literature

Payment

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Literature Text

With so few customers here, the air conditional was very cold in the exhibition hall causing a somewhat rare situation since beginning of work: Elena was forced to put on her jacket inside her red uniform apron. It was against the rules to put one on the outside since it would cover part of the all faithful red apron. She was not working as a cook here, but only an ordinary cashier part-timer.

“A total of one hundred and thirty-eight ringgit and thirty-five cents,” she mentioned in her best pronounced Chinese. In normal case, such near figure to one hundred and fifty was supposed to be told to customers for them to redeem two pieces of five ringgit vouchers at the redemption counter. But since today was the last day of work, she wouldn’t give a damn about it. All she cared about was to get over all the customers and play all day until the last hour comes. Before waiting for the customer to walk away, she turned around to Lyn and said, “Can you stop poking my tummy?” Her expression was a blank with traces of twitching smile at the corner of her mouth. Seeing no other customers coming, she took off the straps of the aprons and unzipped her black thick jacket. A relief came through once Elena was out of her bulging cocoon. Inside revealed a plain white t-shirt with a school logo at the left top corner.

“Where got?! I didn’t poke, I only twisted! Don’t simply accuse me,” Lyn laughed. She was short with long hair that curled slightly near towards the end. The way she joked was cute, increasing her charm point among new friends. “Hey! Don’t poke me,” she laughed.

Elena laughed too and got overly excited spending her last moment with Lyn and the others. Although she laughed, deep inside her, she really missed her colleagues who spent these whole eleven days together. “Look, she’s getting high again!” Tan called out, “Hey, it’s only in the morning, not nine o’clock at night yet.”

“Stand up, a few customers are coming,” urged Wanny. “This counter, sir,” she welcomed.

The customer who came was with the basket, not big ‘Ikea’ bag which most customers asked for sale (both basket and bag were not for sales and were not even allowed to be carried out of the hall). Elena stood up after asking for a member card. And they met. The customer was not like any Malaysians. Not from the way he looked. But from the way he dressed. He was one head taller than Elena, hair quite long for males, wearing an autumn outfit – with soft cotton hat, long sleeves, a jacket and… a mask. No customers had to wear mask during this season. Elena’s eyes looked through the customer’s glasses and met the eyes for split seconds. Then, she dropped her gaze, packing everything out of the basket. All around this customer was silence.

Tit- Tit- “One two three four. Four models.” Tit- “Mark, why do boys like to fix models so much?” Elena asked when Mark, one of the supervisors, passed by behind. All the items on her counter were models of different sizes and structures. Mark just left with a shrug. Doesn’t he fix models too? ...

The customer continued to lay his eyes on Elena’s scanner as time passed, not even once on the price screen. Suddenly he voiced, “There are so many phones on the floor.” Elena looked back. Her collogues had been charging their electrical appliances illegally there. One clean step towards her right blocked the view of phones from that wrapped up customer. He kept silent.

“Where do you get those five ringgit vouchers?” The customer at Lyn’s counter asked.

“Just outside of the hall on your right side.” Lyn averted her gaze at Elena for stealing her line.

“Eavesdropping?”

Elena smirked, “It’s just revenge.”

“Do you need a knife?” She was puzzled by the suggestion brought up by this customer.

“Pardon?”

The customer tipped his now fully visible sling bag from his waist and repeated his question. Except for his eyes and slightly curled long hair, no bare skin was exposed, which made it impossible to guess his expression. “I have a knife. Do you need it?” His voice suggested no joke.

Keeping calm, Elena felt his aura magnified, pressing against her and her packer. Wanny said nothing but stared at him. Both of them exchanged glances. “Did you hear it, Lyn? There’s a knife here. You better be careful,” Elena joked, concentrating on the last progress of his payment.

“Do you still want the knife?”

Without holding it, Elena felt the weigh in that customer’s bag, imagining a real threat being pulled out from it. “Please sign, sir.” She glanced at the credit card machine which was vomiting a customer copy receipt. He had only bought sixty plus, no need to mention about the voucher issue. “Thank you, sir. Here are your receipts and card.” The man passed back his gaze at me.

“Do you still want the knife? I have it.”

“Never mind. I have scissors here,” she smiled.

As if a warning was passed, he mumbled something inaudible. “Pardon, sir?”

No reply.

“The payment should be correct, so I’m no checking.” He took the bag from Wanny. Then his eyes smiled at his cashier, “Scissors are not sharp enough. You should really use knives.” The heavy aura was taken away with him as he left the exit. Some cashiers in the same row came over quickly. “Who’s that suspicious man?” someone mentioned.

With a deep breath, Wanny answered, “Might be some authors. Only idols cover themselves up like that. It’s relatively hot in Malaysia too. I suspect that it’s the Nine Knives (the correct name is in Mandarian). And I actually met him down stairs earlier during my lunch break.”

“Anyone has an event guide book?”

Elena passed one to Wanny. She glanced at the exit as if the man would come back any time or his shadow would remain at the spot he just stood.

“No, he doesn’t look like the Nine Knives…”

Elena couldn’t hide the smile on her. “I don’t think that he is any famous authors but only an Otaku with murdering intention.” The girls threw a weird glance at her. True indeed that the author tour for Nine Knives was the day before and not today. But otaku in Malaysia never wear like that except for Taiwanese. “He can never be the Nine Knives. If he is, I’ll post my status saying that ‘I was the cashier for the Nine Knives.’ I think many fans will kill me before Dawn by then. But he is weird,” Elena admitted. If there was a chance she would like to have a nice chat and see if any more unusual things would happen next. And his hands were really rough when he took the receipts from Elena’s hands just now. Not of an author for sure.

“Why didn’t you say ‘yes’ just now?” a colleague asked.

“I’m afraid that he would really take out a knife,” she admitted.

“I thought that he was just joking?”

Recalling his eyes, Elena said, “It’s hard to tell. He doesn’t sound like joking or serious in particular. The customer just sounded as if it was a very usual thing to do.”

“Scary.”

She nodded.

After a quick snap of photo of the customer’s merchant copy receipt, Elena resumed her cashier duty. That signature on it was not like any ordinary one with symbols or initials. Instead, it was a full name, written in cursive style without fancy add-ons. This copy would remain in her memory as a payment for such memorable unusual abnormal event. The murderous intention within that casual voice still retained in her head.
The second non-daily incident I've met in my life.
© 2013 - 2024 kchikage
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