The Gum Thief - Douglas Coupland [12]
I like the fact that I’m invisible to my co-workers.
Strike that.
It kills me that I’m invisible to them. The fact that they don’t see me means that I’m truly old, and it’s hard to grow old in a place—a city—where everything is so young. Being old means no sex. Being old means never being flirted with. Being old means that Shawn and Kelli make spooked eyes at each other when I come in from my smoke break and grunt a hello in their direction.
Psycho!
I miss sex. Once upon a time I could take off my shirt and walk down by the beach carrying a Frisbee and there wasn’t a girl there I couldn’t confidently chat up. That was my prop, by the way, the Frisbee. Couldn’t toss one worth a damn, but people see you holding one of those things and in their minds you’re suddenly this well-balanced person who’s never had gonorrhea or police issues—and you can probably summon a well-groomed, cheerfully dispositioned golden Lab with a single whistle.
Last month I plotted out how I’d win the attention of these junior shits here who speak and think like chimps. I was going to work my butt off, totally kiss ass with the regional boss and thus win Employee of the Month. Imagine the no-hopers coming in and seeing my picture on the little wall plaque. Dear God, it might actually give them hope. Hey! If Roger can do it, then I can do it!
I don’t know why I work here in hell at Staples and not someplace else. Bethany here is confronting me on this issue, and I don’t know what to say. I’ve had so many real- world jobs—in offices where people have their own parking spaces, and where biweekly meetings are held, and where they have Christmas parties. I drank my way out of all of them. Pre-Internet, I could get away with it. These days, if you type “lush” into Google, I would likely be the first hit.
Fucking Internet. I can’t even move to someplace remote where they still speak English, like Tasmania or South Africa. They’ll know my dirt.
They.
So until I figure out an escape clause, it’s Staples for me. It’s okay in its own way. It demands little of me and I demand little of it. I like being rude to customers. I like starting to serve them and then vanishing for a smoke break for fifteen minutes. They always ask for the supervisor, Clive, but Clive knows that I’m here for a longer haul than the younger workers, so he doesn’t discipline me. Even on the days where I get hosed on vodka and stack cartons of twenty-pound bond all day, not a shred of discipline. Hah!
Discipline me.
Master! Master! Beat me!
I’m an adult. Discipline me and I’ll bury you alive.
Roger as Bethany
I’m Bethany.
Did you find everything you were looking for today?
That’s this dorky phrase I have to say every time I ring in a sale, even to kids. It’d be great, for once, if somebody looked me in the eye and said, “Well, I wrote the word ‘Fuck’ on a piece of paper in the felt pen section, and then I drew an anarchy symbol, and then I stopped thinking or breathing or anything, and I had this experience where time stopped and I wasn’t on this planet any more—like I was sucked out of myself—and I didn’t have to care about the world or people or pollution, and instead all I had to do was be in awe of the stars and the colours and the effort that went into making the universe safe and warm like a womb. And then I snapped out of it and I was staring at the Crayola boutique and the moment was gone. After that, I walked around the aisles like I’d been clubbed. I was going to steal the felt pens instead of paying for them, but I’ll steal them some other day. Right now I’m still in the afterglow of experiencing the universe. And you ask me, did I find everything I was looking for today?”
I have to wear this red shirt at work. We all do. It’s like scientists got together and selected the one colour from all the known colours in the universe that makes everybody’s skin look bad. In any other shirt, I look white as a ghost. When I put one of these things on, my skin pinks up like a strawberry milkshake—my mouth is a black olive.
Shtooples lighting was