by Matthew Ederer

Some people come in, usually attractive business women or single mother types buying milk or eggs or 7-up, wielding a palpable tension. Every day, a surge of the same few at either 5:30 or 8:15, wearing different, intricately matching outfits with different, intricately maintained hairstyles. He was sure that if he stuck around long enough, he’d see the cycle continue – same different hairstyles, same different outfits, only with new, different cracks and lines on the same different faces, the chronicling of the toll that such visible pressure takes on a person.

It wasn’t that these ladies made him uncomfortable. He welcomed their presence, found their stress fascinating. He figured that like any stress, it was at least 50 percent self imposed. Sometimes, he’d like to play with the women as much as he could. Try to talk to them, joke to them, get them to crack a little. The scientist of small talk, he became very adept at playing the game of "I love what you like". Buy a newspaper, and he would scoff at the state of the world, buy a carton of milk and he would lament the rising food prices, all the while maintaining an eye contact that would be intimidating to somebody still capable of basic human shyness. He was like a smart advisor, trying to close that deal. After all, every single smile or giggle that he elicited from Mrs. Daisy was a step closer to driving her.

These women, they weren’t all the same. He could tell which ones used to be happy. He could tell which still were. They were interspersed pretty thinly amongst the ones who were at this point just going through the motions in life, but they came by from time to time. He felt almost obliged to resurface the will to live in these women, the salvageable ones, as best as he could. Smile the puffy smile, show the pearly teeth, and don’t dare let her know that somewhere, on some level, you’re just as miserable as she. Happiness was his M.O. Mutual happiness.

On that front, the happiness front, it was suddenly shaping up to be a productive day. He couldn’t believe how beautiful it smelled. Maybe that’s what got him singing. He cracked the bottle, poured the liquid, and instinctively more than anything, breathed a nice, deep breath. And it knocked him on his ass. It was like a hit of strawberry kiwi crack-cocaine. The world became a better place. The lights shone brighter, their incessant buzz now inaudible. Even the dull yellow of the mop bucket was more vibrant. Walking up and down the isles, paying little heed to the boxes of rice that his aggressive side-to-side technique was strewing about the store, he began to sing, loudly. It takes a special person to be inspired by Mr. Clean he thought, not certain if he was proud or ashamed of that fact, as he hit the chorus in a perfect falsetto that was as embarrassing as it was impressive.

"Just like the white WINGED dove, sings a song, sounds like she’s singin…" Stevie Nicks would be rolling over in her grave, were she dead. "OOOOO BABY OOO BABY OOOO". The edge of seventeen indeed. He paused, in between swigs of a stolen Red Bull that would hopefully afford him the energy to continue the onslaught of rock and roll that was this closing shift. He propped the outside door open, to dry the floor faster.

If he had a flaw, it was that when he was alone, he was far too sure of himself. Some people may have slowed down here. That wasn’t in his personality.

"Just like the white winged DOVE"….. He paused, took a long, exaggerated breath. "Just like THE WHITE WINGED doooooooooooooove". That was a run. It was exquisite.

"Just like the white winged dove, sings a song, sounds like she’s singin…." And again, a deep, forceful breath. He opened his mouth, leaned back with his mop in both hands in a perfect Mick Jagger rock stance, knowing the next words out of his mouth were going to be great. And then, he heard a voice from the next isle. "Ooooo, baby, ooo, ooooo".

Thankfully, it was a manly scream that he let out. More of a shout than anything else. But was it great? Debatable. He paused, dreading the fact that he would eventually have to turn around and literally, face the music. Who could be capable of such incursion?

He’d seen her before, but never like this. She was wearing grey jogging pants and a purple hooded sweatshirt, a relic from her college days. Her hair flowed naturally and she had taken her makeup off because she’d gotten out of work early, on account of it being a Sunday. It didn’t matter though. She was still gorgeous, absolutely beautiful. Maybe even more so, to him, because he knew that he was looking at the version of her that he would be if he ever got the chance to wake up beside her. She smiled a genuine, beaming smile. This was the first time that he’d ever seen anybody come into the store, male or female, and smile a smile that real. You could see it in her eyes. She meant it. This was also a relic from her college days.

Together, they laughed harder than he had laughed in a long time, and in all likelihood, harder than she had as well. They laughed until it hurt, laughed until they began to sweat and choke and cease being attractive. All the way up the aisles, all the way to the counter, where she counted out the exact change for her Multi-grain Tostitos, as was her custom. They laughed some more. Laughed until they cried.

This was completely surreal to him. Sharing tears with someone is always an incredibly intimate experience. He had never shared tears with anybody who wasn’t a major player in his life. Not many people do. But here he stood, tears flowing, in the middle of this truly perfect moment with somebody who was basically a stranger.

Eventually, the laughter subsided. Somebody had to say something, and he knew it. Usually, not just in these situations but as a general life rule, his anxiety grew exponentially with the silence. This, however, was different. He’d said enough, tonight, and he knew it. The ball was in her court.

She looked at him, sizing him up and down. "Wow. That was impressive, I won’t lie to you. How old are you, anyway"? He was taken aback. He didn’t even have time to formulate a lie. "Twenty-one". He replied. "Just turned twenty-one". She touched his arm, smiled coyly, and looked him right in the eye. It startled him. "Twenty-one? Just a pup. That’s crazy kid. I’ve been married for twenty-one years".

She took her hand off of his arm, picked up the Tostitos, waved, and gave the sexiest, breathiest goodbye he’d ever heard. He tried to return the favor. No linguist alive could quantify this response as an actual word of English. It was more of a monosyllabic hum, somewhere between "tennis grunt" and "boiling kettle".

He watched her leave, and turned to the sink. He washed his face. He knew it wasn’t dirty. He sat back down on his makeshift throne of milk crates and a cardboard box. And then, he stood up again. He had a job to do.