She moved her shoulders carefully, strategically, the way that madesure that she could show off all she wanted. The man was falling forit, like a dog fell for the same fake throw of the squeaky ball everytime. Jim wanted to feel disgusted, but he couldn’t, not whenrealizing that he had been tempted as well—he had fallen for thesame trick, chased the same squeaky ball. He had walked all the way out there, and he wasn’t going to leaveempty handed. Ripping his eyes from the man and Linda to the book binhe headed quickly for it. He was going to grab one book, just one. The paperback titles glared up at him, some with the telltale creasein the spine of being well read and enjoyed. On others, there wasmaybe a small mark where it had been cracked open, but not reallyread, not really deeply read. Some books were like that, their spinesgoing from that wonderful straight line to a kind of crooked U. Thatwas one thing about a hardcover that he had to admit, they didn’tdeteriorate the same way paperbacks did, but they cost more, took upmore space, and were a good amount heavier. He was beginning to feel the pull play at the back of his mind again,a faint rattle at the back of his skull. He wasn’t sure what itwas, but it was something that he knew wasn’t right to let rulehim, but at the same time it felt good—real good. Like forbiddenfruit. He pulled another classic out of the stack, passing over all the pulpthat lined the bin, and started to flip through, looking for ruinedor missing pages. Linda laughed behind him. It was a loud laugh, one that wasunnecessarily drawing attention to her, a bubbly, fake laugh. It wasone that didn’t belong on her, just like the T-shirt, and he wassure that it served the same purpose. <I>You do indeed sell “anything” Linda, even yourself. You evensell your own morality and decency. </I>He looked up for a moment and saw a young woman with shocking copperhair staring at him. Her eyes were almost unblinking, he waited, andthen saw her lids rise and fall. She was under average height, andsomething else about her looked small, the way she was standing, shelooked vulnerable—afraid. </ol>
<I>Why is she staring at me? </I>Jim almost dropped the book as he looked away hastily, trying toignore her. He moved to another box conveniently marked: MUSIC.A CD poked out of it, and he grabbed it, just trying to find adiversion. It was a beat-up classical CD; a man with a comb-over wason the front, hunched over a guitar. He tried to keep his attentionon the turtleneck-clad man and away from the woman, but he knew shewas still watching him. Jim swiped a quick sweep in her direction and saw that she was stilllooking at him, her blue, saucer eyes deep with concern and thought.He noted that she looked afraid—very afraid. He took the CD along with the book and began for Linda, who had justfinished talking with the man that had been there before he was. Heset the items down on the table carefully. Linda smiled, bright and easy. She struck a pose that seemed bothridiculous and sexy at the same time. She was trying to toy with himand he knew it. “Hey, there, Jim. Come back so soon?” “Ran out of stuff to read.” He said. He dared glance behind himto see the copper-haired girl not looking at him anymore. She waswalking around the merchandise, glancing at it and counting, as ifshe were taking inventory. <I>Did they hire on workers? </I>“Oh, I’m sure glad you enjoyed them.” The flicker of her lashesshooting up and down, remaining only slightly lowered was barelyregistered and only later would he think that she was still trying totoy with him. The way she stood was intended to give him a view thatwould be enticing, he would realize that only later on as well, andhe would come to realize for sure that she was trying to hookhim—hook him good. “It’s like I couldn’t put them down, you know?” He said, halfdistracted by the woman behind him. </ol>
“I know, read a few good books in my time.” “It wasn’t even that, it was more like just the book itself, Ijust couldn’t get away from it.” Linda chuckled understandingly. Jim thought there might be morebehind it, but he didn’t pursue it further. “That’ll be five dollars.” “The CD that much?” She shook her head, the dark hair flourishing around her. “The bookis a dollar and the CD is four.” Jim reached into his back pocket for his wallet. “Books went upquite a bit.” “We’re getting more people coming through, and go through moremerchandise quicker, and we’re trying to up our quality. Qualitycosts.” “I guess.” He handed her the bill. “The other customers findthat out?” “Well, yes, and for more expensive items we designed aneasy-payment system. They can pay it off over time, or all at once.”“How many use that option?” “Quite a few. Some people go for one-fifty at a time, or fivehundred.” “People buy <I>that </I>much stuff here?” “You’d be surprised.” She grinned, those perfect teeth shining.“We do eventually work off a limit, if they don’t pay up after acertain amount of time, or rack up more than enough, then they aren’tallowed to buy any more till them pay up.” “Sounds fair. What if they never pay?” </ol>
“We devised an option for that, if they can’t afford it, then wework out a trade.” Jim set five dollars down. “What do you trade? Do they honestlyhave something that would be worth that much?” “Most do.” Her smile faded. “We don’t give away secretsthough. All of our trades are private. Most of the time it takes alittle more prompting for them to trade, but we try to work it outpeacefully.” “What do you mean?” Linda took the money and set it in her little box and passed the bookand CD back to him. Her face was changing rapidly as she watchedsomething behind him. He took the book and CD. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” She screeched and rushed from behind thetable, losing her pose, and baring her teeth in a stare of absoluterage. Jim looked where she was heading. “PUT THAT DOWN! WHAT ARE YOU STUPID?” He saw the target of her rage was the copper-headed young woman,hastily putting down a large pot—it looked like very nice china. He watched Linda go for the young woman. Her hands were clenchedtogether in fists, and her eyes were bulging. “Linda?” He said. Linda flashed a look of rage back at him, and for a moment he wasn’tsure if he was looking at a human, her face had changed sodramatically that he hardly recognized her. Veins stood out, and twotiny protuberances were noticeable on her forehead, or at least hethought they were. She turned away and back at the woman, shouting and swearing at her.“BEVERLY, YOU RETARD, I TOLD YOU NOT TO TOUCH THINGS!” Her handflashed out and made contact with the girl’s face, causing her headto jerk backwards. “Get back where you belong.” Linda pointed toa tent. </ol>
The girl bowed her head to the ground and started for the tent. Jimwatched her a moment. She looked in his direction, her eyes a steamyblue, foggy with tears. <I>Help me</I>. A desperate voice pleaded.He did not see her mouth move, but he knew that it had come from her,there was no way that he could confirm it, but he knew that the voicehad to have come from the young woman. She ducked back in the tent. Jim looked back at Linda who was back to her normal self, and turnedslowly, composed, and headed back for the table. Her face wascompletely normal. He looked right where he thought the two littlelumps had been, but there was nothing, not on either side. He had tohave been imagining it, for a moment he thought he had seen horns.But that was impossible. Jim looked down and saw that he still had the book and CD in hishand; he began for the gate, anxious to get away from the place assoon as possible. He didn’t know why, but he felt like someone waswatching him. <H2 ALIGN=LEFT >OVER THE next few days Jim began to notice more and more how thingshad been changing around the neighborhood. It started in simple ways,there were more people walking around—but then he noticed wherethey were going. Then they started coming back with armloads of stuff, stuff that wasreally only junk that had been resold to them at a bargain price. Heknew where it came from, and he didn’t want to think about it. He saw a man walking down the road wearing a backpack one day. Theman seemed in a bit of a daze, as if he really didn’t see anythinggoing on around him. Jim was sipping a cup of coffee at the time,watching the man walk. As he watched him a few moments longer—thezombie like expression never leaving his face—he noticed that thebackpack the man was empty. The floppy folds of it fluttered slightlyin the wind, the backpack was slumping down on the man’s back,serving him no purpose whatsoever—but Jim knew why he had the pack.</ol>
He waited for the man to come back down the road, and sure enough thebackpack was full. There were several odds and ends sticking straightup out of it, he saw the ears of a stuffed rabbit in particular,somewhat dirty from use. Why a grown man had bought something likethat was beyond him. He watched until the man disappeared down theroad, walking slowly, his face expressionless—robotic. Jim had gone to bed that night, but didn’t get much sleep—all hecould think about was the man with the backpack. When he did sleep,all he saw was a face, screaming and angry, that had twoprotuberances sticking distinctly out of the skull. The next day he sat in the same chair in his living room, by the samewindow that looked out to the street, where he had seen the man withthe backpack. The book he had bought a few days ago was in his hands,and he was trying to focus on the pages in front of him, but washaving a real hard time paying attention, every few moments his eyeswould drift upwards and he would find himself watching—waiting forthe man with the backpack. He had seen several people go down in the direction of the sale, awoman in a white Tahoe had driven down there, and when she came backhe could see that her back seat was loaded down with all manner ofstuff. The windows were cracked, and a single sleeve from the pile ofclothes on top flowed out, reaching into the breeze, trying toescape—<I>Help me. </I>—out the window. Jim watched it disappear and turned back to his book, realizing thathe had no idea what was going on in the plot, he had just beengrazing through it the whole time. He glanced at the road and thoughtabout that voice he had heard the last time he was at the sale. Hethought about the girl—Beverly—who had been yelled at, and thatcobalt misty look to her eyes that had been there when she looked athim. That desperation when she had looked at him floated around inhis memory, like a ghost that had found the perfect abode in hismind. He didn’t know why she had looked so distressed, aside fromLinda firing off at her the way she did. He supposed that Beverly wasan employee there, what with all the sales they were making, Bram andLinda probably needed to get some staff. He wasn’t sure what tomake of the desperate expression on her face, or the voice—<I>helpme</I>—that he was sure was hers. There had to be more to it, heknew that much, there simply had to be more to it. </ol>