There were a handful of cars in the icy parking lot that night. As many as one might expect at two in the morning. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted to try a spinning a few donuts on my way to a parking space, but the security vehicle was there near the entrance with its usual yellow lights blinking and bouncing off the walls and windows, so I pulled into a spot near the door and headed inside.
And there was no greeter. That should have been my first clue that something was not right, but then really, how many 70 year-old people do you expect to run into at that hour of the night? It was late, and the quiet of the store didn't seem out of place at all. I grabbed a cart, even though I had no idea what I might buy that I couldn't just carry, and pushed it noisily through those theft detectors. As I passed the pastry display, I tossed a few boxes of sugar cookies and two loaves of bread into my cart. I didn't really need the carbs, but I had nothing better to do, so I added a head of lettuce, an artichoke, and a watermelon that must have made quite the trip to be this fresh in such wintery climes to my cart. Maybe I'd buy it all, maybe I'd just end up putting it back, or maybe I'd just leave it all in the cart in the cereal aisle and walk away as I pretend to search for some other grocery I just can't find. I didn't know, I didn't care.
The aisles were a maze of half emptied cardboard boxes. The night shift seemed busy restocking the shelves, or they had been at some point, but now they all seemed to have gone on break. Abandoned hand carts and dollies were all I found as I made my way through frozen foods and soup and added a few cans of cream of corn to the mix that was my cart.
And that was when it hit me: Hershey's Chocolate Sauce. Literally, right on my head. Fell off of a high shelf, I guess. It didn't hurt, but it nearly scared the pepto right out of me, and it was as my scream disappeared into the lifeless aisles that I first noticed something wasn't right. No one came to help. If anyone was nearby, they didn't even seem to take notice. As I listened to the silence that had fallen around me, I suddenly felt very alone. Not a sound was returned to me, save for the ceaseless buzz of the halogen lights above and the low whistle of the freezers nearby.
"Um...hello?" I called. I felt kind of silly, and I totally expected a worker or another insomniac shopper to pop out from the next aisle over and see what I needed. But no answer came, and that was when it hit me figuratively: I was the only one there.
"Forget this," I said to myself as I ditched my half-full cart and began to jog toward the main aisle. I rounded the corner and would have sprinted for the door, but something caught my eye and I had to pause...
"Candy Cane Oreos? They have those?" I'd never heard of such a thing, but I'd been a huge fan of the chocolate covered mint Oreos, and....
And that's as far as that thought went, because at that moment, everything erupted. There was this crashing, like shelves being knocked to the ground, the shatter of glass, the squeak of toys. Then across the store in Children's Clothes, entire racks of clothing began flying through the air, then the Women's Clothing section, then the far end of the Men's, and I would have turned to run for Clyde, but in that moment, I heard him coming. I turned up toward the aisle and there he was, barreling toward me with an empty cart, his gaze focused on the nearing flying clothes.
"Hey!" I shouted, and he saw me, but it wasn't quick enough. I jumped all of a few inches before the cart ran into me, and I fell into the empty basket, hit my head, and the next thing I knew, I was lying on the ground in the appliances aisle in the Sam's Club next door. And all was quiet again.
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