True Porn Clerk Stories - Ali Davis [41]
That made him unusual, but that wasn't why I learned his name early on: Mr. Cheekbones was a pain in the ass who I magically turned into a regular.
Mr. Cheekbones liked to prepay for his movies, which we usually don't do. It's not a huge deal, but it does require a special entry in the register and printing out a receipt to put in your drop at the end of the night. Now I could do it while blindfolded, shackled, and under the influence of a horse tranquilizer, but when I first started clerking prepayments were a pain. The prepayment itself bugged me, and then the fact that Mr. Cheekbones always mentioned his prepayment just after I'd checked out his movies and cleared my screen bugged me too. I'd have to ask for his account number again and it threw off my rhythm and now it seems like a very petty thing to be irritated with at all, but I think when I started I was an angrier clerk, or at least a more resentful one. (I wonder if that means I've learned an important life lesson or if I've simply given myself over to despair.)
So I'd get annoyed when I'd see Mr. Cheekbones coming and he'd sense my distaste and be annoyed right back. We didn't like each other, and we kept not liking each other for a week or two.
Then one night he bopped up to the counter and chose David's register instead of mine. David was an even newer clerk than I was, so I gave him a friendly warning.
"That's Mr. Cheekbones," I said, "He likes to prepay."
And suddenly Mr. Cheekbones broke into a huge grin. He was a regular. I knew his face, his name and his preferences. A regular.
After that, we were buddies. We joked at the register, and talked, however briefly, about movies. One night he was checking out new tapes and I told him that the tapes he'd checked out before were due that day. He raced home, swearing he'd be back before we closed. I said he was never going to make it, but he stunned us all by doing it. He made it back to the store, sweating and wheeling his bike, with just minutes to spare. I clapped when I saw him coming.
He also had a pride about the way he paid: bills, not change. Once -- only once -- he had to pay for a movie with a handful of quarters and dimes, and he was furious with himself. It wasn't a big deal -- we don't mind taking change for a $2.10 charge -- but he kept saying, over and over, "You know me. I don't pay with change. You know me. I'm not the kind of guy who pays with change." He never did again, or at least not with me.
But we'd been seeing less and less of him for a while, and he wasn't looking too good. He didn't bop, he didn't chat, and he leaned on the counter like he was exhausted.
Once he came in with an awfully small dressing over a wound. Casey and I both thought it looked like he'd been shot. We're no experts, but still.
I don't know what happened, but somewhere in there he got his account cancelled. There's an outstanding charge of about $180 on his account, which usually means someone checked out movies and never brought them back.
Somewhere in there his life took a slide, and I hope he can make it back.
Wherever he is, I hope he has his headphones on.
My Day in Court
This is my own fault. I slacked off on updating (general business and some actual freelance work came up) and now I have to write about the many things that have happened with the curse of perspective. I'll try to stave it off as best I can.
Thursday the 14th was my court date for the whacker. We had to be there a little before 9:00. Megan, my manager, was nice enough to pick me up and drive me there. I hadn't had quite enough sleep the night before and I barreled out of the apartment having remembered to do everything but eat breakfast, so I nearly wept for joy when I discovered that Megan had also been nice enough to pick me up some orange juice and a blueberry muffin. Empathy: the hallmark of an excellent manager.
We actually had a pretty good time. Megan had a mix CD playing, and while we