CAUSTIC FUMES FROM THE industrial floor cleaner burrowed in my nose and refused to budge as I stepped outside for my final smoke break of the evening. I couldn't even taste my Marlboro. No satisfying dry sting to offset the mundane closing duties, and it irritated me. It's also why I didn't smell the dead body until I touched it; I'm a hundred percent certain.
The glass doors to the Dime Stop soft-closed behind me, backlit by the wan florescent lights inside that bounced off the pockmarked ceiling tiles. I stood in what little light leached onto the sidewalk, tired, blissfully unaware of the nightmare about to unfold in the next fifteen minutes. With one quick, unsatisfying puff, I cut to my preferred trashcan at the farthest brick corner of the building.
The Dime Stop was a convenience store located a dash away from the 101, easy for tourists but small enough for long-time locals to feel relevant. It was my sustenance hell, livelihood, and a quick half-gallon of milk when we needed it.
I was not too fond of milk.
Exhaled smoke clouded around me. I placed the crumpled Marlboro carton, a stainless lighter, and my quarter (because it seemed intent on traveling out of my front pocket alongside everything else) atop the metal canopy covering the four-foot-tall trash receptacle. Green paint curled away, revealing rust underneath. I leaned on it regardless. The liner had been changed by me less than two hours prior, so there was no offensive garbage to worry about, not that I could even smell it. I sniffed experimentally. Nope. Nothing.
The night was colder than comfortable, and I hunched my shoulders to hide inside my oversized bomber jacket. The worn cuffs, brown ribbed-knit, inhaled most of my hands. There was less to process, with only my stubby nubs called fingers out to interact with the world. I liked it that way.
My mother blamed my inability to stretch for chords on my pale, short fingers. As if being born small-handed and genetically "bad" at reaching octaves was a plot to victimize her and her grandmother's precious, off-brand piano. "Stop smudging the notes," she would say whenever my pinky finger clipped incongruous keys—smudging the notes. Like it was a technical term and not a made-up criticism, a Pollycism. Unfortunately, her early-onset arthritis meant I had never witnessed her prolific piano playing. I only had her word and a vague note from Pastor Tom thanking her for the "musical blessing" as proof.
I took another pointless pull at the cigarette. The tip flared brightly. The delicate paper peeled and flaked to black under the cherry heat. Burn in Hell, Polly.
Sour, I scrapped the cigarette across the pimpled brick wall and placed it back inside the half-filled carton to revisit later. Ten past eleven p.m., and the only cars in the parking lot belonged to my shift mate, Dalen, and our reliable patron, "Gay Ray." A nickname I wasn't enthusiastic about, but my brain grappled with changing. I was curious to know if anyone else in town referred to the skinny little man as such or if it was only us crude coffee slingers at the Dime Stop, but either way, I felt awful about it. I did. I hoped he was oblivious to what people called him behind his back, snipping out a singular piece of his existence as a reference, but I wasn't stupid. My last name was Shippy. Shitty Shippy, if you asked anyone from my graduating class. All of who I hoped were dead.
I could see Ray now, angling to get out of his car. An ancient mustardy Buick, half Bondo, half prayer. Probably the height of coolness twenty years ago. But the rims were shot, and the black soft-top shed skin like a snake. It was his sole possession. Yes, he lived out of it, I was a hundred percent certain, and I had approximately two minutes to get back inside before he managed to raise his ass-bones free of the cracked leather driver's seat.
Cigarette carton tucked into the front pocket of my green polo shirt, I pushed the coin deep into my jeans and scurried through the glass doors—doors we should've locked fifteen minutes ago—grabbing a can of tuna off a shelf as I beelined for the register.
"Oh, Jesus," Dalen said, emerging from the snack aisle, mop in hand, yellow commercial bucket in tow. He'd heard the bell from me and materialized defensively. His face crumpled as Ray shuffled toward the entrance on knees that refused to bend inside their bland chinos.
"We're closed, man."
"He'll be a second. He always is," I said, pouring the burnt remains of Columbians Best into a tall paper cup. Three creams. Two sugars.
"You have a bus comin'."
"I got time," I double-checked my wristwatch, a 1960s men's Rolex that smothered my bony wrist beneath its champagne face and crumbling leather band, "I got ten minutes."
Dalen bared his teeth, "You get to clean the bathroom after he pisses. I'm not catching anything off him."
I glared at him, "You're such a little sh—"
The small bell above the door jiggled, announcing Ray. I snapped my mouth shut and swallowed the insults. It was for the best. I habitually launched missiles with zero care when I got angry.
"Good evening, Ray."
"Hey, Andy."
I overlooked the fact that my name was, in perpetuity, Amy, not Andy, and slid the coffee dregs across the scuffed linoleum counter. "Saved you a nightcap."
Ray chuckled. Rail thin and colorless, he stood before me like a ghost. His white hair was meticulously cut around his ears and combed neatly to the side. He had no facial hair; Time seemed to have given up on that venture years ago; his skin appeared translucent under the ugly mini-mart lights, and his eyes were an odd pewter. His clothing ballooned around his whippet frame in shades of almond and cream. Darker colors would snap him like kindling. He wore a windbreaker and a button-down, and I never saw him in anything different.
Ray was a World War veteran, too, the second one, not the first, but no one talked about that bit.
His hands trembled, pulling a dollar bill from his jacket.
"On the house," I waved him off. Somewhere amongst the corn chips and peanuts, Dalen snorted. I raised my voice and said, "Here's a snack for Eleanor," and dropped the tuna can onto the counter.
Dalen swore. The mop smacked water.
A smile tickled Ray's mouth at the mention of his cat, a grey tabby he'd inherited when his mother had died, rendering them both homeless. Ray was in his mid-sixties, but his situation picked at him, nibbling away his vitality season by season. It saddened me.
"How's your brother?" Ray said.
"Still here," I joked. "Asa's doing all right. Thanks for asking."
"He working?"
"Yup. He's got that job with animal control. Nights mostly, when they need him."
"Tell him something is right-stinking out by the creek, been there a good few days. Can't see it too well. Might be a black tail."
"I will."
I wouldn't.
Ray shakily pocketed the money, shuffling off to the restroom like most nights. At least the nights I worked because I let him. One last dignified pee before bed.
A juicy slap in front of the check-out counter drew my attention around. Dalen dropped a second garbage bag next to the first. Both bulged like full bladders. Fat knots closed the tops, stopping the heavy, wet refuse inside from falling out on the chemically blanched flooring.
"Your turn tonight."
It wasn't. Dalen stared at me, daring me to argue. His brown eyes challenged mine. His usually warm black skin didn't take kindly to the sickly lights either. We all looked morgue-bound. As a general manager, Dalen relished in his six-hour-day-ten-cents-more-a-paycheck senior power. He wore his name tag and the appropriate uniform visor, half a green ball cap that allowed the top of his curly hair to breathe. I was six inches taller than him, eight years older, and refused to wear both simultaneously.
Without replying, I slipped into the storage closet behind the counter, a transient, musty room that performed multiple functions throughout the day—clock-in, breakroom, broom holder, dry-goods inventory escape, cuss-closet, clock-out—and punched my stiff-paper time card through the clunky machine bolted to the wall and returned it to its weekly holster. There were corrections to be made. I'd forgotten to clock out at lunch. But I had five minutes to catch the bus home and two garbage bags to dispose of. The timecard was tomorrow's problem.
"Do not touch his coffee," I said, hefting the bags as high as possible. The bloated plastic bumped my ankles with each step I took.
"I mean it, D, so help me God—"
"Ayiayia, fine," Dalen said. Flipping the 'OPEN' sign in the window to 'CLOSED,' he held the door, stepping aside to give me clearance.
I waddled through. The night was still cold. "See you tomorrow."
"Check for raccoons before you close the lid," he said and went to wait for Ray, jingling the store keys like bait.
"Love you, too," I muttered. Sighing, I adjusted my grip and dragged the overfilled bags behind me toward the dumpster.
A decently sized metal box on cruddy rollers, the dumpster sat behind a privacy fence, several yards past my favorite trashcan, far enough away from the storefront to negate any smell when the temperatures spiked a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Stationed at the edge of the parking lot but not in prime view, the rear backed up to a chain link fence that separated the mini-mart property from a stretch of dusty, vacant lots. Scattered talk suggested a builder had plans to erect townhouses one day, but in fifteen years, the town had yet to see a single nail or wood splinter even glance at the weedy, wind-whipped land.
I gave the garbage bags my last effort and hauled them together in front of the dumpster. It was dark, with no street lamps. Eerie. The vacant lots were a void that made me dizzy if I looked too long. The pallid glow of the full moon overhead did little more than sketch outlines for me to touch, and I fumbled to open the gate.
The plastic dumpster lid gave easier than the rusty gate, and I slung it up with unnecessary force. Crack. I winced. At least it was a fair warning to any critters inside. Raccoons were not uncommon at the Dime Stop. Most looted well into the day, sampling stale doughnuts and occasionally burnt pizza.
I could hear no sounds save the breeze in the tall, skinny pine trees near the street. The dumpster was nearly filled. On my tiptoes, I gripped the still-warm metal ledge for balance and tried to be thorough, but I couldn't see a damned thing beyond general, lumpy black shapes.
At least my lack of smell was turning into a positive.
"Shit."
My shirt pocket caught on the ledge as I backed down. My lighter pinged the dumpster's side, skittering to a stop near my left sneaker. My Marlboros took the opposite direction, leaping off my chest and diving in with the rest of the trash.
"C'mon," I groaned.
On my toes again, I stretched my arm as far as possible, grabbing towards the faint, white spot amidst the dark sea.
That's when I felt it.
Something cold and rubbery, yet distinct, like stiff velvet or the outside of a peach before the centers ripened, collided with my fingers. I jerked my hand away instinctively.
Memories I'd long condemned peeled open, and for a moment, I stood paralyzed.
"G'night, Andy."
Ray's distant voice shook me loose, and the blood in my veins started flowing again. Heart thudding against my eardrums, I bent slowly to grab my lighter off the sidewalk.
Tich. Tich. Tich. I thumbed the spark wheel, shaking. I was freezing despite my jacket. The unnatural coldness I'd touched had flowed through my fingertips to settle in my bones.
The flame sparked. I cupped the lighter protectively, forcing myself to unveil it as I pushed my arm back into the dumpster.
The weak light of the tiny flame did what it could, and it was enough.
I snapped the lighter shut.
It was a body. Dead. Even without the light, I could still see it, embossed behind my eyelids: Blood pools. Splotchy skin. Purple and black. An arm (that I touched). The round relief of a breast (a woman?). Eyes open, facing me. Milky-white. Nose, broken, smattered by dried blood. And her mouth—
Remarkably, it was closed, held shut maybe, and between her black and blue lips, I saw a silvery glint.
My free hand traveled into my jeans pocket. Between the cotton lining, I pinched the quarter inside—a 1910s Barber, slightly discolored, nowhere near mint. Bringing it out, I brushed a thumb pad over the impression of Miss Liberty's profile and laurels.
She was silver, too.
Now came the great decision. There were things I'd been a part of and wasn't too keen on repeating. Most people would run screaming from the sight three feet from my face, but I wasn't like most people. Most people hadn't seen the things that made up my memories.
The squeak of bus brakes pushed me forward. I balanced the quarter in the crook of my bent index finger, my thumb tucked under, ready to spring.
Heads: I'd find the nearest pay phone and call the police.
Tails: I wouldn't.
I flipped the coin.
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A/N: Wattpad WC: 2288
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