Hello again, Children. Are we excited to hear a story today?
Not really, Mother Zebez.
What do you mean “Not really,”?!
Eh. We’re just not in the mood.
What an ungrateful bunch of children you are!
It’s not that we’re ungrateful. It’s just that you spit when you tell us stories and we don’t like to get it in our eyes.
In all my years I have never heard children as spoiled as you. Back in my day I would have loved to have spit in my eye if it meant I got to hear a story that didn’t completely embarr*censored* me. That’s it. I will never tell you stories again.
No Mother Zebez! We want to hear your stories. We’re sorry we weren’t more appreciative of your spit!
Very well then children. This next story is about an adventure my granddaughter and her roommate had in the grocery store.
That sounds boring. I don’t want to hear about grocery shopping.
Will someone take that kid out of here?
*guards come in and throw kid out of the house and lock the door*
Ah that’s better. Now, let’s begin.
Paige sat up in her bed, staring at her magazine with half open eyes. Muffled, choppy music seeped from the headphones on Paige’s ears which, supposedly, let the user enjoy their music privately. Every so often, she licked a finger and flipped a page. Paige found boredom fine as long as she didn’t have anything else to do. What a wonderful gift to not do anything. “Hopefully, something won’t come up for the rest of the day.” thought Paige.
As if on cue, Whit burst through the door, wrapped in a towel, dripping with water, the strips of her bacon afro hanging limply a top her head. “We need moar bacon shampoo for my hair.”
“Then go get some.” Paige did not understand why Whit was telling her this.
“I don’t have any money.”
“Oh.” Paige thought, finally understanding her role in this. Paige blew air out of her cheeks and looked under her bed. After moving some papers she found the purse she was looking for. She took her wallet out of the purse and pulled out a five dollar bill from her wallet. Paige held out the five to Whit. Whit took the end of the bill but Paige did not let go of it.
“Wait, how do I know you are actually going to buy bacon shampoo and not just buy something stupid, like TV dinners?”
“I only did that once!”
“And it was disgusting!” Paige made a face at the memory of creamed corn and a too hot, mushy brownie. “That’s why you can’t be trusted!”
“Come on, Paige. You know if I don’t grow out my bacon hair we won’t be able to eat. It’s much cheaper than anything else in the store.”
“Ok, you can have the five dollars but I am going with you to get the shampoo to make sure that’s what you are actually getting.”
“Awesome! Let’s go Paige!” Whit whipped around, opened the door and started running down the hall.
“Whit…Whit!?” Paige followed Whit yelling and screaming her name.
“Stop being such a slow poke Paige!”
“I am not a Pokémon! And Whit you’re wearing a towel!” announced Captain Obvious.
“Oh yeah.” She turned around, went back into her dorm and put some clothes on.
―
Paige and Whit stood at the entrance to the grocery store. Black clouds, occasionally turned white by a flash of lightning, swirled in the red sky above the store. Ravens sat on the grocery cart handles, trying to peck at whoever tried to take the cart out of the designated parking lot. Skeletons hung by a noose dangled from the little café stand that they sometimes have in front of the grocery stores. The menu only had one thing on it―recalled eggs. Other than that it looked perfectly safe. An ominous breeze made little bacon bits fall from Whit’s afro. A look of concern crossed her face as she grabbed the bits and stared at them. “We better hurry.” Paige simply nodded and they walked into the store.
“Hello, youngin's! Welcome to HellMart!” The old woman’s baboon voice screeched, causing Whit and Paige to jump. Her looks were comparable to a baboon’s too. Her face was long, wrinkled, and filled with green, rotting teeth (because she had no dental). She waddled along, hunched over. Paige and Whit jumped again when they saw it move.
“Uh, I think we should go to another store,” said Paige.
“Yes, I agree.” Whit agreed. The pair turned around to go out the door, but instead were greeted by the baboon face.
“Noooooo, you cannot leave,” the baboon lady hissed, curling her fingers.
“Watch me.” Whit walked around the baboon lady and stood before the sliding gl*censored* doors. She stepped on the mat that would activate the doors, but they remained shut. Whit glared at the mat and then jumped up and down on it. The doors began to rattle, and a smug look crossed Whit’s face. An enormous crack opened beneath the doors and flames burst from the ground, engulfing the doors, sucking them down into the earth.
“See?” said the baboon lady. “You cannot leave until you buy something. Hisssssss.”
“Well,” Paige defiantly answered “We’ll just buy some gum and then leave. Now, where are the cashiers?” Paige just realized that the front of the store had no cashiers. In fact the whole layout was strange. There seemed to be another building inside of the store, with one opening that a few shoppers p*censored*ed through, went down the hall and disappeared around the corner.
“They are at the end of the store, youngin's.” the baboon lady cackled.
“Is the end of the store inside that building?” Whit asked.
“Why yes, yes it is.” The baboon lady flashed her slimy green teeth. “But, I understand you are looking for bacon shampoo.”
“How did you know?” Whit ran her hands through her crunchy bacon hair.
“Your hair looks like it is in some serious need of treatment. Only 5 dollars.”
“Maybe we should just go and get the shampoo then Paige,” said Whit.
“But we’ve had such horrible service already! I really don’t want to spend even that much in this place.”
“Well, we really can’t leave and there isn’t a store that sells bacon shampoo for over a hundred miles.”
“Ugh, you’re right. Curse this small college town.” Paige turned to the baboon lady. “I guess we’ll go buy that shampoo then.”
“Just go through that doorway, yougin's.” Her slender, wart covered finger pointed towards the entrance of the smaller building. Paige and Whit marched through the doorway, determined to prove the old hag wrong. The baboon lady just watched, smiling.
Not merely a hallway, the p*censored*ages consisted of impossibly high shelves. Cans of beans, chocolate syrup, mayonnaise and a variety of other things lie upon them. Paige and Whit scanned up and down the shelves for the bacon shampoo but none was to be found. Paige tilted her head back, looking for a sign indicating the categories for this isle, but was met with fluorescent lighting instead.
Paige turned towards Whit. “How are we supposed to know where the bacon shampoo is if there are no signs for the isles?”
“I have no idea.”
“Well maybe we can figure out the categories. See, there’s mustard, ketchup, and mayonnaise.” Paige pointed to each of the items. “We must be in the condiment section…wait what’s that?” She pointed to a bag of something. Whit bent down and examined it.
“It’s rice Paige.”
“RICE!?! What is rice doing there!? Rice does not belong with condiments! It should be with the Asian food. There is no Asian food around here!” Paige screamed in terror.
“Whoa,” Whit’s face went wide eyed. “I wasn’t aware you were so p*censored*ionate about rice…”
“No Whit! Don’t you see?! It’s a trap!”
“A trap?”
“They always put things that don’t go together so you have to walk through the whole store to find what you need because the more time you spend in here; the more tempted you will be to buy something.”
“Dear god.”
“Look let’s just move on. Hopefully we find this shampoo soon.”
Paige and Whit walked through the store, but as they found no shampoo after shelves upon shelves, their frustration grew. They feverishly picked up the pace, intently scanning all the items, still finding nothing. They ran down the isles, looking for any glimpse of their prize. Sometimes there would be dead ends and Whit would scream out, pulling out some of her crispy bacon hair. After seven hours in the store, their thirst was unbearable.
“Ugh, I’m so thirsty…” Whit’s whining reminded Paige of her own thirst.
“Come on Whit, I’m thirsty too but this store can’t go on much longer.”
Whit did not answer. She spotted the ob
ject of her desire on the shelf. “Must…buy…just…two dollars…” She limped, hands raised forward, towards the bottle of water.
“No, Whit!” Paige grabbed Whit’s arm and pulled her back. “If we buy that we can’t get the bacon shampoo and we won’t be able to eat. We have plenty of water at the dorm. You can get some back there.”
Whit’s sunken in eyes locked on Paige. “Ok…” she groaned, realizing that logic sucked.
Paige placed Whit’s arm over her shoulder to support her. Together, they trudged on, trying with all their might to resist temptation. The pain was excruciating. So many deals, but no money to splurge on them. Candy, socks, milk…all unbearably cheap. The store was wearing on their minds. How could anyone ever get out of this hell hole with sterile, fluorescent lighting and smooth jazz playing softly in the background, alive? They felt the life being sucked out of them, their hopes waning. Then, just as the pair was contemplating the ways they were going to die, a sound brought back their ability to dream. Boop, boop, boop, caching. A cashier. They were almost to the end! Paige and Whit began skipping through the halls, still keeping an eye out for the shampoo, but cheerful for the end of their excursion. Then they saw it.
The shelf, lit like a beacon in the dark, the bacon shampoo resting delicately upon it. Paige and Whit held each other’s hands and jumped up in down, spinning around linked together. Their giggles echoed through the store. Someone yelled “Shut up!” but their cares had already been washed away. Then Paige stopped bouncing. Whit looked at Paige’s face. She knew that look. It was the same look she had gotten when her thirst was so great that she was willing to spend all she had on a bottle of fancy tap water. “Paige?”
“Uhhhhhhh…” Paige moaned. Her arms raised and she walked forward.
Whit followed Paige’s eyes and now saw what she saw. A box of ramen, 50 packages for five dollars. She couldn’t possibly be considering buying that ramen? They had found the bacon shampoo. They were so close. Paige reached the ramen.
“Whit.” Paige’s face was super cereal. “We have to buy this.”
“No Paige, we can’t. We need to buy the bacon shampoo. My hair is more nutritious and will feed us way longer than ramen.”
“But it’s so much ramen, for so cheap!” Paige’s face took on a red hue.
“No Paige. We have to buy the shampoo.”
“No! I have the money so I am buying the ramen.” Paige reached for the ramen. Whit’s eyes went wide. Thinking quickly, she leaped through the air and knocked Paige to the ground just before she could touch the ramen. They wrestled on the floor, screaming and yelling at each other.
“Get off me Whit!”
“No I can’t let you do this!”
“omg stop it!” Whit reached into Paige’s jacket pocket and snatched the five dollar bill. She got up on her feet, raising the bill triumphantly over her head. Paige scooted across the floor on her belly and clung to one of Whit’s legs. Whit grabbed some of her extra crispy hair, crumbling it into tiny bits, and throwing them like high calorie shrapnel. Paige sputtered and flailed as the bits flew into her face. Whit grabbed the shampoo and ran, ran as fast as she could to the cashier. Paige was determined though. She had wiped off the bits and grabbed the box of her precious noodles, and now was running after Whit, screaming like a banshee. Whit would not beat her to the cashier.
Whit was almost to the line though. She looked at the cashiers. Each one had a line with three people in it, all with just a few items, so she took the closest one. She stood there anxiously, listening to the beeping of the scanners and Paige’s distant cries, which were becoming louder. Whit kept one eye on the end of the maze, and one eye on People magazine. To her horror, Paige came barreling through the exit, gripping the box of ramen, still screaming. Whit looked at the lady in front of her who was pulling out change to pay for some whitening strips. Paige was coming closer, and closer. Whit could see the whites of her wild eyes as she charged. She tapped her foot rapidly as the cashier printed out a receipt for the old lady and handed it to her. Whit saw her chance. She shoved the bottle at the cashier. Paige screamed Whit’s name as she ran into her, accidentally throwing the box of ramen past the register. They wrestled on the floor. Kicking and screaming at eachother, raising no eyebrows.
“What is the matter with you two?”
Whit, pushing down on Paige’s face and Paige, biting Whit’s bacon hair, both looked up at the cashier. One of her hands was gripping the edge of the check out stand while the other held the bottle of shampoo. Whit looked at the display. Bacon Shampoo: $4.99. She jumped up for joy and handed the annoyed cashier the five dollar bill. Paige curled up into a ball and cried, while Whit took her bag and her receipt.
“Thank you, Ma’am.”
“Don’t ever come in here again.”
Whit looked down at the emotionally wrecked Paige. “I promise you we won’t.” Whit grabbed a cart someone too lazy to put it back had left by the register, and placed the shampoo in it. She then picked up Paige and put her in the cart with the bacon shampoo, and pushed the cart out the store, where Whit could wash her hair, and they could cook up some bacon, back in the comfort of the dorm room.
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