“Okay,” said Jess cheerily, before wandering off in one of the gleeful dazes that Kath hated so much. Sometimes Kath was sure the girl was just out to annoy her.
Like the way she always calls me Kathleen. If it wasn’t so ridiculously hard to fire people these days, that girl would have gotten her marching orders long ago.
Jess reached the store’s main entrance with a skipping hop and her complexion became ghostly as she entered the pulsing green hue of the glowing Fire Exit sign.
Kath cleared her throat. “Well? What are you waiting for, girl?”
Jess pushed open the door and exposed the stark white night outside. Immediately a chill entered the building, rushing quickly to all corners like a horde of fleeing rats. Kath waited impatiently as Jess popped her head out of the door and looked left and right, then left and right again, before finally stepping back and pulling closed door. When the girl turned back around to face Kath, her company-supplied fleece was peppered with snow.
“The weather out there is craaaaaazeee!” said Jess. “With a capitol zee”
Kath sighed at the girl’s childish tone. “What about the lights? Are anybody else’s on? What about The Trumpet across the road?”
“No,” Jess replied. “I can’t even see the pub it’s so dark. I can’t make out Blue Rays Video Rentals or any of the other shops either.”
“Wonderful!” Kath shook her head and felt a migraine coming on. If the whole area was out then she would be forced to sit and wait for the electricity company to get off their overpaid behinds and do something about it.
…and God only knows how long that will take. Two minutes? Two hours?
Either way, until she could cash up Kath couldn’t set the alarms and go home. Not that she had plans, besides catching up on the episodes of Eastenders she’d recorded, but staying at a dingy council-estate mini-mart on the coldest night of the year wasn’t her idea of fun.
How did my life turn out so wrong? To think I spent four years at university… I make one little mistake and I’m condemned to a life of pointless mediocrity. Kath breathed in deeply then let the cold air out through her nostrils. What a wretched waste of intellect!
“It’ll be back on in a jiffy,” said Jess, still standing by the fire exit. “It never takes long, Kathleen. Tell you what, I’ll take a little walk over to the pub and see if anyone knows anything, okay?”
Without pausing for an answer, Jess slid out through the exit and was immediately swallowed by the shifting snow and darkness. A second later it was as if the girl had never even been there.
Kath sighed, leaned back into the torn-padding of the cashier-desk stool, and rubbed at her aching forehead. Shivers ran up and down her spine and made her think about the store’s heating. With the power off, so too would be the store’s electric fan heaters. It was Britain’s worst winter in history and she was stuck in a building with no warmth.
Just gets better! Probably why the power went off in the first place. All those lazy slobs, cosy at home in front of their fan-heater, over-taxing the grid while people like me, who have shown some commitment to work, suffer.
Well screw this, Kath decided. She’d give her manager, Mr Campbell, a call and see if there was any chance he’d allow her to cash up in the morning. She slid her fingertips along the icy surface of the shop’s counter and searched for the phone, but at first found only a stapler and some biros. Eventually the side of her hand found what it was looking for; knocking the receiver from its cradle and off of the desk. It swung on its coiled cord, jerking up and down like a bungee. After a couple of swipes at knee-level, Kath caught the handset and pulled it up to her ear. She tapped at the buttons on the phone’s cradle, waited a beat, and then tapped them some more. No dial tone. Perturbed, she placed the handset back down onto its cradle, before picking it up and trying to ring out once more.
Nothing.
“Please, for the love of God!” Kath patted down the pockets of her work shirt and located her mobile phone. She plucked it out and slid up the illuminated screen to expose the keypad. Then, from memory, she entered Mr Campbell’s number and pressed the green CALL button. She put the phone to her ear and waited.
Ten seconds passed and Kath pulled the phone away from her head to look at the display. She could barely contain her frustration when she saw NO NETWORK COVERAGE scrolled across the top of the screen.
For crying out loud. What the hell is going on tonight?
Before she could put her next thoughts in order, Kath was interrupted by a voice in the darkness. It was male. “Ms Hollister?”
The voice had a Polish twang and there was only one person at the supermarket that ever called her by surname. “Peter,” she said, more calmly than she felt. “Have you checked the fuses?”
“Yes, Ms Hollister. I need show something to you. Come.”
Speak properly, for God’s sake. If you’re going to come here then at least learn the language. And show me what exactly? Bah, I’m never going to get home at this rate!
Reluctant, Kath followed the boy down to the back of the store, ducking through the strips of clear plastic that separated the cramped warehouse from the shop floor.
“So, what is it that’s so important, Peter?”
“One moment, Ms Hollister. I will show to you.”
Peter turned a corner in the cramped warehouse and Kath stayed close behind him, lighting the way with her mobile phone. It didn’t work particularly well, but at least it illuminated the piles of over-stacked boxes she would’ve otherwise bumped into.
Kath was getting impatient. “Come on now, I’ve got to find a way to call Mr Campbell so we can all go home tonight. Unless you want to spend the night sleeping in the staff room?”