Page 3 of Savage

The grocery store was too small for how big the area was becoming. But instead of building onto the one that was there, it was left and a new larger one was put in the other end of town. The older people in the town didn’t care all that much for the new place and were loyal to the smaller one. It worked out well for everyone.

Once things started rolling along in a nice way, the library asked for computers from the county. While they could very well afford to put computers in every house in the city, they said that they’d go half on them with the city. For every dollar they earned, they’d match it. Brenin was good at giving suggestions on how to raise money, so he would be found at all the meetings about the program, and in the end, they were able to purchase eight new computers as well as printers to go with them. Everyone was happy, and so were they. It was a good way to start things off, he thought, since they’d been so behind before.

Things were moving along nicely, and they couldn’t be happier. None of them dated all that much but would, outside the limits of the town, go and find someone to have a nice dinner with. Savage, for all his good looks and lack of charm, stayed home most nights, and that seemed to be fine with him. He only hoped that someday someone would come along and show him what it was like to be loved. If any of them deserved it, it would be his young cousin.

Chapter 2

Twenty-eight years later.

Kaida watched as the product went down the line. It would mean that until the next set of stores were added into the night, she’d be finished to clean up her mod. It wasn’t really a mess, she usually cleaned as she made her way down the product line, but there were still bits and pieces that needed to be picked up that she’d dropped.

They’d send her the labels about an hour after she was finished putting the first set—one on each of the products that she had in her mod. The last batch had her putting a single label on over seventy-three ramen noodle boxes as well as a lot of other things that she had. Mostly, the noodles, but there were things like cases of green beans, peas, and corn. Once, she had a mod full of Christmas paper and that had been several hundred of the labels with a single one to be put on each box.

“Hey, K.” She hated the shortened version of her name and ignored the man calling her that. “K? Are you finished with your stores? I need some help.”

She turned and looked at him with the powdered donut left overs on his shirt. Mac, his name illuded her for now because she didn’t particularly care for the man. His smiled creeped her out a bit, too. Like he was leering at her or something.

“Kaida. My name is Kaida.” He told her that was his pet name for her. “It’s still Kaida. Not K. or whatever other shortened form of it you come up with. Also, I’m not a pet for you but a woman who has a first name that you can’t seem to remember.”

“Whatever. I’m behind. Can you come up and—” She was shaking her head before he was able to finish. “I know, I know, you’re not supposed to help me out, but I’m going to lose my job if you—”

“The last time I helped you, you’d not even started on your labels. How many are you behind now that you need help.” He told her that he was counting on her to help him, so he’d waited on her. “I’m not going to help you, Mac. Your job is to get your labels out, and if you don’t do it, they’re going to fire you. I’m finished because I don’t screw around waiting for someone to come along and do it for me. Unlike you, I don’t take a break from working until it’s time to go.”

“Come on. We’re friends, and friends do things for one another.” She began cleaning up her mod and ignored him. He was a lazy fucker and thought he should have been fired a year ago. “Just this one time. I’ll be better at getting some out next time you help me.”

“No.” Grabbing her broom, she was startled when it was jerked from her hands and hit with it. “What do you think you’re doing? Get away from me. Stop before you hurt me.”

The next thing she knew, she was waking up in the back of an ambulance. Even then, she didn’t know what had happened. She sat up and looked at all the blood that seemed to be all over her. Looking at the woman who was sitting talking to someone beyond them, she asked what had happened.

“What canyoutell me about what had happened?” Kaida replied what had happened right up until waking up a few minutes ago. Just then, realizing that the woman was a cop not a medic. “I have a different version of that from the man who accused you of hitting him.”

“Did you look at the security tapes?” She told her the company was getting them for her now. “Mac has been told before that he can’t beat people into submission to helping him. They put him on my mod because the cameras were set up there after the last time he hit someone. He nearly killed the last person.”

“Like I’m supposed to rely on your word that you were the victim. So get this, on your word alone, I’m going to allow them to take you to the—”

“Margaret? What the hell are you doing interviewing my victim?” She told the man, whom she couldn’t see, that she wasn’t a victim but a perpetrator. “That’s not for you to say. This is mine and—why hasn’t she been sent to the hospital yet? She needs stitches, for Christ sake. Get your ass out of there and let them get her some medical attention.”

In a lot less time than she could count, not only was she being taken away, but there was an IV in her arm and a blood pressure cuff on her other arm. Also, before she could ask for something for pain, her body began to need something more than the aspirin she’d taken an hour before work this morning, she was given enough to take the edge off, they told her.

When she was being unloaded from the ambulance, one of the medics was telling her where she was hurt. Every time he listed a place, it began to hurt badly. Especially the ones on her face. Even her eyes felt like Mac had tired to remove them with her broom.

She didn’t know what was going on for the first hour or so she was there. Her body hurt, and it felt to her like every question started with her doing something wrong. The little shit had better lose his job after this, or she was going to quit. Kaida had been at the warehouse since before it had opened, helping get the shelves hung correctly and the computer system set up in a way that when it did open, every person working would have not just a badge that would clock them in and out but one that would help them with the flow of their jobs too. Just as it had been told to her, it would.

In the last ten years, she’d seen a lot of people come and go. Especially the management. They thought that with a place as large as it was, fifty-six thousand square foot, they could hide out and do things that were better left at home. Or their car.

She especially loved the rule that there was no smoking on the job. No vaping, either. The place didn’t have the terrible smell of cigarettes to the things. It did, however, sometimes in the summer have a very strong smell of body odor when the breeze from the large fans were working. Sometimes, that alone would make her wish she could hand out the little containers of deodorant to the employees rather than not being able to tell them that they stank.

“Ms. Loren?” She’d only just gotten back from an x-ray when there was another person in her room. She told him that it was her, but she wasn’t feeling up to answering any more questions right now. “I understand. I do. But I need this one question answered. It’s for insurance. Did the management know that Donald MacKenize was a problem before transferring him to your mod?”

“Yes. That’s why they put him on my mod. So that when he got behind, I could catch him up. After that, he started waiting for me to put his labels on the product to be sent out. I told them several times that he’s been in trouble three other times that I know of for beating up a worker and that I wanted double pay if I had to do his work in addition to mine. They thought I was funning them. Do I look like a person with much of a sense of humor? I’m not.” She closed her eyes and laid back on her bed. “I’m really beaten up here, buddy. I’m off tomorrow, but I have to work the day after, so if you’d not mind, I’d like some rest time before my next shift comes up.”

“How long have you worked there?” There was something about his voice that had her resting better than with the sound of hospital workings. After telling him how long, he laughed. “What is your employee number, if you don’t mind me asking.”

“Two. It should have been one, but that number was taken when the equipment I was testing failed to print my picture. I’m the only one, other than the big boss, that is still left.” She yawned and heard him chuckle again. “Go away, will you? I have to get stitches soon, and I want this to last. I’ve never felt this relaxed since I was born, I don’t think?”

Another chuckle and she didn’t have the energy to look up to see what he was laughing at. She couldn’t even see him all that well because of the bandages on her eyes and face. He must have been a loon. No one ever thought that she was funny even when she had the jokes explained to her. After another laugh, she was out.

Kaida was being shaken awake sometime later. The room was semi dark and the sounds were different. Asking whomever was in her room what they were doing, she was told that they were getting her blood pressure. She wanted to tell them to be more quiet but she was awake now so it matteredlittle. She asked the woman the time.

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