Trolley Pushers

by Acologic

Part 1: The Store – IV

‘It is you!’ said Ale, frowning through the bright eleven-o’clock sun as East heaved a trio of twin seaters into the specialised bay.

‘Yeah,’ said East. ‘Did you not know I was coming in?’

‘No! I asked Lime yesterday and he didn’t know, and Gat wouldn’t pick up when I called him. Has he released the rota yet? Did you check it when you clocked in?’

‘Yeah, it’s been published. I printed it and put it up on the wall.’

‘Unbelievable,’ said Ale, though meekly. ‘He could have done it yesterday, but no. I guess I’ll just have to start now. Has it been busy?’

‘Pretty busy, yeah. With two of us on, it should be fine. What time are you finishing?’

‘Eight, I think. At least I get the extra breaks.’ But Ale didn’t really mean it. He’d much rather have come in an hour later. Nine-hour shifts were painful to think about, tiring and tedious. Time moved doubly slow on a nine hour than on an eight. He had grown to hate them and had often wondered how Ant, who had pushed trolleys for ten years, still managed to turn up for them with a straight face. ‘Could I get the keys?’ he asked East.

‘Oh yeah. One sec.’ She dipped a hoof into her high-vis and pulled them off her neck. ‘Here you go,’ she said, smiling as she passed them to him.

‘Thanks.’ Ale made the walk to the trolley hut, unlocked the door and stepped in. The keys, he noted, were still warm. He pocketed them and tugged out his tray, from which he grabbed his straps and into which he placed his Com. He picked up the Company Com, pressed A to clock in, spoke his number into the receiver and swiped his card through the Com slot. The rota, as East had said, was pinned up on the corkboard-clad wall. He saw that none of his shifts had changed. Even his overtime was as had been agreed. He sighed and closed the shed door, locking it.

Bays one and two were chock-full of trolleys, typically disorganised on account of shoppers having rumbled them in carelessly. East had emptied bay six and moved on to one, so Ale took two and secured his straps over eight mainfleets, grunting as he leaned backwards and tugged them out with his weight. A car was pulling out. He stopped to let it, but it stopped too. He pushed his trolleys past, taking the hint, but then the car moved again suddenly and he only just managed to clear the space, sweating from exertion, before its horn honked at him angrily. Swearing quietly at the occupant, Ale forced his face into a smile and nodded at the shopper through the latter’s window, who glared back.

‘Prick,’ muttered Ale to himself, and he pushed on to the main bay.

The one mercy was that, albeit busy, it wasn’t nearly as busy as Ale had feared it would be. He and East were able to clear the shopper park of trolleys within the hour and so waited together at the spare rows behind van parking for the bays to fill up again. Ale got on reasonably well with East, and she wasn’t nearly as much of a pontificator as Ant or Lime. He didn’t mind her. He didn’t mind any of them, in a way. He also didn’t like them. It was strange, but Ale, when he truly considered it, found he didn’t like anyone all that much at all.

‘So what’s new with you?’ East was asking him after she’d talked a bit about a misunderstanding she’d had with a shopper the other day. ‘Anything interesting? Anything exciting?’

Ale shrugged and leaned his hoof against the nearest row, very conscious of where his limbs were and where his eyes were. He tried not to keep eye contact with East for too long, but he also thought he couldn’t risk not keeping it for long enough, however long that was. He really, really hated small talk. ‘Not really. I’m just sort of pottering around, you know. Just enjoying time off when it comes and that’s about it, really. How about you?’ And he regretted this question the moment he realised he’d asked it only two minutes ago. East rolled with it politely enough.

‘Yeah, I’ve been pretty much doing the same,’ she said, moving around on the spot a little. Ale could see he wasn’t the only one uncomfortable with their deteriorating conversation. The pause that followed, though short, was horribly painful.

‘Well,’ said Ale, the task of breaking the silence having fallen to him. ‘That’s good.’ His faced burned and he tried hard not to look away too quickly.

‘Oh, I... found a cone up there, by the way,’ said East, her face as red under the pressure of an awkward pause as Ale thought his must be. ‘I put it back in the shed.’

‘Nice,’ said Ale. ‘Gat’ll be happy his pothole’s been fixed.’

‘Is that what it was?’

‘Yeah,’ said Ale, pleased they’d moved on to something he was comfortable speaking about. ‘I reported it yesterday. He must’ve got someone to fix it when he did the rotas.’

‘I didn’t see anyone in the morning,’ said East.

‘Could they not do it at night?’ asked Ale. East shrugged.

‘To be honest, I don’t really know,’ she said. ‘I just turn up for this.’

Ale forced a laugh. ‘That makes two of us.’