He Called Me In

"Beth, could you please come in the office?"

Shit. I panicked. That was the voice that cold fucker used when he was going to fire someone. That nasally, superior, detracted, completely fucking in-your-face voice that he adopted whenever he was preparing to financially rape someone in the ass. I knew that voice. I'd heard it a lot for only having worked at the Nut for three months.

Now he was directing that voice at me.

Fuck, I thought. My parents will kill me.

I slowly turned from my register and faced the child-molesting asshole I was forced to answer to and quickly had to readjust my eyesight to match his height.

I always forgot that he was about four inches shorter than me. No wonder he was so goddamn cranky. My dad always referred to this as 'Little Man Syndrome' – the shorter the asshole, the bigger the attitude.

"Yeah, sure Brad. Just let me find someone to cover my register."

Will you believe that little prick shoved his nose right into the air?

"Sarah's going to cover your register. Come with me, please."

I could tell that 'please' was forced.

I followed Brad back into the office and sat in the chair he indicated, nervously twining my hands together. My boss sat across from me in front of the time-clock computer and shuffled a couple of papers around before getting down to business.

"Beth," he said seriously, "do you know why I've called you in here?"
I shook my head. I was too afraid of losing my job to speak.

"Earlier this afternoon, you let a woman charge gas and cigarettes to her food stamps." Brad pitched his voice lower than normal to help indicate the severity of the crime I'd committed.

I didn't catch on.

"Beth," he said slowly, closing his eyes and rubbing his face. "Do you know what this means?" He looked at me with his most serious expression but all I could think about was how disgusting he was, how his face was covered in little moles and how he resembled a weasel and how his goatee was uneven and poorly trimmed and even how he'd touched little boys back in the 70s.
God, how I fucking hated him.

"Charging gas and cigarettes to an EBT card is against the law," Brad said sternly, bringing my attention back to our conversation. "I could terminate you for this."

My face slackened.

Fuck, I thought. Fuck fuck fuck. Mom and Dad will kill me. I won't have gas money. I'll never be able to go anywhere again. Fuck. Fuck. FUCK.

"I'm so sorry, Brad. I didn't know. I mean, I know better than to charge that stuff on EBT but I just wasn't paying attention," I fumbled, trying desperately to save my job. I hated the Nut more than anything. I hated working there, I hated driving there, and I hated the thought of being there but I needed the money I got from that job. I pleaded with my eyes, I did everything I could to lie and tell my boss I didn't want to lose my job.

Finally he responded to me.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to terminate you," Brad said after a sick pause. I hated the way he said that word, 'terminate'. He wielded it with a nauseating power, like he wasn't wearing a ridiculous blue shirt and khaki pants and a stupider-than-fucking-stupid hat just like I was. He said that word like he had power when he really didn't, but the kicker is that inside the Nut he did. He reigned supreme.

This fucking killed me.

"I'll let this one slide this time," Brad said, a disgusting weaselly grin spreading across his face, "but don't let it happen again. I don't want to see you back in this office." With those words he just turned away from me and started shuffling paperwork. I knew he wasn't doing anything important but I was just so grateful not to be fired I didn't care.

I got out of there.