Trick Ending

Meanwhile, yesterday, back at the Big Y, things were heating up.

My shopping list was short. Boxed salad, heavy cream, frozen blueberries, and bananas. Inside the store, I realized I’d left my reusable bags in the car.

I pulled my cart into self-checkout, thinking, I’ll just ask if I can just take stuff, unbagged, to my car. No big deal, right? But who should be working the self-checkout area but the bane of my existence, sourpuss herself. I refused to humble myself, begging her for permission, so I ponied up the dime for a dumb paper bag.

Of course sourpuss ignored me. Of course she pretended to help out a kerchiefed old woman who didn’t speak English. Of course she made an endearing goo-goo face at a little baby with a schnozz like a snot faucet.

I rang up my four items and placed them in the paper bag, then steered my cart one-handed around a steel support column and directly into the path of my nemesis. Startled, we looked at each other.

“Hi,” we both said, in unison, smiling pleasantly.

I know what you’re thinking, because trust me, I was, too. WTF, right? What a letdown! It’s like the ghost that scared you shitless for your entire childhood that turns out to be a loose shutter banging against the side of the house. My mundane life is actually mundane.

But I woke this morning thinking about how the dry cleaner always looks flustered when I come in.

I wonder what’s up with that.