Holding His Heart
~insanity and co~
Chapter One; "Meet Penny, Bragi's One"
Twenty more minutes.
Twenty more minutes and I can close the store and go home and sleep. I had been tired since the start of my shift, and restocking shelves and tidying a small movie store wasn't exactly enticing work. I did get to look at the new movies that had just come in, but it would be a while before we had enough in stock so I could take a few home and watch them, so they were only interesting for so long.
Towards the end of the Friday night shift – as per usual – we would get a small rush of customers, so I was content to stand at the counter and make small talk with a few of the regulars.
"I'm Axl," a boy blurt out, awkwardly turning to look at the customer behind him. He isn't a usual, but he was rather chatty and I suppose I did work in customer service, so I smile back.
"Hello Axl," I respond, scanning the movies on the counter and waiting for the horribly slow computer to churn out a total for him.
"What's your name?"
"I'm sort of wearing a name tag," I answer, pointing to my pocket which – low and behold – held my name.
"Oh, right. Haha, didn't really see that...Penny."
"That's my name."
"It's a nice name."
"Thank you, I didn't really pick it out though. I'll pass the compliments onto my parents."
"Yeah, right, right. How much'll it be?"
"Dunno yet, sorry." I slap the side of the monitor and for just a moment the screen when static. The picture returns a second later, little box labeled Total still loading. "This thing is ridiculously slow."
"Oh, no problem. I'm meeting someone later to watch these, so I'm not in a hurry or anything."
"Friday night date night?" I ask, smile falling abruptly when he nods. "Uh...look. No offense, but no chick's going to want to watch old war documentaries on a Friday night. Unless she's really into that kind of thing," I say, quickly backtracking because he looked either very confused or offended.
"Old war..." Axl cranes his neck to read the titles of the movies. "...documentaries." I raise my eyebrows and wait; did he not even look at what he was picking up off the shelf? "Maybe I should pick something else."
"Yeah, that might be a good idea." I try not to sound too irritated, but now I had to wait for the stupid computer to load the total, void it, and then start all over again. The customer behind him is already peeved at the wait, and I'm not exactly the epitome of patience when I'm tired.
"Any suggestions?"
"Try something down there," I say, pointing down the aisle. "Romantic comedies are a better idea than documentaries. Nothing about friends with benefits, though."
"Yeah, thanks."
"Can you just ring me up?" The man behind Axl steps up, combing his fingers through his beard and nearly slamming his movie down on the counter. "I'm kind of in a hurry."
"Yeah, sure. Membership card, please." He fishes the card out of his pocket and I scan it into the computer, a loud beep making me jump – it does that every time – and he impatiently raises his eyebrows. It feels like we go through this every Friday night, probably because we do. "Well, Mr. Lan, it looks like you've got seven overdue movies. I do believe that's a record this time."
"Well can I get this one?" He slid another over the counter to me – another horror movie. Judging by the titles of the overdue ones he was a huge fan.
"Not until you return the other seven or pay for them."
"Isn't there some policy?"
"Some policy?"
"Yeah, about renting movies out without having to go through silly memberships." He smiles, dropping the pissy look for just a moment and I sigh.
"No, there's no policy about that. Look-" I smile and wait until Mr. Lan is looking at me again, "-it would really make my day a whole lot easier if you would return those movies," I say, my voice slow and even. For just a moment the man's eyelids droop and he looks relaxed, he even faintly smiles. It fades seconds later, and once again he looks pissed off – though a red tinge creeps up from his beard.
"I lost them."
"Then you'll have to pay for them."
"Right." Mr. Lan turns slowly, leaving the movie on the counter and the door dings when he leaves.
"So you use your powers to get people to return their overdue movies?" Axl steps back up to the counter and places two more movies down. I slide Mr. Lan's into a bin to be restocked and scan Axl's card again.
"My powers?" I scan his new movies and wait for a total. Much better choices this time.
"Yeah, you know...the powers," Axl whispers, leaning over the counter. There were no other customers in the store...so why was he whispering? Ahh, Friday night, I thought to myself, probably already drunk.
"I don't have any powers," I whisper back.
"What do you mean? I just saw you use them, you know, the way you talked to that guy." Axl turns just in time to see Mr. Lan's car pull out of the parking lot.
"Talking to people? That's my special power?"
"Not just talk. You know, talk."
"Right," I say slowly, sliding his movies across the counter to him. "Your total." I turn the small screen towards Axl and he fishes some change out of his pocket.
"Your powers won't work on me," he says with a grin, handing me the money. It took a moment to sort all the small change he had given me.
"Is that right?" I murmur, not in the mood to encourage the rantings of a drunk man...even if he could compose himself enough to pass as sober. Only a ten more minutes until I could close.
"Yeah, you know, cause I'm a God too."
"You're a God?" I ask, taking my eyes off the till for a moment to look at him.
Eyes aren't red, so he isn't stoned. Drunk it is.
"Yeah."
"I think you're off your medication," I say, giving him his change. "Here's your movie."
He takes them and it almost sounds like he says something else, but when I look up he's already leaving, the ding echoing around the empty store. He stands outside for a moment, taking out a phone and I go up to the front door and turn the Open sign to Closed.
A few minutes early won't make much of a difference, I think to myself.
He looks back into the store, talking to someone frantically but I couldn't hear anything through the glass, so I turn to finish closing the store.
"What do you mean you found her?" Ty shoots up from the couch and walks into the kitchen, phone to his ear and leaving Anders in the living room.
"Who found who?"
"Who do you think? Axl found your One," Ty says, shushing Anders. "Say that again? Her name's Phranny?"
"Oh no, I'm going to need a drink for this," Anders says, quickly going to the kitchen and he rummages through the cupboard and pulls out a shot glass.
"Oh, Penny."
Anders thinks for a moment before shrugging and leaving the shot glass on the counter. "Cute name, how'd she look?"
"Works at the movie store a mile over," Ty says, putting his hand over the phone. "And would you shut up?"
"No! Axl found her and I want to get a good image of her."
"She's short, dark hair, younger," Ty says, parroting what Axl is telling him.
"Good," Anders says with a sigh of relief. "Wait, how young? She's not like...a teenager, is she?"
"He doesn't know." Ty turns his back on Anders again to listen to Axl. "Okay, see you in five."
"Please tell me he got pictures."
"No he didn't get pictures," Ty says, sounding disgusted and pushing Anders away again.
"Come on, you've got to give me more than 'young', 'short', 'dark hair' and a name. I want to know what I'm getting into here."
"And you will, when Axl gets here."
Author's Note: Thank you for reading! I hope it isn't all that obvious, but I don't know New Zealand (or their currency system, which is surprisingly difficult to write without knowledge of). If something is coming across as off please let me know so I can fix it ASAP.