David sits on his lopsided couch to put on his shoes. One of his couch legs had come off when one of his buddies, while trying on VR headsets, had jumped on the arm and bent it. The front leg under the bent arm had come off. Now, when he sits down, the couch sighs in relief.
While he knots the laces, he scans through the handwritten shopping list to make sure he hasn’t forgotten to write anything down.
The time on his phone reads 4:03 pm.
A couple of his friends are coming over at 6 pm to watch a football match. Zilo, the one responsible for the wobbly couch, had asked him to pick up a pack of straws.
When David had asked why, Zilo said that his swollen lip was making it hard for him to drink.
"Man, now what happened to your lip?"
"Football injury."
It was always something with Zilo.
David pulls into the supermarket parking lot entrance at 4:26 pm.
The sun hits the side mirror awkwardly as if asking to be let in to wait for night. It had been a long blue sky day.
He frowns at the overflowing parking lot. Apart from the outdoor bakery attendant wearing a birthday hat, there’s no sign of a promotion going on.
This parking lot feels like a dark cloud that shows up at the end of the day to turn night into ink. David feels like joining these cars will be the drop that breaks the dam.
He’s contemplating going to the minisupermarket a few minutes down the road when a parking lot attendant waves him forward. He’s directed to the front, near the outdoor bakery. He shuts off the engine and quickly exits the car, not looking forward to the traffic inside.
The supermarket is quiet.
Empty in contrast to the world parked outside its doors.
A few attendants mill about, a woman with a child, an old man stands at the far end of the aisle from the entrance, and he appears to be reading a list.
The four check-in counters are all manned.
He pulls out a cart and his list and starts for the snacks section.
Milk
Bread
Eggs
Remote batteries
5 Guava juice boxes
5 Crisps bags
1kg Popcorn bag
Wipes
Straws
6pac Redz
He pulls up to the counter and checks his phone while the teller rings up his purchase.
"Congratulations!"
David startles away from reading Bonny’s Status "Pregame!" under a picture of his Jersey and a can of Guinness.
"Excuse me?" He says.
"Congratulations! You are the 100th and last customer to buy Goehl’s straws. Come with me to the back to get your prize!" The female teller explains.
"Uh that’s alright. Just ring me up, I’m kinda late."
"It'll only take a minute, sir."
A beat."Fine."
"This way, please."
He follows her down the old man’s aisle towards a maroon door.
The old man adjusts his eyeglasses and looks up at a box of wine glasses. It looks like he’s trying to siphon the sight of all who have looked at this box. He looks back, as David passes, and appears to want to say something before turning back to his opthalmic task.
The maroon door opens into a lit corridor. The contrast between the aisle and the corridor makes David pause.
He looks at his phone. 40 minutes until the game.
"Hi!" A man approaches him.
"I’m Daniel, the manager. Congratulations. Your package is this way."
The teller walks back into the arena of goods waiting for gladiators armoured with carts and lists and money to entertain them.
David feels like one of the goods, picked off the shelf, and carted inside his body.
"Did you drive here?" He asks while leading the way back down the corridor.
"Yes, I drove here. I'm David. What's the package?"
"You'll have to drive around so that we put it in the trunk of your car."
They reach a garage full of boxes.
Two steps sound behind David but before he can turn around, he is shoved over the threshold into a stack of boxes.
The garage door slams shut. Darkness engulfs his senses and stiffens his whole body.
"This way, please." Daniel's voice has adopted a drawl. His tone has changed from client relations to priestly command. A door that was previously hidden behind David's "package" opens.
He feels around his pockets for his phone, but it’s missing.
"Please let me go."
"You will leave after receiving your package," Daniel walks through the door into a candlelit room.
The walls of the room are made of black rocks. The rocks look like hands belonging to prisoners trapped in a small space together. It looks like a kitchen turned into a makeshift church.
Crying, consoling, and bowed heads fill the pews on both sides as Daniel walks the narrow aisle up to a pulpit.
A casket sits in the middle of the pulpit. It sits like the silence after ellipses, an extension of the small aisle, and the only way out of this warm room.
David stops three steps away from the pulpit. The darkness still holds his body in a grip, keeping any overwhelming fear at a distance. He doesn’t know if that distance is connected to the fact that no one has invaded his physical space yet.
"It's not yours. Someone is already inside."
The reassurance does nothkmg to ease his apprehension. A shadowy figure from his left shoves a box into David’s arms.
Fear licks at his neck, making him shiver in distaste. He doesn’t look in the direction of the figure but feels it fades from his side.
"Come forward and pour the box into the casket."
Almost catatonic, David overcomes the three strides, closes his eyes, and dumps the contents of the box over the deceased.
A sharp cry from the back startles him. When he opens his eyes, Daniel is right in his face.
He's holding his grocery list and reading each item. Once he's done, he tells David to travel home safe and to be careful to buy every item on his list.
Daniel drops the list in the casket. When David looks over to see what he had dumped on the corpse, he sees a pile of straws.
He frowns.
Daniel closes the casket.
For the second time in this chasm, David is shoved.
He drops on the hard floor and feels himself spilling like a torn bag of meat.
He gasps awake in his car.
"What the fuck?"
He checks for his phone.
4:26 pm.
The parking lot attendant waves him forward.
David reverses into the main road, his tire spins in space over the roadside trench for a beat. He revs up the engine twice before the tire finds ground again and helps peels away.
He enters a minisupermarket. On his way to the counter, he looks at the straw packs before deciding against getting them.
The teller rings him up Shs40,300.
When he gets home, three out of the expected company of five have arrived. They are standing around the patio talking when he walks up to them.
"You said you have a busted lip."
"What?" Zilo looks at him questioningly.
"You told me to get a pack of straws because you can’t drink straight from the cup." He says as they enter the house.
"No, I didn’t. My lip is clearly fine." Zilo laughs while he settles on the couch.
You know I have the messages, right?
"Well, I could use a straw." Bonny says.
Zilo opens his chat with David.
"I last talked to you last night asking where we would catch the game."
However, David is motionless, his hands pausing from opening the battery pack.
"Yo, where are the straws you said you got?" Comes from the kitchen nearby.
"First, get up." David points to Zilo.
"Bro, are you okay?" The second guy asks.
David rests on his knees to inspect his couch.
The previously bent arm is in perfect shape.
The previously missing leg is good as new.