Page 44 of Show Me How to Heal
My hipster-hippie was a little social butterfly, and it was absolutely stunning to see him in his element. I mean, I’d watched a few of his YouTube videos, and his passion for his job was awe inspiring by itself, but seeing him with customers added another layer.
I chatted a little with Mel — who told me she expected me to meet up with Corbyn, Raphael, and her at The Bar next Friday — while ringing up her extensive purchase. Damn, she hadn’t been kidding when she told me she’d stock up whenever she could.
At seven pm, Zayne finally shut the door behind the last customer — a full hour later than we were supposed to be open.
“Damn,” he sighed contentedly. As he turned around, his face showed utter exhaustion and pure happiness at the same time. His eyes were sparkling, and he had a wide smile on his lips. “That was… unbelievable.”
“It was awesome. Congratulations, Zayne.”
“Thanks, Luke. This wouldn’t have been possible without you.”
Zayne locked the door, then walked towards me, rounded the counter, and stepped right in front of me.
“I didn’t do much,” I said. Zayne had done all the hard work. This business was his baby. I’d merely placed a few soaps on the shelves and manned the register for the day — which was my job. He was paying me.
“Don’t sell yourself short,” he chastised me, shaking his head. “You charmed the pants off most of the customers. I might not have seen it in person, but Corey told me so, and several of my customers told me that you’re a great addition, and they liked you. Hell, I think like eighty percent of the deodorants I sold today are because of you.”
“Oh.” I shrugged, biting my lip. “I really didn’t do that much. Like… I’m not trying to oversell stuff, you know? I know that’s not the way your business works.”
Zayne rolled his eyes. “Would you please just take a fucking compliment? Because that’s what this was — a compliment. In case you don’t know: That’s when people say nice things about you. You’re not supposed to argue about it. You say, ‘Thank you, Zayne.’”
I smiled. “Thank you, Zayne.”
“Good boy.” He shuddered. “Forget I said that…”
“Yeah, I’m not a dog.” I sighed wistfully. It was really getting lonely in my cabin. The sale for the other one hadn’t gone through yet, and I was already regretting that decision. It’d been an impulse buy because apparently I was now the rich ex football —soccer.Fucking stupid shit, why did this one country have to call a sport the whole fucking world called one thing something completely different and unrelated? — who impulsively purchased real estate. Next time I’d probably do something stupid like buying the neighboring buildings if any of Zayne’s neighbors ever gave him shit.
Yeah… I could actually see myself doing that, which was not good. Not at all.
“Oh… yeah… dogs…” Zayne coughed, his cheeks tinting a little. “I was absolutely talking about dogs. Right. Yeah. So… this day was a complete success, and I wouldn’t have been able to do this without you, so… thank you. I owe you one.”
“You’re welcome,” I answered automatically. “Wait… you owe me one?” I added, biting my lip. “Did you already post any pictures of your soft opening on social media?”
My heart started hammering in my chest as I awaited his answer, hoping he’d say no but not believing it would be. Up until I’d seen Zayne aiming his smartphone at me, the fact that I might be in some of his pictures had completely escaped me. I mean, yeah, it was logical. I was an employee, this was his shop…. If he took photos of everything happening here, I might happen to be in the pictures. But I couldn’t be.
“No… I mean, some people might have uploaded the pictures they took, but I hadn’t had the time.”
I cringed, pulling a face while trying to stop the bile rising in my throat. That was not good. I mean, at least the people possibly posting about this were his followers that — hopefully — didn’t have a big following themselves, but… there might still be pictures of me out there.
I swallowed hard.
This is the US, I tried telling myself. If Zayne didn’t post any pictures yet, the possibility that someone posted a picture with me in it was small. And the possibility that someone who knew me and recognized me was even smaller. I mean, I even changed my appearance up a little. My hair was longer, I’d started letting my beard grow a little. Gone was the clean-shaven football — soccer, goddammit! — player with the short, almost military style haircut. Instead, I was looking a little more like… what had Moritz called it last time? Boy next door meets lumberjack? Whatever that meant. I didn’t have the physique of a lumberjack.
“Okay, so… can you do me a favor?” I asked. Time for damage control. Zayne had too many followers, about a hundred thousand on Instagram alone, plus a shit ton of people on YouTube, and a rapidly growing TikTok Channel. Someone from Germany — or hell, Europe — would see me and probably recognize me.
“Sure? Do you want a shoutout on social media? Because I can…”
“No!”I shouted, making Zayne flinch. “I mean, no, thank you.” Yeah, that was better. Next time, don’t even start behaving like an ass. “I actually wanted to ask you if you could not post any pictures of me?”
“Oh…” Zayne blinked, cocking his head in confusion. “Sure… is there a reason you don’t want me to? I mean, I’ll respect your boundaries, but it’s just… sorry, I don’t want to call you weird.”
“Well, it is, isn’t it?” I laughed, though it sounded hollow and forced to my own ears. It probably wasn’t normal to have such an issue with having your face visible on Social Media – especially if he didn’t tag me or anything.
“I don’t know. I never thought about it.” Zayne shrugged. “I grew up with Facebook, migrated to Instagram, I’m on YouTube… now TikTok… I guess it’s always been a part of my life, you know. Since I was a teenager, there have always been social media platforms, but I know people who don’t want their photos anywhere online.”
He didn’t have to say anything. I could see on his face what he was going to say. Or not going to say. The weird kids were the ones without social media.
Yeah, well… Zayne thinking I was a weirdo was way better than anyone finding me here now that I really felt like I was putting down roots.
