Without a doubt, the weakest spot in any grocery store is the immeasurable space between the deli and the checkout lanes. It is the one place where an operation that lives or dies by upholding strict protocol can suddenly find itself clinging to blind faith alone; total trust that the customer will, at some point, make that trek from the deli to the checkout.
The proof was splashed across the faces of the employees; furrowed brows carved into a dark crimson and I felt downright giddy at the knowledge of my extreme advantage. After all, this was not a street fight. It was not a numbers game and even the dumbest of my opponents were starting to grow aware of that fact. Better for all of us.
“It appears that what we have, gentlemen, is a little old-fashioned standoff!” I said. “Your deli worker has foolishly entrusted me with a pound of lunch meat, which I have neither the means nor the intention of paying for!”
The manager scooted forward a couple of steps and I retreated, careful to keep tabs on any peripheral movement.
“But the product cannot be returned!” I shouted. “You can’t put this on the shelf and sell it! So let the games begin!”
I laughed and held the turkey up like a trophy, taunting the manager.
“Oh, what a world class dilemma! You can’t arrest me because I’m still in the store and at no point can you force me to leave because you’re open twenty-four hours. Who will win this little showdown, I wonder? Who will outlast…”
Even though the pepper spray hit me in the side of the face, it still made my eyes burn enough to drop the turkey. I recoiled and then took on a defensive stance in response to the sound of approaching footsteps.
“Don’t move! Damn you!” I screamed.
Then I bolted, blind, out of the store. I ran to a door, opened it and was met by a burst of freezing cold. An ice truck! I slammed the door behind me and listened. Nothing. It was a clean escape.
I sat down inside the ice truck and waited for several hours as it drove me along, far far away from my crime.
“I can start over in another city,” I thought. “I can get a job on an ice truck or something. An ice boat, maybe. Maybe even an ice bicycle where the ice is in a wagon.”
Later, I discovered that there was no ice truck and that I’d simply run inside one of the freezers in the ice cream section of the grocery store.
“Well I sure hope they got a kick out of watching me sit there for three hours,” I thought angrily. Then I got all huffy puffy like an outraged, white consumer guy. “Well, they just lost themselves a customer!”
THE END
