The blonde cashier shrugged and blew out a bubble. When it popped Phil had a sudden whiff of blueberry. "The guy who did that was a regular," the cashier said. She smiled. The blue 'Swifty Mart' name tag over her left breast said her name was Lucy.
"Apparently it was bad enough to get the attention of the national tabloids," Lucy continued. "I still can't sleep at night." She leaned over the counter, and with hushed words she said, "The guy who did that lived right next door me. Nothing like that ever happens around here."
"Really," Phil replied. He placed the magazine back on the rack and raised an eyebrow. The grainy black and white picture on the cover revealed an edited scene of what looked like a bedroom. The walls and floor had been repainted with what appeared to be chocolate syrup. There were two bodies in the scene, Phil noted. One was sprawled on the bed and the other lying unnaturally on the floor. A paper grocery bag, possibly tossed aside in haste, lay toppled between the bed and the second body. The poor picture quality didn't alow Phil to make out the spilled contents.
"They ever find him?" Phil asked, "I mean, wouldn't he leave a trail of blood after all that?"
Lucy shrugged again with another bubble. "The story says the cops cornered him in the same house and shot him once in the hand and about eleven times in the chest." Then she stared at him in that do-you-need-something look. Clearly she had become bored.
"Oh, er...where's the...oh, you know, the..."
"Condoms?" the cashier finished. Clearly she expected Phil to be impressed at her customer service skills.
"No," Phil responded, slightly embarrassed. "Those female things. Sanitary napkins or something."
"Oh," Lucy said and pointed somewhere off to the left. "Down that way, sir. Next to the dog food. Aisle twelve."
"Oh, thanks." Why Pads where in the same section as the dog food, he couldn't guess. He could imagine some guy in a big Swifty Mart office somewhere laughing about it with his coworkers.
Then he was caught by a sudden memory and chuckled a bit. He had stepped on a pad once on the way to the kitchen for a late-night snack. It was still in the light blue wrapper and it had let out a little squeak. He never knew they made noise when stepped on. His wife still didn't believe him.
He passed by aisle ten, eleven, thirteen.
"Excuse me," he asked a stock boy. The same type of blue name tag was pinned to his green apron. It said 'Swifty Mart,' and below that it said his name was Sanchez. "Where is aisle twelve?"
"We're in it."
Phil looked back up at the sign and sure enough, aisle twelve. He could have sworn it said thirteen not ten seconds ago.
"Thanks--"
Sanchez had disappeared. From the time it took him to look back up at the sign and back again the stock boy had disappeared. He stood in the middle of the aisle and knew that Sanchez didn't have enough time to leave without being seen. Or maybe he did. Phil shrugged it off and began his search for the pads. Didn't take long. There they were, next to the dog food, right in front of him.
He picked up the box, and his hand brushed a can of dog food. A sudden sharp pain enveloped the back of his hand and he jerked it away. The box of pads went soaring down the aisle. He must have cut his hand on a sharp edge of one of the cans. But a sharp cut on his hand would not look like teeth marks. Teeth marks? He thought for an insane moment that the dog on the can had bitten him. The can with the caption 'Scruffy likes it!' on it.
He slowly peered at the other cans of dog food and could have sworn he heard odd throaty sounds emanating from them. There were at least twelve cans on the shelf and they all seemed to be growling at him. Not loud, but menacing just the same. Got to be a prank, he thought nervously. It's probably Sanchez the stock boy having a little fun. He reached for another can to search for the speaker that had to hidden somewhere in back of the shelf and was bitten again. Blood droplets hit the floor when he jerked his hand back. He slowly stepped away.
"Who's doing this?" He looked around for a hidden camera or something as he clutched his wounded hand with the other. It stung a little, and he could hardly move his ring finger. "You guys must be bored! Having a little fun, are we? Well, I'm bleeding here, and I can sue!"
A chorus of screeching cat sounds invaded his ears and his heart skipped a beat. He had backed up into the cat food section. He grabbed another box of pads with his good hand and headed quickly down the aisle, periodically glancing over his shoulder. In front of him he could see the checkout lines getting closer. But not close enough, it seemed. In fact, Phil wasn't sure if they were getting any closer or not. It felt like he was on a treadmill while fake rows of groceries sped by him like they were on giant rollers.
God, he thought, why do they make these aisles so damn long? How long had he been walking? Twenty seconds? Twenty-five? Then the world spun around him. He saw the long fluorescent lights on the ceiling and then he hit the ground. He had slipped on something wet. He got up, leaving bloody prints on the floor. He hand was still bleeding. Not bad, but bad enough to drip a little. He could see a trail of it leading far behind him. He was cold and hot at the same time. Sweat evaporated from his back and neck. His shoulders let out a little shudder.
Must think. This can't be happening. He calmed himself down a bit and was fascinated by the fact that the pain in his hand was more intense. It thumped with the beat of his heart. Definitely teeth marks. By a dog. Phil had grown up with enough pets to know.
Band-Aids. There they were, next to the ground coffee. Was everything on this aisle? What do they need the rest of the store for? He tore open a box with his teeth and covered the holes in his hand with a bandage.
"Hey handsome."
Phil gazed at a bag of ground coffee. There was picture of a pretty woman holding a steaming cup in some stylized cafe scene. She winked at him. He screamed and took of running. And he probably had screamed a few more times as well. What would his old high school gym teacher think of him now? There goes the little pussy boy, he would say. Running away like a little girl. Running from what? And to where? Now, these were really good questions Phil's depleting mind didn't want ponder. It was happy just keeping the little pussy boy running for now.
"Would you like to join me?"
But Phil barely heard this. The checkout lines still didn't seem to be getting any closer. The shelves sped by him though, so he knew he had to be getting somewhere. Finally out of breath, he sat down in the middle of the floor and contemplated his sanity.
"You're not crazy," said the lovely woman on the box of pads. He must have picked them up again. He didn't remember. The woman on the box was running on a beach somewhere. Phil could see her hair tangling in the breeze, the outline her nipples poking out of her bikini top, and he swore he smelled salt. "You'd best get home soon, or you'll be in big trouble. Please don't keep me waiting..."
She blew him a kiss. Phil screamed again. Or he tried, at least. Nothing came out of his mouth but a sad, dry gurgle. He dropped the box as if it were a severed hand.
"Hey buddy," The German guy on the bottle of imported beer didn't have an accent, and Phil thought that rather odd. "Have a few sips and you're feel just fine."
Phil sobbed. Tears rolled down his cheeks. He let out another cry for help as loud as his soar throat would allow. He rocked back and forth, holding his arms close to his chest as he used to do when he was young. There really were things in his closet and under his bed back then. Naturally, no one had believed him. He would climb to the top of his bookshelf to hide. His father had bolted it to the wall after a mild earthquake, so he knew it would hold his small weight with no problem. He would shiver up there, periodically glancing down to witness a tiny clawed hand withdraw back under his bed as if it knew it was being watched. He wished he had that old bookshelf now.
He snatched up the beer and tossed it as hard as he could down the aisle. He watched as it flew. Down it went until it was nothing more than a little dot. The sound of broken glass was distant and hollow, as if in a cave. He could barely see the mess it made.
Okay, he thought, something not quite right here. He knew this for a while now, but now he had the proof. What am I gonna do about it? Climb up the shelves again and hide like a little girl?
He began to climb, knocking the first few metal shelves off. Products rolled away or broke. He didn't care. Sanchez can clean it up, he thought and smiled the kind of smile that only happens during bad situations, like car wrecks.
Finally at the top, he could see down into the next aisle. But there was no aisle thirteen. A vast black ocean greeted him with rolling waves. A light breeze filled his nose with the smell of salt. Rows and rows of florescent ceiling lights stretched far above him and into the horizon, barely illuminating the dark water with flickering light.
He picked up a few items and tossed them over the edge.
But they never hit the water. A box of taco shells had bounced back in thin air the second it had left his hands. Phil didn't have the energy to scream anymore. He had used up all his screaming points while running down the aisle the first time. He slowly eased himself down, trying to get his breathing under control. This situation wasn't real, he knew. Couldn't possibly be real. The lighting in this place is bad, that's all. Yeah, and those sanitary napkin things squeak like mice when stepped on.
"Didn't help much, did it?" The German guy on the beer bottle said. This wasn't the same one he hurled down the aisle of course. This was one of the German guy's many evil twins or something. "There's things in that ocean. I wouldn't dive in if I were you. Please, have a cold one on me."
With one swipe, Phil cleared the shelf in a rage he never would have thought possible. Beer bottles exploded in foam and glass as they hit the floor.
Well, he thought morbidly, at least I won't starve to death. Anything you could ever want is in aisle twelve. No need to go anywhere else. Oh yes, aisle twelve is the place to be. Aisle twelve is proud as punch to serve you. The problem is, you can't leave once you're here. It's your own little island. This is Isle Twelve. No one leaves.
"Why would you want to?"
Then a box of cereal jumped down from a shelf. The other varieties of breakfast goodies seemed to cheer it on as the box hobbled closer.
"You'd best get home now," it said. Its voice was raspy and crackled between words. The cartoon character's tiger-face was menacing and serious. "Can't keep the wife waiting..."
Oh nice, Phil thought, they can walk about now. He kicked at it and it fell over with a thump. Orange crunchy stuff spewed out, and he stomped it into the drab tile flooring. He laughed and laughed. He laughed one of those crazy man's laughs, and it felt good. It felt right.
"Aw, lookit whut'e dun," a can of creamed corn said with a sigh. "He trampled Sugar Crunchies."
Many hushed murmurs filled the aisle. Phil could feel many little eyes glaring at him. Then the sounds suddenly stopped and were replaced by a rhythmic thumping noise, like heavy machinery.
Or something big walking.
The creature was humanoid in shape. But that was as far as it went. Its body was composed of every sort of canned and boxed and packaged goods as possible, it seemed. The thing came out of nowhere, and Phil was not surprised. He was beyond panic, beyond screaming and running. He stood still as the thing walked towards him. No, walked wasn't quite right. The thing seemed to swagger, like a top-heavy pile of cardboard.
"We gonna getcha naw," the can creamed corn said. It was embedded in the creature's chest, Phil saw with mild amusement. He chucked under his breath. The thing was nearly ten feet away form him now. "You shudda naw dun it. Naw sir."
"Go to Hell."
"Phil, that's no way to talk," the box of pads said from the creature's shoulder. "You know I don't like it when you use language like that."
The beach was gone. The box now revealed a black and white picture of a bedroom somewhere. Phil's wife was sitting up in bed with what looked like chocolate syrup smeared all over her face and arms. Some thing was wrong with the way her head tilted to the side. More syrup drained from her mouth as she spoke.
"Did you get my pads," she said with a gurgle.
Phil back up slowly. His legs were numb and he didn't think they were even working at first until he felt the shelves against his back. Urgent, hollow growls and hisses emanated from behind him. A moment later he felt his shirt being ripped apart by many little paws. His brain shut down as he felt several nails dug into his back and shoulders. Warm liquid ran down his legs and he knew in the back of his mind that he had pissed himself. He peered down and saw a yellow puddle with thick red swirls forming around his feet.
"Sick sonofabitch," a voice said. It was Lucy from the checkout. Her head was now bobbing back and fourth on the product-creature's neck like a bird's. Her breath no longer smelled of blueberry gum. Instead, the putrid oder of decaying fish assulted Phil's nose. "He shoved his wife under their bed after he killed her."
"Doesn't seem like that good a hiding place," a can of beer said. "What did he do to her?"
"You don't want to know,"the Lucy-thing said. "I'll just say they will never get all the stains out of the carpet. Then he murdered me after I went over to the house to see what all the noise was about. Crazy bastard even killed his own dog and cat."
"You dawn't say," the cream corn said.
Just keep running, Phil thought as he shoved his way past the creature. Just keep running. A thick trail of blood stretched out from behind him on the floor as he ran. His chest and back hurt terribly with every raspy breath. He knew the creature must be in pursuit. Phil could still smell the thing's putrid fish oder.
I can out-run it, Phil thought as the oder began to fade. But it never went away entirely, and Phil knew with certainty that it never would. He knew he would be running for a very long, long time.
Bio:Mark manages a hardware store in San Francisco and is a member of the Delray online writing workshop
E-mail: kntrdr2k@compuserve.com
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