Page 11 of Heathen

"You didn't need to stay home with her again?" I ask, although I'm grateful she's here for her shift because I just don't have it in me to work another double shift today.

"She's with my mom," she explains. "She came home early from her vacation to watch her so I didn't have to miss another shift."

"Vacation," I muse with a smile. "I wonder what that's like."

She huffs. "Seriously, but I wouldn't call chasing after a boyfriend who took off to California a vacation. Those are Mom's words, not mine."

"Well, hopefully, Ginny feels better soon. I'm going to finish breaking down that canned good display and then I'm off."

Rachel scrunched her nose. "Didn't Mr. Gillis just have you build that the other day?"

"Yep," I say, trying my best not to sound frustrated.

This isn't my business, and no matter how differently I'd do things if it were, I'm not the one who gets to make decisions about it.

"He said it looks weird now that people are buying the items," I explain.

"So you'll break it down and put the products back in the storage room where no one can buy or see them except for their tiny slot on the shelves?"

I pull in a deep, frustrated breath. "Exactly."

"Why not just reconfigure it to accommodate the lower product count?"

"That's a great idea," I tell her with no enthusiasm. "Let me know what he says when you suggest it."

Laughter bubbles out of her throat as she shakes her head. "Not a chance. I need this job."

"Same," I quickly agree. "Have a good shift."

I run to the restroom quickly because I've been at the register for the last several hours without a break. On my way out of the back, I grab the cart to remove the canned goods, already not looking forward to the ache moving so many cans is going to cause in my back.

I've got only half of them down and stacked onto the cart when the tinkle of feminine voices rounding the aisle meets my ears, making me look up.

Although there are two new faces, I recognize the small group of Russian women, including the same one I spoke with mere days ago.

Instead of smiling at me as she has done in the past, she frowns as if already annoyed that she'll have to deal with me again today.

"Good afternoon, ladies," I say as I place a can on the cart and approach them before they can walk away as if they didn't see me standing there. "Where's Alena?"

Several of the women look at each other rather than looking at me.

"Where. Is. Alena?" I ask again, breaking the question down even though I know the one looking right at me has spoken English before.

She mutters something in Russian before leading the group of women away.

Frustration grows thick inside of me, and I know how ridiculous that is. I don't even know Alena's last name, but I do know she has always been kind to me. She had been coming to this grocery store twice a week for months before suddenly she was no longer around. It concerns me.

I finish loading the cart and sweep up the floor where the display was before pushing the cart back to the storage room and stacking the cans on the shelf to clear the cart. We only have one stocking cart in this entire store, and I know someone will probably need it later.

I clock out and pull my apron off over my head, waving at Rachel who is checking out another elderly woman as I leave the store.

The heat hits me the second I walk outside. The weather in Vegas is temperamental at best. We wake up to temperatures in the fifties and sixties, and by midafternoon we're inching upto the upper eighties. It feels sweltering after being in the back room of the store.

I swipe my arm across my forehead, as I walk to my car.

I'll be the first person to tell people that I have no life. My one friend, Morgan, gives me a hard time about it all the time. I don't know why I skipped the whole go-out-and-party part of my early twenties, but now at twenty-six, I just have no desire to spend my hard-earned money on drinks and partying.

Morgan assures me that a short dress and a quick smile will have men falling at my feet to buy all the drinks I could ever consume, but I hate the expectations that men have once they've dropped a ten-dollar bill on the bar top, as if a drink is worth a night rolling around in hotel sheets.

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