's smile broadened. "Right this way, Reverend."

  "You're not . . . going to report me?"

  "Our aim is to meet our customers' needs and keep them happy." The clerk walked forward, the reverend following. He smiled knowingly at Bill as they passed by, and Bill could not help thinking that The Store had _wanted_ him to hear the exchange, that it had _wanted_ him to see Reverend Smithee in this light, that it had arranged it all.

  Feeling chilled, he found the right size of printer ribbon, picked up five of them, and hurried to the checkout stand at the front of the store.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  1

  He usually enjoyed the free period between assignments, but this time Bill felt restless, stir-crazy, almost claustrophobic. Juniper seemed confining to him, and no matter where he went or what he did, it seemed that The Store was always there, looming in the background, monitoring his movements, watching him.

  Even hiking, alone, in the forest, in the canyons, on the hills, he felt the presence of The Store.

  He needed to get away from Juniper.

  The idea that his documentation was now winding its way through the channels from Automated Interface to The Store's corporate headquarters, and was about to be filtered down to individual Stores all over the United States, made him feel supremely uneasy. There was nothing he could have done, no way he could have avoided it, but the mere fact that he had been indirectly working for The Store, that he had even in a minuscule way contributed to the efficiency of its operation, galled him.

  They were lying next to each other after they'd quietly finished making love long after the girls had fallen asleep one night, and the only noise in the house was the low murmuring of the bedroom television. He rolled onto his left side, looked at Ginny. "I think we should go on a vacation."

  "A vacation? What brought this on?"

  "I just think we need to get out of here, get away for a while. . . ."

  "Get away from The Store?"

  He nodded.

  "Where do you want to go?"

  "How about Carlsbad Caverns?"

  "Sounds fine to me. But what about the girls?"

  "They're going with us."

  "Sam won't go. And at this point, I'm not sure we can make her."

  "Shannon's going. I guarantee you we can make her."

  Ginny was quiet.

  "What is it?" he said.

  "What if The Store won't let her go?"

  Bill shook his head, sat up. "We've been too soft on all this. That's our problem. We should've put more pressure on her. Or, hell, maybe we should've just talked to her like an adult, told her what's really going on. I think we're still treating her -- treating _both_ of them -- like they're little girls.

  We're still trying to protect them from things --"

&nb
sp; "That's what parents do."

  "I know. But what I'm saying is that we should've tried to convince them to quit on their own. The Store'll sue us and come after us if we try to force them to quit, but if they quit themselves it'll let them go."

  She looked up at him. "You really believe that? After everything that's happened?"

  "I don't know," he said. "But it's worth a try."

  "Yes," Ginny agreed. "It is." She placed a soft hand on his stomach. "But Sam probably won't do it."

  "Probably not."

  "And if The Store won't let Shannon go?"

  "We'll take her with us anyway."

  "What do we do if The Store comes after us?"

  He looked down at her. "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it."

  They brought it up at breakfast.

  Sam stated immediately and unequivocally that she had duties and responsibilities, that The Store put its trust in her and she could not let the company down. There was no way she could take any time off.

  She walked out of the room without waiting for a response. "I have to get ready for work," she informed them.

  Bill turned toward Shannon, who was sipping her orange juice, trying to look invisible. "You, young lady, are coming with us."

  "Da-ad!"

  "Don't 'dad' me."

  She put down her orange juice. "I can't. I'll lose my job."

  "You have to quit anyway when school starts."

  Shannon stared at him, shocked. "No, I don't!"

  "Oh, yes, you do."

  "You're part of this family," Ginny said, "and you're going to go on vacation with us."

  "I don't want to!"

  Bill leaned forward across the counter toward her. "I don't care if you want to or not. You're going."

  "How come Sam gets to stay home?"

  "Sam is a year older than you."

  "So?"

  "So, she's eighteen."

  "Big fucking deal!"

  Ginny hit her.

  It wasn't a hard hit, not a punch, but it was loud, a slap across the face, and they were all stunned by it, Ginny most of all. She had never slapped either of her daughters before, and Bill could tell that she instantly regretted the action. Still, she did not perform the cliched follow-up, did not immediately hug Shannon and tearfully apologize. She merely stood there, staring at her daughter, and it was Shannon who burst out crying and did the tearful hug, jumping off her chair, throwing her arms around her mother and apologizing.

  "I'm sorry! I'm sorry, Mom!"

  Ginny gave her a quick hug in return, turned her about. "You should be apologizing to your father."

  Shannon moved around the counter. "I'm sorry, Dad. I . . . I don't know why I said that."

  Bill smiled. "I've heard the word before."

  Shannon wiped her nose, laughed.

  "But you're coming with us," he said. "We're all going on vacation. As a family."

  This time Shannon nodded. "Okay," she said. "Okay."

  2

  Shannon approached Mr. Lamb with trepidation. She hadn't really spoken to the personnel manager alone, on a one-to-one basis, since she'd been hired, and she found herself somewhat frightened by the prospect. He was standing in front of the Customer Service counter, talking to a customer, and she waited for him to finish before approaching him, glancing nervously up at the wall clock above the counter as the minutes of her break ticked by.

  She didn't want him to catch her taking a too-long break.

  She watched the personnel manager as he talked to the woman. He had always seemed to her very intimidating, and he seemed even more so now, since he'd been elected mayor. He never mentioned his new office in meetings, and no one else did, either, but it was known and it was there, in the background, and it lent to him a power above and beyond what he already possessed.

  At the party on election night, the victory party, The Store had provided free food and liquor, and more people had shown up for that reason than to celebrate the election results. She'd helped Holly pass out candy and mints, and the party had grown wilder and wilder as the night wore on, with Mrs. Comstock, the librarian, taking off her clothes and dancing naked in the Stationery aisle, Mr. Wilson, the postmaster, picking a fight with Sonny James in Boys' Wear, and a group of rowdy women puking on cue in Housewares. But Mr. Lamb had remained aloof and above it all, completely sober and in control, and Shannon's most vivid memory of that night was of loud, drunken, half-dressed men and women attacking each other while Mr. Lamb, smiling, looked on.

  She hadn't told her parents what had happened that night, but she'd talked to Diane about it, and her friend had suggested that she quit her job at The Store. "You're only there because you're bored," she said. "You don't really need the money. Why don't you just find something else to do?"

  She'd seen Diane less and less this summer, and it wasn't just because of their conflicting schedules. Working for her dad, Diane had developed an anti store attitude similar to her parents', and the same contrary impulse that had caused Shannon to defend The Store to her parents had made her do the same with her friend.

  "I like working at The Store," she told Diane coldly. "I'd rather do what I'm doing than what you're doing."

  Truth be told, she didn't like working at The Store. And she'd much rather be working for Diane's father than for Mr. Lamb. But for some dumb reason, she didn't seem to be able to admit that aloud. Not even to Sam, who had asked her point-blank about the subject more than once.

  Which was why she and Diane were on the outs.

  Which was why she'd fought with her parents about the vacation.

  She looked up at the clock again, her hands sweaty with tension.

  She wished she'd never applied for a job here.

  Mr. Lamb finally finished with the customer, and as the woman walked away he turned, smiling, toward Shannon. "Shannon," he said. "You have exactly five and a half minutes left on your break. How may I help you?"

  She'd practiced in her mind the words she would say, but all of her planned statements had suddenly fled. She could not remember what she wanted to say or think of how to ask him for time off. She stalled. "I, uh . . . could I . . . could we, uh, talk in your office?"

  He looked her over and nodded. "Certainly. You still have four and a half minutes left."

  Maybe she'd be lucky, she thought, as she followed him behind the Customer Service counter. Maybe Mr. Lamb would fire her.

  Lucky? Would getting fired be lucky?

  Yes, she thought, looking at the back of the personnel director's suit.

  Yes, it would.

  He walked into the small room, sat down at his desk, motioned for her to take the chair opposite him. She did so.

  The door to the office closed behind her, and she turned her head to see who had pulled it shut, but there was no one there.

  "What is it?" Mr. Lamb asked. The patina of friendliness that had been in his voice outside, on the floor, was gone, and there was a hardness to both his words and his attitude as he faced her across the desk. She was not just nervous, she was afraid to ask what she'd come here to ask, and she suddenly wished she'd tried to do this some other place, at some other time.

  She cleared her throat. "I know this is kind of short notice, Mr. Lamb, but my family's going on vacation to Carlsbad Caverns next week, and I was wondering if I could take three days off. We'll be gone for five days, but I don't work Monday, and Gina said she'd trade with me for Friday, so I'd only need Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday."

  He smiled insincerely. "Oh, you're going to be going on a family vacation."

  She nodded.

  His smile disappeared. "You lazy bitch," he said. "You lazy fucking bitch. You think you can just waltz in and out every time you feel like it while all of The Store's hardworking _loyal_ employees stay here and bust their asses to take up your slack?"

  She was stunned, frightened, caught off guard as much by the vehemence of his delivery as the violence of his words. She shrank back in the chair, feel
ing deeply afraid as he leaned across the desk toward her.

  "All of our rules and regulations, all of our work and responsibilities have to be altered and put on hold because one fucking little part-time slut can't do her damn job correctly. Is that what I'm hearing?"

  Shannon shook her head meekly. "I . . . I'm sorry. I . . . didn't --"

  "Quit your whining," Mr. Lamb ordered.

  She shut up, and he leaned back in his chair, fingers pressed together, pretending to think. "The Store is not a charity," he said finally. "Give me one good reason why I should allow you to take off on a vacation, galavanting around the country when you're supposed to be working."

  "There is no good reason," she said. "I'm sorry I asked. I didn't mean to disturb you --"

  Mr. Lamb suddenly burst out laughing. He spun around in his swivel chair, pointed at her. "Gotcha!"

  She blinked, confused. He was watching her, still laughing, and she tried to smile but was not sure why.

  "I knew why you wanted to talk to me before we even came in here," he said. "It's all taken care of. Your shifts are covered for that time period. You may go on vacation with your family."

  She shook her head. "How --"

  "-- did I know?" he finished for her. "Your sister stopped by before her shift and told me _all_ about it."

  "Sam?"

  "Oh, yes," he said, and the playfulness was suddenly gone from his voice.

  He was still smiling, but there was a slyness to it now, something unpleasant that made her squirm in her seat. "Samantha and I had a nice long talk early this morning before The Store opened."

  He pulled from his desk drawer a pair of panties.

  A pair of panties stained with blood.

  Sam's.

  Shannon recognized the pattern, and she felt as though her guts had just been scooped out. Grandma Jo had sent each of them underwear last Christmas, identically patterned h'oliday panties with holly and teddy bear designs. She hadn't wanted to wear them, had been embarrassed to let Jake see her in anything so goofy, but Sam hadn't minded, and she'd taken all four pair.