The Trouble Way (26 page)

“
Very interesting,” Dwight said. “What else do you know?”

“
Ann won’t want Candy anywhere near her department, I’m sure, and cosmetics is right next to the deli. She doesn’t trust her. She thinks Candy is stealing from her. And that’s after Ann was so nice and gave her a place to live when she got evicted from her last place.”

“
Well, maybe we can help Ann out.” Dwight said. “Spatter  some feces on Candy’s halo.”

“
How can you do that? She’s in pretty tight with personnel. It might backfire on you. You may be the one covered with feces.”

“
Not to worry your pretty little head about it. You could even provide a little help, if you’re up to it.”

“
Ann is my really good friend and I will do anything to protect her. Just tell me what to do.”

“
It may take a few weeks. Let Candy get settled in,” Dwight said. “Before we redecorate her bright little halo. Take some of the sparkle off.”

“
When is Candy scheduled to work again?” Dwight asked.

“
She works early on Tuesday, according to Ann,” Linda said.

“
So, just exactly where in cosmetics does Candy-Cute-Ass work?” Dwight asked. He pulled open the glass door for Linda and they walked into Big Richards. It was late on Monday night, twenty minutes before closing. He grabbed a cart.

“
We’ll both need one,” Dwight said and pushed his cart toward Linda and he pulled another from the cart rack behind the service desk.

“
She works in the make-up section. You know, lipstick, mascara, stuff like that.” Linda said.

“
Couldn’t be more perfect. Lots of little stuff and things on a million peg hooks.”

“
What do you mean, Dwight? Why is that perfect?”

“
Just do as I do and don’t make it look obvious. Take your time ... you’re shopping,” Dwight said and headed to the lingerie section, selecting several flimsy bras from the rack, holding them up to Linda, making like he was buying something for his girlfriend. With each one, he held it up, examined it in the light, took it off of the hanger, and returned the hanger to a different rack from where he selected the bra, and tossed the bra in his cart. “Bras and panties are excellent; either will do. Just make sure you select something on a hanger, something flimsy. Put the hanger back on a different rack, or drop it in one of the stray carts.”

Linda followed and did what he said.
“Hey, I like this one, she said as she pulled a lacy black number from the rack and held it up to herself displaying it for Dwight.

“
Very nice, Lindy, but, control yourself,” Dwight said. “We can shop for you next time.”

With eight or ten different bras and panties from different racks lying in the bottom of their shopping cart, they turned to the cosmetic department. He browsed the lipstick section pulling a tube from several displays. Linda did the same. Each had about ten or fifteen shades of lipstick lying on top of the bras and panties.

“Why the lingerie?”

“
The bras are to keep the lipstick from falling through the cart, that’s all. Plus, they are hard to re-hang ... takes forever to re-stock. They’re a nightmare for the clerks.”

They went from lipstick, to eyeliner, to mascara, to any item that was in a clam-pack or were in tiny bottles. Next, they hit the fingernail polish and gathered several dozen from various displays.

“Just take one of each color and take them from different shelves,” Dwight said. “Only select one item from a peg or shelf. One more thing, remove the best sellers, the items with two or more facings, and put them someplace else. Replace them with a similar item, but only an item that has one facing. The good seller will never be reordered and the replacement item will be ordered and will get overstocked because it doesn’t sell. I’m a fuckin’ genius.”

Not a single employee asked them if they needed help. All employees they came near, in fact, avoided eye contact and often re-directed themselves down a different aisle to avoid them.

“What if someone asks us what we are doing?” Linda asked.

Dwight looked at Linda, put his hands on her shoulders and turned her directly toward him, like an elementary teacher needing to discipline an unruly youngster with an attention deficit affliction and needed her full attention.
“Linda, Linda, Linda, look me directly in the eye. When have you ever,
ever
heard of, or seen, or been told of a Big Richards’ employee voluntarily, intentionally, or even accidentally asking a customer a question; or even a rumor of such activity? About anything? Remember, these people are at the bottom. They don’t get paid squat, they aren’t about to go out of their way to answer questions. In fact, as you can see, they go out of their way to
not
answer questions.”

“
You’re right, you’re right, silly me, you are definitely right, it never happens. How could I have been so stupid as to question your wisdom?”

Dwight and Linda finished selecting items and putting them in their carts and they stopped. Each estimated they had nearly a hundred different cosmetic and lingerie items when Linda turned to Dwight and asked,
“Now what?”

“
Nothing,” Dwight said. “Absolutely nothing.”

“
What do you mean?”

“
Push your cart into the hardware department and I’ll show you.” Dwight followed her with his cart. When they passed the domestic department, Dwight grabbed a couple bath towels and threw them over his merchandise and grabbed two more and handed them to Linda. When they got to hardware, he said, “Leave it.”

“
What?”

“
Leave it.” Dwight said it again and caught her hand and pulled her along with him and he left his full cart in the curtain department.

“
When Candy comes in tomorrow for her shift, the first thing she’ll do is go to the service desk where the return carts are assembled and she’ll be spending at least half a day trying to get the merchandise in those two carts, along with any others that have accumulated, returned to their proper homes.”

“
She get anything else done,” Linda said.

“
Bingo. We’ll just see how long management will put up with that bullshit. My guess is not very fucking long. Of course, I may be wrong. I have seen some pretty stupid managers around here.”

“
Anyway,” Dwight said, “it takes forever to hang cosmetics on those pegs and to return those small items to their right place on their shelves. You have to have the dexterity of a juggler to keep shit from falling on the floor trying to restock that small stuff. If I know Candy, she won’t return stuff to their home, she’ll shove it anyplace she can find an empty shelf or peg hook.”

“
Eventually, customers will complain of their favorite items being out of stock. The wrong items will be ordered because their home on the shelf will be empty. Pretty soon, she’ll be overstocked on the slow sellers and will be out of the best sellers. Given the employee’s proclivity to avoid customers, the customer’s will eventually stop shopping at Big Richards. Sales will tank and before she knows it, Candy-Cute-Butt will be sitting her little round ass in the personnel office getting her shiny little behind chewed about her lack of productivity and poor sales. They’ll be asking her why she is ordering merchandise she doesn’t need and why she is always out of the best sellers and why so many items are being miss-stocked.”

“
I’m not sure if I like all these references to Candy’s cute, little, round ass.” Linda said.

“
Sorry about the ‘ass’ comments; guess my mind gets distracted.”

“
I’ll let it slide for now since we’re trying to help Ann out. What about all that lingerie we put in the carts?”

“
That lingerie is what is called collateral damage, like burning down the village to get one enemy soldier, unfortunate but unavoidable. Those bras and panties take forever to re-hang and re-stock in the correct displays; it lowers the store’s overall productivity. That is getting
The
Man
in general, not specifically getting Candy-ass. Oh … sorry … Candy-Cane.”

“
Dwight, you ought to be a store manager, you know all the tricks.”

“
That’s not bloody likely. I applied once for the management program and got rejected.”

“
What happened?”

“
Oh, something about ‘requisite education. After I see what those asshole assistants go through, I wouldn’t give that job to a one-legged chicken on a scooter.”

“
Dwight, you are so funny,” Linda said and took his hand as they walked out the front door.

“
That new assistant, Forest, ain’t so bad; he seems to have all the lug nuts screwing his head on securely. The other assistants’ nuts are either missing or cross-threaded.”

“
Yeah, Mr. Forest is sort of a cutie and he has nice little round butt too. What do you think of that?” Linda said as she gave Dwight’s arm a jerk. “Enough talk about work. Now, I want to show you a couple of
my
tricks,” she grabbed his elbow with both hands. “But first, how about a drink or two at the Triangle?”

“
I really like tricks and a Rainier always makes them seem trickier,” Dwight said.

“
My treat,” Linda said and they walked across the huge parking lot to the tavern. “Both the tricks and the Rainier.”

“
Just so you know, we have to do this more than once or twice for it to work,” Dwight said. “Are you up for it?”

“
You bet. I think we can even get Ann to help. She is tired of dealing with that little sick-o.”

“
I can’t wait to see her tomorrow when she sees that butt-load of return carts.”

“
I don’t work tomorrow, but I’ll call Ann and tell her what we did,” Linda said. “She’ll get a real kick out of it.”

“
Wait until I fill you in on my little ‘weed killer’ project for Mr. H.” Dwight started laughing. “I got a million of ‘em.” Dwight kept chuckling as they made their way to the Triangle. “And then there’s the ol’ ‘Armor All’ trick.” That caused him to chuckle even more. As they neared the Triangle, Dwight took the opportunity to clutch her cheek causing her to jump.

“
Dwight, stop that.”

“I’m just playing, Lindy.”

What’s the Armor All trick?”

Dwight pulled open the heavy wooden door and t
hey walked into the tavern, scanned the room and found a table. He pulled out a chair and Linda took a seat.

“
What you do is spray Armor All down an aisle,” Dwight said taking a seat. “Better if you can do an entire department. It so goddamned slippery, it’s like walking on an oil spill on ice. Impossible to walk on, it’s invisible, and the best part, the floor wax has to be stripped to bare tile and re-sealed and re-waxed. Takes several days to correct. Nobody can walk down the aisle to shop. It’s a real pisser for management with the lost sales and all. I eventually quit doing that. Some guy fell and I felt real bad.

“
Well you should feel bad, Dwight, that’s terrible. That poor old man didn’t do anything to you.”

“
They had to call an ambulance. He sued the company for all his pain and suffering. I heard he really made out, stuck it to them for over a hundred grand. I still felt kind of bad. I only did that a few more times and decided maybe I should quit.

“Well, I should hope so.”

“I didn’t want anybody else falling. I just wanted them to stop shopping in that department. You have to admit, it was pretty fucking effective.”

“I’m sure it was, Dwight. I’m glad you don’t do that anymore.”

“And then there’s the ol’ feces incident.” He laughed even harder.

“
Why are you always talking about shit?” Linda asked.

“
Well aren’t you little Miss Upity,” Dwight said. “I’ll teach the bastards to reject my application. I’ll close the damn store down before I’m finished with ‘em … feces … shee-it.”

“
Half the time, I just don’t have a clue what you’re talking about Dwight,” Linda said. “But it’s a pretty good bet it will have something to do with shit.”

Early
1970’s

“
What in the be-Jesus is going on, Jake? I leave for an hour and come back and my cafeteria is shut down and I find out there are rats in the ceiling and maggots in the mashed potatoes. Just what in holy-hell happened Jake?”

“
I hate to tell you, Mr. Hedd, but you ain’t heard the worst of it. The County Health Department is going to be back in the morning and is going to do a full store health check.” Jake leaned forward on the desk across Mr. Hedd and looked down at the notes Jake had taken when he toured with the inspector. “They said it’s possible the entire store could be shut down if they find that we have a rat infestation problem. The inspector did a cursory check and found two rotting carcasses in two different stockrooms, one in the pet food stockroom, and the other in the candy stockroom.”

“
What the hell. I told Dwight to set those damn rattraps. His ass is grass.”

“
Dwight said he did set traps and caught several rats but he apparently didn’t catch them all. Said he even put rat poison around like you told him to do. The inspector said that was a huge mistake because once they eat the poison, they go off and die someplace.”

“
That’s exactly what we want them to do, for Christ sake, die.” Mr. Hedd threw both hands up and leaning back in his chair. “What the hell does he want us to do with them, take them to rehab?”

“
Well, not exactly, he said you need to recover bodies to dispose of them. That’s the problem with poison, no bodies. They don’t come out into the middle of the stockroom and die. They hide, then croak. That’s where all of the odor is coming from in some of the stockrooms, the poisoned rats that wandered off and found someplace comfortable to die. That’s what happened to the one in the ceiling above the cafeteria, apparently.”

“
Oh, Christ. Braunswine is going to have a coronary artery blow over this.”

Mr. Hedd looked up and saw Dwight in the outer office waiting by his office door and motioned him in.

“What is it Dwight?” He flagged Dwight to come in.

“
I checked all the stockrooms and we caught a few rats in the traps. Apparently there are a bunch,” Dwight said.

“
Thank you Dwight,” Mr. Hedd said and began absently rifling through the pile of paperwork on his desk. “Do you have any idea of how much money is at stake if the store is shut down for even a day?” He shoved the stack of papers to the side, looking from Dwight to Jake and back. “Not to mention the publicity if the newspapers find out. Jake, if I didn’t know any better, I’d almost think there is some sort of conspiracy going on around here. One goddamned thing after another.”

Mr. Hedd looked up from his desk and saw that Dwight was still standing there waiting for further instructions.
“That will be all, Dwight. Keep all this on the low down.”

“
Yes Sir,” Dwight said and turned and walked out, closing the door behind him.

“
Jake, I want you to get a crew to work overnight; I don’t give a good goddamn about overtime. I want you to do a thorough sweep of the entire store and find if there are any more dead animals.”

“
Will do, Mr. Hedd,” Jake said and got up to leave.

“
One more thing, Jake, replace those stained ceiling tiles above the grill. It doesn’t look too appetizing to have stained, dripping tiles above the steam table. Check the tiles above the entire sales floor and replace any that need it.”

Jake made a quick dash after Dwight and caught up with him as he was about to disappear around the corner on his way to the stockroom.

“Dwight, hold on. One more thing, how would you like to make a little overtime pay? Mr. Hedd wants a crew to work overnight tonight?”

“
Sure, why not. I can always use some extra hours. What’s up?”

“
We’ll be stalking big game tonight.” Jake said. “Rats.”

“
Mr. Hedd must have found more scrats.”

“
No. But it’s scat, not scrats, Dwight.”

“
Whatever you say, Mr. Forest. Must be another one of those damn requisite education problems. You providing the pizzas?”

“
Sure, why not,” Jake said.

“
What in the bejesus happened here?” Mr. Hedd said, looking at the two thirty gallon metal trash barrels overflowing with dead plants sitting on a flatbed cart.

A startled
Bertie dropped the six inch container with a dead houseplant and looked up at Mr. Hedd standing within inches of her. He shifted his gaze to look at the entire row of houseplants on the display rack with shriveled brown leaves.

“
I’ve been watering them every day, Mr. Hedd. She scurried to scoop up the dead plant and scattered dirt from the dropped container. “I don’t know why they’re dying.” She put the plant in the overflowing container and used both hands to push down on the pile to make room.

“
My God, Bertie, how many plants have you thrown away?” Mr. Hedd shook his head and fingered a few of the dead, plants in the garbage can. A third empty can was lined up, waiting to be filled.

She
went back to her task and continued to methodically pick up each dead plant, record the price on a markdown sheet.

“
I’m not sure, Mr. Hedd, but I have the count on the markdown sheet. I swear I watered them. See, Mr. Hedd, the roots are still wet,” Bertie said holding a shriveled plant, roots up, with one hand and handing the list of dead plants on a clipboard to him with the other.

“
Well, Bertie, it’s obvious to me that these are dead plants,” Mr. Hedd said as he scanned the sheet mentally running a total of the number of plants on the list. “I certainly don’t think someone would intentionally spray them with vegetation killer ... let’s not be ridiculous. My God, there are over a hundred plants on this list and there are that many more on the display. They may be wet now, but by the looks the leaves, they died of thirst. They have obviously not been watered properly. It looks like you missed this entire side of the plant display, Bertie. Everything else appears to be fine but this row. You are going to have to be much more careful. I want you to set up a watering schedule and stick to it. I will not tolerate losing so many plants to neglect.” Mr. Hedd reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a pack of Chesterfields and took a cigarette from the pack and stuck it in his mouth. “When you work out a plan, in writing, I want to see it before the day ends. Understood?”

“
Yes Sir, Mr. Hedd.”

“
I suggest you take a few notes, Bertie.”

“
Yes Sir, Mr. Hedd.” She reached in her pocket for a scrap of paper, attached it to the clipboard, and began scribbling notes.

Now, let
’s see what the rest of your department looks like,” he said and walked down several aisles before stopping at a horticulture aisle. Looking at the mound of seeds on the floor, he bent and picked a one-pound bag of wild flower seeds. As he picked it up a waterfall of seeds cascaded onto the counter base and overflowed to the tile floor. He turned and stared at Bertie, back to the bag and then to Bertie without saying a word.

Bertie stared at the waterfall of seed accumulating on the floor and
shrank when she looked up and saw Mr. Hedd glaring directly into her eyes. “Mr. Hedd, I don’t know what to say. It looks like the seam busted open.”

“
No, Bertie, someone slit the bag with a knife or possibly a box cutter.” He took a deep breath, the cigarette still hanging unlit from his lip, and let out a disgusting sigh. Something caught his eye and he kneeled for a closer look at the spilled seeds. “Oh, for crying in the night, Bertie.” He pointed his finger at the dark drops mingled with the seeds on the floor. “That’s scat. We’re feeding the goddamned rats. Jesus, Bertie.”

He looked up at Bertie as she kneeled closer, adjusting her glasses, for a better look. She picked up one of the dark drops and eyed it closely.

“What’s scat, Mr. Hedd?” Holding the drop up to him.

“
For Christ’s sake, that’s rat shit Bertie.”

She flipped the drop out of her fingers and looked at Mr. Hedd.
“Why didn’t you say so, Mr. Hedd? I could be infected.”

“
Doesn’t anybody around here know what shit is? Get all this damaged merchandise on the markdown sheet, Bertie. And, when it’s completed, I want to see it personally.”

“
Yes Sir, Mr. Hedd. Yes Sir.”

“
No doubt the same vandal that killed your plants, huh, Bertie? Or, maybe it was pure carelessness opening the freight boxes. We’ve gone over the use of box cutters numerous times at our employee meeting. Have you been paying attention, Bertie?” He held up the sliced bag of wild flower seeds for Bertie to see, ignoring the seeds streaming out in a continuous cascade, sprinkling the floor. In an obscene gesture he emptied the remaining seeds on the floor and tossed the empty bag toward the garbage can. It missed.

“
I swear to God, Mr. Hedd, I am extremely careful with my box cutter.” Bertie’s face was crimson. “I swear.”

Mr. Hedd turned and walked away from her without another word, dismissing her assertions by his silence. When he got to the garden fence, he stopped and turned back to Bertie.
“For crying out loud, Bertie, go wash your damn hands.”

Outside the garden shop fence, he lit his Chesterfield and saw the distinct profile of Mr. Braunswine as he stopped, the driver
’s window rolled down on his Cadillac. Mr. Hedd looked toward the building to see what Mr. Braunswine was directing his gaze at and saw the weeds growing next to the building. A beautiful bouquet of yellow dandelions had sprouted next to a downspout.

“
At least we do a good job of keeping the weeds watered … shit.”

He
’d obviously missed it on his before dawn inspection tour.

“
Goddamn you Dwight.”

Mr. Braunswine made eye contact with Mr. Hedd, looked at the dandelions, back at Mr. Hedd, sure he had gotten his non-verbal message across to Mr. Hedd. Then he continued slowly driving his Cadillac around the rest of the building. When he got to where Mr. Hedd was standing, he rolled down his window.
“Nice bouquet.” He was not smiling.

Mr. Hedd shut his eyes, took a deep drag on the cigarette, his one, and only chance to fortify his constitution before the inevitable ass-chewing that was minutes away. At this point, Braunswine didn
’t even know about the rats. He gave the cigarette a flick and walked back past Bertie.

“
Get those plants dumped into the dumpster behind the store. Push that flat-bed around the building, not through the stockroom with those garbage cans unless you want Mr. Braunswine to give you another lesson on watering plants.”

“
Yes Sir, Mr. Hedd.”

“
Do it now, Bertie. Get Dwight to help you dump the cans.”

“
Yes Sir, Mr. Hedd,” Bertie said, stood and began pushing the flatbed through the garden gate to the rear of the store.

He walked into the store to greet Mr. Braunswine when he made his regal entrance.

“Shit. Shit. Shit.”

“
Let’s get to it, Hedd,” Mr. Braunswine said and led the way toward the stockroom.

As with his habit of looking into the manager
’s vehicle, Mr. Braunswine gauged the condition of the store by first looking in the stockroom.

It took little time for Mr. Braunswine to zero in on the object of his search. When he entered the building materials stockroom, in the furthest reaches of the store, he stopped in his tracks. The object of his attention was the boxes of merchandise scattered in disarray in the middle of one of the aisles. Apparently some stocker did a perfunctory job of filling the counter and left the overstock in the aisle.

“Do you accept this deplorable condition of your stockrooms, Mr. Hedd?” Mr. Braunswine did not take his eyes from the boxes scattered on the floor for dramatic effect and waited silently for a response.

Mr. Hedd had fallen for that ruse before and was not about to be duped again. He may as well have asked if he stopped beating his wife. There was no right answer for that question either. He almost said,
“No, Mr. Braunswine, I have not stopped beating my wife and as soon as you are finished abusing me, I’m going straight home to knock the living piss out of her again,” but refrained, knowing Braunswine had crap for humor. Besides, in his forty-one years, he hadn’t found, to his profound regret, a woman who had an attraction for him great enough to marry him. In fact, none had expressed an attraction for him at all. He could only dream of having a woman he could go home to and beat the crap out of on days like he was currently experiencing.