Gary couldn’t remember setting out when he came upon the most inconveniently situated convenience store he ever saw: Thrifty Express. The glaring pink neon sign was absent half the letter “y,” the dirt-laden brick façade was crumbling, and there was an otherworldly odor that permeated from the establishment, something of a cross between Downy and old socks.
“Welcome to Thrifty Express: all that you need for your crappy afterlife in one quick, convenient stop,” a clerk said at the door.
She must have been, like Gary, in her early twenties, and her face, plain, pale and oddly circular, captivated Gary. She was pretty, if not in a conventional way, with a gold nose ring, brown saucer eyes and spaghetti-flat bangs that looked like they miraculously survived the Seventies.
“Excuse me?” Gary asked.
Gary was not pretty. His endlessly bloated stomach spoke of a life spent away from the simple things, like the sun, the outdoors, and exercise.
“I’m Yvonne,” the clerk said. “I’ll be checking you out today.”
Gary gulped. Had Yvonne noticed that he was sizing her up, even though he was, well, dead? Gary thought that he had better get a little clarification before he proceeded.
“I was just in line at the Burger King drive thru. And now I’m dead? How?”
“Aisle 1, next to the Buddha Lite Lucky Charms with less sugar.”
Gary started walking towards Aisle One when Yvonne said: “You might want to grab a carriage. You get ten items or less.”
“Isn’t that a little cheap?” Gary asked.
Yvonne rolled her eyes—a habit that was quickly getting annoying—and answered, “It’s like karma. Whatever your spiritual development was on Earth is whatever you walk into here.”
Gary stood like a concerned shopper reading the aisle signs. In Warehouse Point, where he had lived, shoppers were more obnoxious, dropping their carriages in mid-aisle like anchors as they peered out at whatever tuna was on sale that week. At least here, Gary had a clear view with no thoughtless shoppers blocking him: Aisle One: Death Review, Religion, and Cereal; Aisle Two: Life Review, Reincarnation, and Toilet Paper; Aisle Three: Twinkies and Heavenly Timeshares; Aisle Four: Vacation Packages and Deodorants; and Aisle Five: Sunblock, Bargain CDs, and Eternity.
The selection was limited, but there were curious varieties: Know How You Died Lite with All Natural Ingredients; Know How You Died and Why with Iron; and Know How You Died, Why, and Its Significance with Vitamins A, B, and D. Gary naturally went for the most impressive packaging until he saw the cost: eight items.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me?! What a rip-off!” Gary called out.
Yvonne came over, gingerly, and looked from Gary to the aisle markings. “What’s the problem now?” she asked.
Gary held up the deluxe brand of Know How You Died and said: “We really have to talk about these prices.”
“If you can find a better price at any other afterlife convenience store in the county, we’ll match that price and give you a coupon for free tampons,” Yvonne said.
“But you’re the only afterlife shop I can buy from. And what the hell would I need tampons for?”
“Your girlfriend, maybe?” Yvonne asked.
“Are you implying that anyone who dated me must have died from the experience?”
Yvonne clicked her gum and said: “Maybe.”
“So that’s what my afterlife has come down to—being insulted by a Thrifty Express clerk.”
“Judge people much?”
“Sorry, no. It’s just—”
“Pay the price or put the item back.”
Gary shook his head and said: “Fine.” He picked up the Know How You Died Lite with All-Natural Ingredients, costing six items, and tossed it into the carriage.
Yvonne held up her hands. “Be certain. Once something goes in the carriage, it never comes out.”
It was too late. Gary saw the seeming purposelessness of his death in all its stupidity. Indeed, despite his diet, Gary had been at the Warehouse Point Burger King Drive Thru, exactly as he said. He saw an oblong French fry steaming and loaded with salt. He decided that, even though he was too cheap to order the complete meal (he had drinks at home), he needed that fry.
“But why?” Gary asked. “What a pointless way to die!”
“Sorry,” Yvonne said. “You didn’t buy the deluxe brand. Four items left.”
Gary proceeded to Aisle Two. The packages were, again, outrageously overpriced, but some did include Heavenly Timeshares as part of a package deal. There was See What You Did Right Only with No Transfat; Full Life Review with Plenty of Self-Loathing Made with Real Butter; and You Can’t Go Home Again: You Blew It and Here’s Why (With Sucralose But No Calories So You Can Pretend It’s Healthy).
The choice seemed obvious until Gary turned over the package and read the side effects: May attract undead cockroaches and cause hallucinations of demons, devils, and other entities with cartoony pitchforks.
“People consume this?” Gary asked.
“People consume fast food,” Yvonne answered. “It’s no worse for them than that.”
“So which package would you choose?”
Yvonne smiled. “You have to choose. It’s your afterlife.”
“Would a girl like you ever visit a guy who lived with cockroaches?” Gary asked the strangely enticing clerk.
Yvonne stepped forward, so close Gary could see what he missed in a life without women: the softness of her two chins and the brown-black freckles around the golden nose ring. Indeed, Gary’s death promised to be as lonely as his Burger King-centered life.
“I can’t leave Thrifty Express,” Yvonne said. “It’s my job.”
“So once I’m done here, that’s it,” Gary said. “No matter what packages I choose, I never see you again.”
“Listen, buddy, I’m just the clerk.”
“You’re also the only woman besides my mom I’ve had this long a conversation with…ever.”
Upon selecting the life review with real butter, Gary saw everything clearly: every action he had ever committed and its consequence, and the actions of everyone he had ever encountered, including the clerk, who stole retail albums before dying in the Seventies.
“If only you lived in the age of YouTube,” Gary said.
“You what?”
“Never mind. So what’s your favorite band?”
Sadly, the world’s second corniest pickup line, after “What’s your sign?”, didn’t get a reply. Instead, the store alarm sounded. Another customer in a suspiciously long overcoat appeared, ran up to the heavenly timeshare vacations, grabbed a ton, and ran for the door.
“Not again,” Yvonne said.
“This happens a lot?”
“In this store, yes.” Yvonne turned to Gary, touching his hand for just a second. “You have one item left. Take my advice this time. Get the sunscreen. Where you’re going, you’ll need it.”
In a moment of rare clarity, Gary understood. The only package he could afford came
with America’s Hottest Getaways, which wasn’t exactly a vacation, but more a period of hell in which the searing sun would replace the sulfuric lakes of fire.
Gary watched as the shoplifter spontaneously combusted, and then he went back to business. Walking up and down Aisle Five, Gary saw Hellfire Sunblock Ultra 1005 SPF Protection, guaranteed to protect against the mother of all sunburns. One shelf opposite, Gary saw a surprising selection of classics—apparently, celebrities had cornered the market in hell. But as great as the artists were, there was one artist and one album that captured Gary’s attention: Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon. Gary grabbed the album, said faintly, This is for Yvonne, and threw it into his cart.
The alarm sounded again. Gary froze—he’d never shoplifted anything in the hour since his death—until the clerk came up to him.
She smiled, a toothy, but beautiful smile. “I don’t know why I bothered to help you,” she said. “I told you to pick one thing, one simple thing, sunblock, and instead you chose the album I died listening to.”
“You can’t be serious.” Gary blushed a less than manly shade of maroon. “I figured if I guessed your favorite album correctly,” he said, “I’d show you that we have something in common. I figured you might come visit sometime when you get off of work, that is, if someone like you would consider spending time with someone like me.”
Yvonne reached over and kissed Gary gently on the forehead. “It is a long afterlife. I can always make time for some Pink Floyd.”
Gary smiled, preparing to take his cart back outside of the store, readying himself to disappear into his new afterlife, whatever it might be.
“There’s just one more thing,” Gary said. “Do you clerks help people get items into their cars or is this place too cheap to provide real service?”
“There aren’t any cars in the afterlife, genius.”
“Still, I could use a little help.”
Yvonne shook her head. “I have a fifteen-minute break coming up.”
“That’s all you get…for eternity?”
“For today anyway.”
“So can you help?”
“I’ll see what I can do.”