Cleanup on Aisle [REDACTED]
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Jericho stepped up to the lane and placed his three, small items on top of the black belt. A six-pack of the local beer, a loaf of bread. A new lighter. The young cashier picked at her teeth, dark hair falling from her ponytail and into her eyes. He cleared his throat, voice rough from disuse, and said, “There’s a mess in aisle sixteen.” The cashier looked up at him, brows furrowing. “J’so you know,” he added. Just in case.
The cashier, Vera, gazed at him with a strange interest. “Aisle sixteen?” She said, laughing nervously. She swiped the bread across the scanner. “We have no aisle sixteen.” She reached for the six-pack and ran it across the scanner. Punched in a small handful of numbers.
He gave her a look, glancing back to the aisle he’d just come from. Indeed, the markers hanging from the ceiling skipped it altogether, going straight from fifteen to seventeen. Vera coughed as she tapped the digital screen in front of her. “Boss says it's unlucky, so we don’t have it. Always stock in one more or one less, you know?” He didn’t. He rubbed his eyes. The dim overhead lights made his head swim.
Vera picked up the lighter, the last thing he’d retrieved. From aisle sixteen. She turned it over in her hand as he contemplated this. “I need two of those, actually. Mind if I run back and grab another one?” She raised one eyebrow at him, but shook her head and scanned it twice.
“Watch the line forming behind you,” she said, gesturing to the near empty store. Jericho huffed out a small laugh and stalked off. He turned into aisle fifteen, scanning for the lighters. Aisle seventeen, when he couldn’t find it, eyeing even lines of cleaning products. The lights above him flickered, blaring too-bright for a sharp moment. He rubbed his temples. He spun on his heel at the end of the aisle and ducked around the endcap.
There, toward the center of the aisle, a handful of different lighters hung on the shelves. Yellow and orange and red, sitting pretty in their untouched packaging. He picked another up and glanced up at the sign, hanging just above him. Aisle sixteen.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” Vera said. She held the lighter in her hand, packaging undone. Jericho took a step back.
“I don’t want any trouble,” he said, raising his hands to his face.
Vera tilted her head. “I do,” she said, voice dropping. “I hate that number.” She reached for her back pocket, retrieving a metal flask without a cap. “Hate, hate, hate.” She looked back to him, eyes wide. “You brought it here,” she said. “That number. You brought sixteen here.” Moon-eyed, she tossed it at Jericho without another thought.
The liquid from the can sloshed onto his shoes, his pants. It smelled putrid. “If I get rid of you,” she whispered. “I get rid of it,” she said, spitting the last word. She flicked the lighter open, watching as it sparked between her fingers. He took a step back. She tossed the lighter to him, watching with disgust as the floor ignited.
Flame caught hold of his pantleg as the aisle began to fold in around itself, vanishing into wherever it had gone before, bread forgotten on the belt.
A young woman, just two aisles over, hummed along to the soft music lilting through the old speakers above as she stretched onto her toes for a can. She stepped into aisle fifteen, eyeing the small variety of bakery items. Aisle seventeen, when she could not find what she was looking for. She turned to the store clerk, dutifully stocking the shelves just ahead.
“Could you help me find something?” She said, watching the smooth swish of the clerk’s dark ponytail. “I think it’s in aisle sixteen.”
The clerk’s spine went rigid. “There is no aisle sixteen.”