30 Days of Fiction: 12

"I don't know anything about this but I emailed my grandson and I couldn't get that to work. So I had my janitor help me with the email.  But then my grandson, he's 14, he said he wanted the new army game, Call of the Battlefield, or something," the old woman droned on.

"So, your grandson wants Call of Duty," I asked starting to lose patience.

"Yes, yes. I think that's it," the old bag continued.

"Ok, What system is it for?" I asked, hoping she would not deliver another diatribe of nonsense.

"What do you mean?" the old one said not knowing what I was talking about. 

"Is it Xbox or PS4?" I asked.

"Oh...I don't know," she said staring into space. 

"Ok. Can you call someone to find out?" I asked noticing a line forming behind the oldest lady ever. 

"Um, I don't know. I don't have my phone on me," she said looking like she'd never thought about solving this type of problem before. 

"Ok. I have a bit of a line so if you can ask your grandson exactly what he wants we would love to help you with that," I said as nicely as possible.

"Yes, thank you so much for your time," she said looking back at the people staring at her not accomplishing anything. 

The old lady waddled out and the next customer came forward. 

"How are you," I asked with a forced smile.

"I'm looking for Leap Pad mini, where is that," a 30 something female, with long black hair, asked. 

"We don't sell that product, unfortunately. I think you can get them at Wal Mart," I responded looking behind her at the line continuing to grow. 

"No, you sell it because I saw one the other day. Or maybe I was online. Just a sec," she said putting her finger up and pulling out her phone. 

She tapped on her phone a few times and then turned it over to show me my error. The screen showed a Leap Pad mini for $129.99 indeed but the website was Toy R Us. 

"That's the Toys R Us website," I said with a twinge of righteousness. 

"Oh shit, OK never mind," she said and turned around and made her way out. 

Next in line was a greasy looking white kid with a superman t-shirt. 

"Do you have the new Tenkei Ichi Domo Cha Cha," he said assuming I knew what that was. I did not. 

"What is that for," I asked preparing to type the name into the database.

"It's for 3DS of course. You work here and don't know Tenkei Ichi Domo Cha Cha," he said adding a laugh to his smugness. 

"Nope, I'm not seeing it in the system," I said looking up at the overweight teen. "It might not be out in the US yet. Sometimes these kinds of games get released in Japan well before they come out here."

"I don't know. I could buy it on Amazon but I wanted to buy it from you," the genius said. 

"Yeah, sorry. Maybe check back later or check our website," I said as he turned around in a witless huff. "Thanks," I added as he left. 

Then, a man is his mid to late 20's came up and I hoped it would bring some normalcy to the conversation. 

"Hi, How are you," I asked.

"I'm fine, how's it going," he responded in kind.

"I'm well, what can I help you with," I asked starting to feel like the world wasn't a complete shit hole.

"I'd like to pick up the new Diablo 3 game, I heard it's really good. What do you think," the reasonable man asked.

"I think it's great actually," I said turning around to grab it from the shelf. "I played it when it first came out and it's really fun. Lots of action and good graphics. The best thing is four person couch coop," I continued.

"Couch coop, what's that" he asked.

"Oh, it means that up to four people can play on the same screen at the same time. Or you can play online or any combination. It's pretty cool and not a lot of games have that nowadays," I said happy to inform someone of something. I decided to give the man a break so I found the used version of the premium edition and put it on the table. 

"Oh that's great," he responded.

"So, I happen to have a pre-owned version of the premium edition with all the ad-ons and it's only three dollars more than the new one without the ad-ons. Do you want to go with that," I asked showing him the cases to emphasize the difference. 

"Oh yeah! That's awesome. Of course," he said with jubilation.

"Great, anything else coming out your looking forward to," I asked as I rang up the purchase. 

"No, not really. I don't play a lot anymore but my friend said I had to get this one and I loved the older one, so," he remarked.

"Cool, well if there is anything else you're looking forward to you can pre-order it and get some bonuses and what not. Just something to keep in mind," I said finishing up the payment and handing him the bag with the game. 

"Cool, well thanks and have a good one man," he said as he took the bag, turned and walked out. 

"Next please," I said noticing that the person in line was standing back and talking with their friend. They were middle aged hillbilly looking white trash folk so I assumed it would be a fun conversation. 

"How can I help you," I started it off friendly enough.

"Well, I bought these games last week and they don't work. Also, I bought this headset and it's broken already," the man with the dirty white shirt and not so many teeth explained. 

"OK, so none of this worked," I asked looking at the perfectly fine items on the counter. 

"Nope, and I want a refund," the beer bellied man retorted.

"Alrighty, do you have your receipt," I asked cordially.

"Nope. Can't you look it up," he asked, the smell of cigarettes, booze and something else emanating from behind his cracked lips. 

"Unfortunately without a receipt," I began but was quickly interrupted.

"Nope. I've done it before here and it was no problem. I bought it from some girl yesterday and she said I had 7 days to bring it back," he said his rehearsed line. 

"That is normally the case, but we can't do a refund without knowing how much you paid and how you paid," I explained looking the man in his shit colored eyes. I could see he was about to respond poorly so I offered, "But if you just want an exchange for something in the store I can do that."

"Oh, well I don't want to do that, is there someone else I can talk to," he said looking around. 

"Nope. I'm the manager and without a receipt I can't give you a refund. I'm sorry," I said sternly. 

"Fine, Fuck," the man exclaimed and grabbed up the items on the counter, bagged them up in an Wal Mart bag and walked out mumbling to his equally dissatisfied friend. 

I looked up to see my replacement walked in the store as the next person came up to the counter. This time it was a young boy who had a game and some cash in hand. I took the game and began finding the disk for it when I asked,"Do you have a parent or guardian with you because this game is rated M."

"They are out in the car, I can go get them," he said meekly.

"Yes please, can you go do that or else I can't sell this too you," I said holding the game up. "I'll hold it for you," I said and put the game on the back counter as he left the store. 

The next person came up as my replacement came up to clock in and said, "Hey, what's going on?"

I stepped back and turned to say hi. "Not much, same old stuff," I said. "Are you clocked in," I asked.

"Yup," he said.

"Ok, this game here is for a kid who is getting a parent, otherwise just stay on till and help customers. I have to go in the back and get something done," I said.

"Hello!"

My associate and I turned to see a large, gross looking woman at the counter staring at us. 

"I'm waiting," she continued with her fat face.

"Ok, Sorry about that. Just getting him caught up. He's heading over now," I said looking at my associate with wide eyes and then walked into the back room. 

I sat down at the desk and ate a granola bar deciding what projects needed to get done that day, making notes on a pad of yellow paper. A few minutes later my associate opened the back door and asked with a somber tone, "How's it going?"

"Fucking stupid," I said. "These fucking white trash retards come in here and fucking don't know what the fuck is going on," I said while my associate started to smile. "I had a lady come in and say we had something and when she looked it up it was from fucking Toys R Us. Not us you fucking idiot," I continued my rant. 

"Yeah, people are dumb. That kid never came back by the way and that lady who was in such a damn hurry left her credit card. So she'll be back, I'm sure," he said looking into the store to see if anyone had come in.

"Yeah. Well, whatever. Just a bunch of tards. I had one cool customer, though. We've got a lot of shit to do today," I said changing the subject. "Shipment hasn't come in but it'll be huge and we have a plano-gram to get done, but Kelly is in at one and I'm here till six so we'll just keep getting it done one thing at a time," I explained. "How are you, John" I asked remembering there was another human in the room. 

"I'm tired. Stayed up way too late playing Overwatch," he said looking tired. "Well, I'll get back to it then," he said and walked out to the front.

I got up and as I walked out the front of the store I turned to John and asked,"Want some coffee?"

"For sure, thanks," he said with pep before continuing to help his customer.

I walked out to get some coffee.