Happy Halloween means a Slutty Strawberry Short Cake, a customer drenched in blood, and my conversation about how we forgot that Kobe Bryant is a rapist

She is vile, twisted, and demonic, and not a thing at all like you thought she was going to be. 

She is a slutty Strawberry Short Cake for Halloween.

The assistant manager makes lurid comments about her outfit to you.  He says things like, "I sure would like to take a bite out of that pie."

You tell him you are confused.  You tell him that strawberry short cake is not pie.  The assistant manager then says things about Strawberry Short Cake's bosoms.  "Her cleavage looks tasty."  He says.  He also tells her, "The boys aren't going to be looking at your face today." When she asks if she is wearing too much make up.

She is not used to wearing a dress.  Her bosoms are exposed to you every time she bends over to package up groceries.  She does not remember to cover herself so at least 3/4 of her breasts get exposed.  You do not see nipple.

She curtsies and twirls around in her dress like a six year old ballerina does.  She is trying to fool you.  She is trying to tell you that she is just trying out the devil temptress persona.  Just to see what it feels like.  She is not serious about it.

"How can you be serious in green and white stockings?"  She asks.

She fusses with her new skirt. She is a kid playing grown up.  She smooths the fabric.  She is tying the ribbons on the front of her dress.

Then she tells you about all the hearts she breaks of the boys she knows.  You know these boys too.  And you know that she is telling the truth.  She is also telling the truth when she says that the one heart she can't break is the one boy who always breaks her heart.

You agree.  And then you tell her that she is heartless and mean to all those boys.  And then because you have talked too long about her you tell her that, "she can't break your heart."

She looks like she is going to cry.

"Are you serious?" She asks.  "Am I really that mean?"

"No."  You try and reassure her.

"I was just kidding."  You tell her.

And she turns her head  and maybe she wipes some moisture from her eye.  And you respect that little movement away from you.  You respect that she is going to keep that all inside her.  She is not going to burden you with the knowledge that something you said may have hurt her.

And then maybe it is your heart that begins to break.

"It makes me want to read more." 

Her words manage to break up your thoughts for a moment.

She has read a few of the things that you have given her to read.  But you know she is lying about wanting to read more.  She is not very interested in what you write.

"Oh?"  You sound surprised and you tug a bit at your ear.  You have tugged at it all day, and now whenever you look at it in the mirror it appears red like it was infected.  But you are not running a fever, so you don't think you have an infection.

Slutty Strawberry Short Cake should not be trusted with children, small pets, or the elderly.  She is a liar.  She sleeps with boys.  She plays with your affection.  She is always asking for favors from you.  When she asks for favors she wiggles her face a bit and she leans into.  You can get a good look at her bosoms when she does this.  She catches you peaking all the time so she thinks she has you.

You would like to write, "and suddenly it did not matter anymore what she thought," but you cannot.

"When did people forget that Kobe Bryant was a rapist?"

You like to ask random questions like this.  Which aren't really random questions to you, because questions like this are always running in the background whenever you talk to anyone.

"I am not... sure."  She pauses and then she asks "Is he?"

"Yes." you answer.  "Basically, at least."

"I mean he admitted to something.  He admitted to rough sex, or to keeping her against her will.  He admitted something.  And then he paid her a lot of money.  And then he bought his wife a 2 million dollar ring." 

You get interrupted by a customer who provides you with fodder for your next rule that all customers should follow.

The customer is bleeding from the mouth.  He has a large wad of toilet paper pressed to his gums.  The paper is bleeding through and is quite red.

"I am going to make a rule."  You think to yourself. "I am going to make a rule that says that all my customers should stop their bleeding before they enter my line."

You are proud of yourself.  This sounds like a common sense rule if you have ever heard of one.

You have done some strange things in your life.  But you cannot fathom why the old man is bleeding from the mouth, yet seems so intent on purchasing 3 lemons, a candy bar, and six cans of soup.  It seems to you that this purchase could have been put off.

The customer wants to hand you his club card for you to scan. You head the customer off at the pass, by picking up your wand at scanning the card without touching him or it.

The customer tells you that he thinks "Kobe Bryant had to do some kind of community service."  He has to remove the wad of tissue from his mouth in order to communicate this idea to you.

"You can go to jail for 2 years for ripping the heads of chickens."  You tell the the line of customers that stand around your check stand.  "But you can rape a chick and only get community service."

You shake your head at this and look down back at the scanner and into the beam of red laser light that shines at your eyeballs.  The beam momentarily blinds you and all you can hear is the clicking and beeping of the register as you scan the purchases.

The folks in line are starting to get a bit uncomfortable with where this is all going.

"The next thing you know Kobe is back to starring in commercial for McDonald's. "  You tell the customer who mops a bit of blood from his chin.

You take his receipt and hand it over to him.

Then you hunt for the anti-bacterial lotion that sits under the counter.  You turn your back and splash a bit on you.  You hope no one notices that you needed to use anti-biotic medicine to dislodge the AIDS virus from the packages you were forced to touch by the bleeding customer.

You can't explain why you feel sorry for the old man and his bleeding from the mouth.  You are just super sensitive you guess.  You can imagine his private pain, the embarrassment that the old man would feel if the customers behind him saw that the clerk needed to disinfect his hands after he left.

You hid the disinfecting from the others without thinking about it.  You are always thinking about people like this, putting them ahead of you by anticipating their needs.  You hate when people feel the need to ask something from you.  They should know that you have figured it out already.

You think people should try to read other people's minds more.