Promised me

My argument boiled down to "two hundred bucks in one evening is a lot of money", but really meant "you never spend two hundred bucks on a night out with me." My girlfriend's was "I have fun and how is it any of your business how I spend my money." And together they were the argument we had, for the length of our relationship, every time her and her friend went out to the casino.

Before we had started dating, the two of them brought me there once. Her friend, she dropped a twenty into a slot machine for me. I kept hitting the maximum bet button, watching as the total rapidly slid towards zero, pausing briefly a few times to go up a buck or two, but never once getting back to the starting twenty. After that I wandered the casino. It smelled of stale sweat, and there was a constant ringing from the slot machines. No matter where you were in the building you could always hear them, loud enough that you'd have to shout to be heard. Like in a bar. I've never been back.

In one of those arguments, she promised me she would stop going. And the next time her and her friend got together, they went to a movie instead. Except the next day she couldn't tell me who was in it or what it was about. We had an entirely different argument that night.

I wouldn't

My mother, in her second marriage, had another child. I was already old enough at that point that it was conceivable for me to claim, when I was out walking her, that the child was mine.

Fast forward to the age where she's half my height and I have to hold her hand while we cross the street. I was babysitting her during the daytime all summer. After I had rolled out of bed and eaten, we'd usually go to the park, and maybe the mall. She didn't have any money, so it was browsing only. One of the stores has two floors, and the toys are on the second floor, so we'd take the escalator up. Whenever we came to the escalator, my sister, she'd grimace while backing away from it and hold out her hand to me, and hand in hand, we'd step onto the escalator.

Until the time I was already on the escalator. She wanted me to come back down, but I said I wouldn't. She'd have to get on alone, I said. She put one hand on the moving rail, one foot on the escalator, and stopped. She left her back leg on the ground as the front one was pulled further and further away from her. Boom. She hit the ground. Started crying.

She still talks about that day. One of the only memories she has of that summer.

Restocked

My immediate supervisor, he tells me that in the year he's been at the store, there hasn't been a full time crew as good as the three that are working there now. He says, he's sorry to see me go, but you can't stop someone from pursuing their dreams. He says you can't even ask them not to. The boss above him, he tells me that he enjoyed working with me, and he wishes me luck on my next project. He says if I need part time work until I leave, that option is available to me. The store manager, he comes up to me while I'm working, and says he's disappointed for the store, but happy for me and shakes my hand.

My replacement started today. We gave him easy tables to stock. At one point I explained to him how breaks work. What to do when customers ask you where to find products and you don't know. What to do with stock that doesn't fit on the shelves.

He took his lunch break at four and never came back.

At night, an entire shelf that he had stocked had to be restocked. Nothing was in the right place.

Sincerely

[Your name]
[Your address]

[Date]

[Manager name]
[Company name]
[Company address]

Dear [Manager name],

Effective as of [Final work date], I resign my position as [Name of position].

It has been a pleasure to work here. Thank you very much for the opportunities you've provided.

Sincerely,

[Signature]

[Your name]

Noise

Late for work today. Again. Late getting back from my breaks, as well. By which I mean late punching back in, because after I punch in, after my break has already finished, that's when I go upstairs and get myself something to drink. Late getting back from lunch. My eight hour shift is slowly shrinking day by day.

In aisle two there's a video advert for canned meat and pasta products. It plays non-stop. It makes noise. In aisle six there's one for toilet paper. It makes noise. At the end of aisle eight, there's one for wine. It makes noise. Specifically a tinny repetitive trumpet. The radio plays all day. The songs are on a cycle. The cycle is short enough that I always know what comes next. Between the songs they sometimes place an advert for different sections of the store. There's three of them. One for the bakery. One for the meat department. One for the prepared meals. Each one plays exactly thirty-seven times during an eight hour shift. I've counted.

Community

Christmas. Easter. Thanksgiving. You can find me at home, alone. The family gets together in the afternoon and has an early dinner, and I'm nowhere to be found. If the location happens to be where I am, I go elsewhere. But every year, on Halloween, I go to the store and buy a day's works worth of sour candies, chocolate bars, rockets, all individually wrapped. I carve out a pumpkin, dress in black, and sit outside on my porch, with no light except for that that comes from the candle within the pumpkin. Some kids skip my house, but the ones that do come, they receive two fistfulls of candy.

When I was kid, the only time I ever went onto a strangers front porch and rang the door bell was on a dare. And I ran away before anyone came to the door. But Halloween is all about that. Little kids, ringing at a stranger's place, approaching strangers in the dark. Strangers. You know, those people that your parents tell you you should never talk to. The ones that the news are always reporting as having stolen another child, abused them. And these strangers, neighbours, people in the community, people you've never spoken to but maybe seen, these people give you a reward for being brave enough to come to them.

Because Halloween is all about fear, but not of ghosts and goblins, rather fear of our community, the people around us, and when we confront that fear, when we approach them, we find ourselves rewarded, and our fears unjustified.