The Perils of Clerking, Part 2

So I step out of the office, but the way my hands are shaking it feels like I've been stuck inside a freshly mixed can of paint. I go to lock the door and buddy from Allendale Bingo across the street is standing outside, apparently waiting for an invitation.

"We just got robbed, bro, you're going to have to go somewhere else." He stares at me blankly. I open the door to repeat what I just said, and he waltzes right in like he's Brian Denham (store owner) or something.

"Hey, buddy, we're closed." I repeat.

"The cops told me to come over here." His voice is oblique, so that all his words run together and he sounds like he's got a golf-ball stuck in his throat. He's only about 5'7" and a little chubby. His face is shaded by a black ball cap, coke-bottle glasses, and the mustache I grew in grade six. Only red.

"Are you a lead investigator in your spare time?" He looks at me blankly. I imagine his guidance counsellor told him that running the machine at the bingo hall was about as high as he could aim.

"The cops told me to come over here. You were just robbed right?" Why do people insist on asking questions they already know the answer to.

"Yeah. That's what I said."
"OK, good."
"Says you."
"Well, I mean--"
"Nevermind. Did you see the guy?"

"Yeah," he says, "I was outside smoking and I saw him wandering around our parking lot with a black-jack, peering into cars and, you know, looking like he was going to do something. So I went in and grabbed my cell-phone, to phone the cops right?" He stood there like he was waiting for me to assure him this is, in fact, how it happened.

"OK."

"When I came back out, he was heading into the store here, then all of a sudden I see him bolting across Calgary Trail with your lockbox. He hopped into a black truck with a white topper and peeled out of there. Hard," making an erratic swinging motion with his hands, "Zwooom."

"Huh," I said, taking stock of the black-clad leprechauns words, "Huh, well, what's your name again?"

"Stevie."

"Now, Stevie, what I need you to do is wait in the cloak-room there until the piggaroos get here. I need to take care of some stuff in the office. Kosher?"

"What does kosher mean?"

"Blessed by a rabbi. Can you do that for me?"

"I'm not a rabbi."

"Can you wait between the doors there until the coppers come?"

"Yeah, I suppose. What are you gonna do?"

"I'm going up to the office to do some work." Before he could get another word in I closed the entrance and locked my new mongoloid in the foyer. I suddenly needed another cigarette. And I didn't want to smoke it with Stevie.

I waited upstairs for fifteen minutes of blessed silence before the crescendo of those bad-news sirens tore into the parking lot. Suddenly there were fifteen police vehicles lined up with two officers busting out of each one. I put out my third cigarette and let them in the exit. For a second I thought about telling them that I had apprehended the subject single-handedly and had locked him in the foyer, where he was praying to God for their arrival. But this soon passed.

The officers piled into the store, single-file, and stood around the counter. They all had their heads shaved and as my gaze fell to their boots I was secretly expecting to find Doc Martens with red laces sticking out from under their pants. Each looked like they had prepped for a full-blown, Whyte Ave. riot, their flak jackets puffing out from under their uniforms, so thickly I thought that maybe one of them was hiding the station copy of Mein Kampf in there, and the holster on their tazers unclipped.

"So. What's the problem?"

"Ummm," repetition was fast becoming the theme of the day,"I got robbed."

"Are you hurt."

"Just my feelings, sir." At this they looked around at each other, like cattle deciding who should step into the slaughterhouse first. Confused and apathetic.

"Oh," the one says, his head drooping as he buttons his tazer back up, "just a theft."

"Just a theft," the rest say in unison before heading back out the door, equally dejected that the couldn't find the M to their S, tonight at least.

"No. A theft is when someone grabs a bottle. He took," I point, "my cash. I think that qualifies as robbery."

"How much was in there?" the tall gruppenfuhrer asked.

"$8oo and change."

"Hmmm." He posited as he scribbled in his notebook, "Theft under $5000."

I could see now that my quick thinking and fast reaction in calling 911, was wasted on this man. He took my statement, and, after a long negotiation concerning the terms of his surrender, I let Stevie out of the boot room and he took his too. I didn't think much further about the incident until Tyler came in to drop off his resignation a couple days later.

"Hey buddy," I said as he waltzed in, "Long time no see, eh?"

"Yeah, yeah. How's work?"

"Same as always, I suspect. Minus the cops and robbers, of course."

"Good stuff. Hey, I just came in to tender my resignation to Paul."

"He's not in."

"Well, I guess you'll have to take it then. I got a sweet job in Sherwood Park, double my pay and benefits." Oooooh, the much-sought-after benefit package.

"Nice."

"Yeah, I can finally afford my truck...Have you seen it yet? Come on, I'll show ya."

We went outside, and I pretended to be very impressed with his brand-new black Silverado. We talked engines, accessories, paint protection and the like for about fifteen minutes until he finally jumped in the cab and I watched him go. The last I saw of Tyler was brand-new taillights sitting under a bleach-white bed-topper. I hope he waved to Stevie as he passed through the Allendale Bingo on the way to Argyll, and blissful anonymity.