“What are you doing?”
He lifted the shirt over his head, exposing a white T-shirt underneath it. “The band is shit. I mean, they sing the same lyric eight times in a row and call it a song. It’s pathetic.”
“Then why were you wearing the shirt?”
“I guess to send a message.”
“The message being?”
“I like shit music and need a pretentiously opinionated emo girl leaning against a rack of laxatives to help me with my taste.”
Dulcolax (see: terrible first impression) caught my eye the second I dared take a look behind my head. “Your taste in music should be the least of your worries,” I said, crossing my arms across my black sweater as if to declare the laxative display my territory. At least it wasn’t feminine products. That could have gotten awkward. “Prozac is the worst antidepressant on the market. I couldn’t fall asleep for days when I was on it.”
“Don’t forget the dizziness,” he added. “I tripped in the shower and about busted my head on the toilet. They don’t show you that on the commercials.”
“Nope. Not unless the sun was beaming through your window or you were on a bike.”
“Man,” he said, snapping his fingers. “The one time I don’t ride a bike in the shower.”
He was staring at me with a weirdly attractive grin on his face, and I felt like telling him to screw off. But there was a slight anger in his snarled mouth, like he disdained convention and flirty conversations and was only still talking to me because I looked ridiculous with MiraLAX poking up from behind my head.
“So, what are you on?” he asked.
“Zoloft.”
“Clinical? Obsessive? Panic?”
“Clinical.”
“Me too. Another thing we have in common.”
“We suck at life?”
“No. We aren’t ignorant.”
“That’s debatable.”
“Not really.” He reached into his pocket and whipped out a strand of red licorice. “Twizzler?” I shook my head. “You see, stupid people are happy with knowing nothing. The less they know, the better things seem. But smart people, geniuses, we see everything exactly for what it is. And then we take pills to make us stupid, because stupid is happy. Whatever the hell that is.”
“And which do you prefer, stranger?” I asked.
“My name’s Snake.”
“Snake?”
That was the most obscenely ambitious nickname I’d ever heard.
“Like the reptile. Yours?”
“Reggie.”
“That’s a dude’s name.”
“That’s a misogynistic assertion.”
“Fine.” He grinned, narrowing his eyes. “It’s unisex. And what do you mean, which do I prefer?”
“Being smart or being happy?”
A muffled voice echoed across the store. “Pickup for Regina Mason.”
“Regina?” Snake mocked. “What a prissy little name.”
“At least I’m not named after a slimy predator that sucks the life out of everyone it comes in contact with.” I pushed past him and snatched the folded bag from the pickup basket. I zipped the medication into my messenger bag and tossed exact change onto the counter.
“Leaving so soon?” Snake asked. Now that he was standing directly under the light, I could see the way his eyes were burrowed deep into his skull. How his full lips had a perfect model pout, like his whole mouth had gotten stuck on the kissy-face setting. His pretty face was too posh for his image.
“As fascinating as this conversation’s been, I’ve got to get home and eat dinner.”
“You should invite me over.”
“A dude named Snake with a pierced ear, a crap tattoo, and a fixation on violent screamo music? Yeah, not gonna happen.”
He shook his head as he ate another Twizzler. “Are you this mean to everyone you meet?”
“Only the special people,” I muttered.
As I was preparing to leave, he grabbed my arm. I was one security camera away from clocking him.
“I’ll see you around?” he asked, his tone strangely earnest.
I yanked my arm out of his grasp. Even though he was determined and forceful and weird, at least he wasn’t annoyingly exuberant. I had to give him brownie points for that.
“I’m not really around,” I said as I walked away.
My mother was waiting for me at the front doors with a bag in her hand. “I bought you anti-itch ointment just in case your fanny chafes again.” She smiled, proudly holding up a thin white tube. “And I picked you up a journal just in case you change your mind.”
“It better not have ducks.”
“Duck-free. Promise.”
She proceeded to babble on about birthday cards and half-price two-liters and a bunch of other irrelevant things I didn’t care about. We got in the minivan and rode away, listening to some girl group singing a ballad about the joy of the Lord.