Careful as she had become in what she spent, she picked up the edition, looking for the price. Nothing appeared on the back cover nor on the inside front flap. There was an odd-looking UPC symbol printed on the back, again in black ink. Emma figured that the price would come up on the scanner at checkout. It could not cost that much, the book was so thin. She threw it in the child seat in the front of the cart.
Emma found the shortest line and quickly moved to where she could begin to unload her items behind the plastic bar that acted as a barrier between her purchases and the customer in front of her. The black conveyer belt moved steadily forward toward the cashier and within minutes, it was Emma’s turn to be rung up. The cashier was a long-time veteran of this task, who rapidly scanned
