Lies He Told Me

Chapter 1 Episode 1

On tiptoe, I lean over the metal shelf as far as I can. My fingertips clamp down on the cardboard box.As I move it to join the row of the other boxes, I mutter, “Sayonara, Honey Nut Cheerios.”

As usual, Ruben stashed another grocery item wherever the fancy struck him, as opposed to putting it,you know… where it actually freaking belongs.

It’s irritating as hell, but I have to admit that I get a little twisted spurt of pleasure when I find one ofthese misplaced loners.

I stand back to admire my handiwork. What was, just hours ago, a testament to losing faith in thegrocery industry—pollock and poppy seed bagels and spicy plantain chips and diapers all in such achaos that just looking at it raised my blood pressure—has now been transformed into somethingresembling order.

Say what you want about working retail grocery. The customers suck. The pay sucks. And, in my case—the evening shift, from three in the afternoon until closing time at eleven—the hours suck. But a jobis a job, and I like organizing things.

Who knows? Maybe I’ve found my calling.

My gaze wanders around, seeking out my next target. Although there’s no clock back here, and I don’tcarry my phone on me on purpose, I still know I’ve got at least a couple hours left.

I locate my next project quickly enough: stray rice bags, strewn in several corners. Huh, I hadn’t evennoticed before. Then again, I can get single-minded in my focus like that.

That’s what I like about this job, actually. Losing myself in the stocking and restocking—themindlessness of perfecting each item’s placement. Getting in the flow—just how I do with painting,weirdly enough.

For a few hours, I don’t have to be Joy Smith. I don’t have to be anyone. I don’t have to deal with allthe problems waiting at home. I don’t even have to think about them. I just get to be here, now, doingwhat I’m doing. Nothing more, nothing less.

I hustle over and grab my first ten-pound Basmati bag, which is way heavier than it should be.

As I wheeze under its weight, the sound system creaks on.

I pause, expecting Ruben’s stoner drawl: Would the owner of the black Toyota Prius please movetheir car? I repeat, would the owner of the black Toyota Prius please move their car to allowaccess for our delivery truck?

That was another stroke of brilliance from Johnny the owner—constructing a pint-sized parking spaceright where the delivery truck needed to go. He’s so cheap that he refuses to pay or lease out extraparking.

Instead of Ruben over the loudspeaker, though, there’s music: “Joy to the World, the Lord has come…”

What the heck? Normally, Johnny and Ruben are too lazy to turn on music at all, Christmas orotherwise. And it’s definitely not Christmas.

Then, I hear the swish of the door flap behind me, and I understand.

These days, I can feel Ruben before I even see him. A slinking presence. A tense up your back, ashiver around your rib cage. And that smell—like Axe designed a weed-scented body spray.

If Ruben was anyone else, I’d laugh. If Ruben was anyone else, maybe putting that song on would befunny, or cute, or at least worth offering a forced smile at the very least. Even if people have beenmessing with me about my name since before I even fully grasped the humor.

Teachers: Oh, it will a ‘joy’ having you in my class, I’m sure!

Employers: Joy, cheer up—it’s your name, remember?

Even my mom does it: You’re my pride and joy, you know that, sweetie?

But this is not anyone else. This is Ruben. Staring-Too-Long, Standing-Too-Close, Saying-All-The-Wrong-Things Ruben.

I keep my face neutral, give him a glance. “Sure. Some song.”

Go away. Go away. Please, please, go away

“You can smile you know.” He sure is. “You know you want to.”

No, what I want to do—what I really want to do—is take the potato chip bag behind Ruben, rip itopen and dump it on his stupid head, then mash the bag in further so he gets the message. What I wantis for you to leave me the eff alone.

Ruben leans back on the shelf, still eyeing me. “Ah, the two of us at Briarwood High and now here.Who woulda thought?”

Not me, for one. Back then, Ruben was the kind of stoner who wrote “nyce a$$” on Jessica Wallen’sgraduation silhouette, while I was happy at my part-time Wendy’s job.

“Must’ve been fate.” Unfortunately for me, he’s still talking. “You worked at Wendy’s before, right?What happened there?” he asks when I don’t give him anything in response.

“Family stuff,” I say, and leave it at that.

No way am I going to spill the whole manager-changed-and-the-new-one-wouldn’t-give-me-time-off-when-my-mom-got-pneumonia sob story. He wouldn’t care, and I decided long ago to stopfeeling sorry for myself about the bad break after bad break that comprises my life.

Ruben nods sagely. “Yep, family’s the best thing in the world.”

As if he doesn’t spend most of his energy—when he’s not getting stoned, crappily covering the scentwith Axe spray, then lying to his dad about it—bitching about his own family.

“Yeah, I should probably get on with these rice bags.” I go over and continue hauling away.

“All right. I can just hang here, though. Don’t mind me.”

As much as I wish, there’s no way for me to nicely tell Ruben to screw off and stop staring at my ass.That’s what you get when you work with the boss’ son—and the boss is as much of a dumbass as hislittle progeny.

Case in point: after over a month, Johnny is still on a maniacal crusade to find the source of therandom blunts and wafts of pot, even though his own son is standing red-eyed and giggling about thename ‘Hubba-Bubba’ right in front of him.

Then, even though I have yet to see Ruben doing any actual work, his dad bought it hook, line, andsinker, when he claimed the new and improved cash shelves (my work of a couple grueling days)were done by him.

I hear the swish of a door and some movement. Footsteps—probably Ruben’s, moving in an effort tolook like he’s doing something useful as opposed to not-a-f*****g-thing, which is more of his usualstyle.

Then, Johnny’s voice grumbles out. “All right, kids, I’m off. Remember to cash out the tills, and noleaving early.” Johnny’s out the door with a thrown wave. Suddenly, his head pokes back out. “Now,you stay out of trouble.”

I resist the urge to roll my eyes.

God knows what Ruben told his dad about me—how he twisted the ‘girl with the secondhand clotheswho didn’t talk to anyone’ from high school into a bad-news she-devil—but whatever he did say,Johnny periodically gives me the evil eye and right now, he is looking at me like he meant the last partfor my ears in particular. You stay out of trouble. As if it’s ever my fault, the trouble I end up in.

Johnny is the worst. But him being gone is not much better. As soon as the door closes behind him, thebuzzing starts up in my chest. Dammit. Even if Johnny is a fatter version of Ruben, with a temper likethe Tasmanian Devil, having him around is safer for me than the alternative

As soon as he’s gone, I can feel it: the air in the stockroom has changed, warped somehow. It’selectric with possibility, mostly the bad kind.

Maybe Ruben is mulling over how to top his latest top creepazoid comments—such winners as: “Hellyeah, girl, you look good putting up that pasta”; “Dayum, if I looked as smokin’ in our uniform as you…,”; “Just us—isn’t that nice?”

Again—cue: barf. I would rather eat my own elbow than be alone with him, let alone actually doanything with him like he’s constantly suggesting.

A puff of something familiar-smelling hits my nostrils. Yep, surprise, surprise—Daddy’s barely tenseconds out the door and Ruben is lighting up.

“Want some?” he drawls from the far corner of the storeroom.

“I’m good, thanks. And we’re not really allowed.”

“Whoa there, Mother Teresa. I was just offering. No need to go all narc-dog on me.”

I roll my eyes. And you are just plain stupid, since your dad could be back any second now.

My fingers dig into the rice bag. Being here at all would make me an accessory to the crime in BigBad Boss Johnny’s squinty eyes.

“I’m going to go to the bathroom.” I head for the bathroom at a jog. The smell of m*******a is strongnow. My eyes are watering.

I’m halfway across the floor when the back door swings open.

“What in the hell?” Johnny roars.

Oh, s**t. We’re in for it now.

I close my eyes, savoring the last of the calm before the storm. The three of us are packed intoJohnny’s cupboard-sized office which stinks of feet. Johnny’s face is as red as the ever-present Cokecan on his desk.

Ruben is squinting around in a daze, like this is just some majorly bad trip.

Johnny waves the smoldering joint in Ruben’s face, although his eyes are still stuck on me. “Explain.”