BLACK EYE

The devil & the Midnight Clerk

¨So is it ok if we call you Dave?¨ I asked for the sake of this story.

¨Dave's fine.¨ The eyewitness had answered. ¨Just leave my name out of it. Most people don't like to talk about this stuff and this'll be the last time I do this.¨

¨Ok, let's begin.¨ I had said trying to hide my zeal.

Being a midnight clerk at a convenience store is like putting a target on your back, but people do it because they need the money. My boss gave me the weekends off and a ten cent raise if I would work the graveyard shift. He hired a large, intimidating guy from our affiliate in the ¨'hood¨ to work Saturday and Sunday. I was robbed twice and he was robbed by a machete wielding bandit armed with 9mm. The guy actually used the truck driver delivering gas to get inside with the blade under his neck. That criminal had taken a customer's wallet, the driver's wallet, Mister tough-guy-cashier's wallet, and two boxes of Kool 100s. Every chance I could get, I was looking for another job.

Fearful, mostly fearful, I had started reading the Bible again. That's when...that's when he came in. That night had been dark, real dark, with few stars and light fog. Looking down at Scripture, my concentration was broken by the sound of a large, crimson red, Dodge Ram running through its diesel fuel parked by pump six. The fog had gotten thicker and the night seemed darker. Quickly, I had book marked my place and began to set my Bible on the counter behind me, but when I glance upwards, he was already at the door.

This guy is got to the door like he had been there the whole time, I thought. He was so tall his face had been covered by the exit sign. Feeling no need to scrutinize him further, I unlocked the door without hesitation. Potential thieves didn't perform robberies in, what appeared to be, a brand new truck. It was always in beaten, primer infested, older vehicles or men on foot. I know from experience.

¨Marlboro Reds.¨ He had said in a voice that sounded like rocks grinding together.

The sound of his voice had woken me up out of my graveyard shift lull. In that moment, I believed that I must have imagined the sound of that pitch because no one sounds like that. He had placed six dollars on the counter and my cashiers autopilot put it in the drawer and easily counted the loose change. His hand stretched out and I paused in horror when I had seen it. My mind was trying so hard to process it and my need for survival activated. I'm not to sure how our biology works, but it seems our Creator designed a sweet default switch for these occasions.

His open hand had looked like a wolf's. The mid-section had been extended to damn far for any human's to be and he had claws. They weren't the result of unkempt nails, they were long, yellow talons and the middle finger looked like it was nine inches. The hand had so much hair on it, I'd seen some growth on the inside. A default reaction released me from momentary paralysis and had me drop the change into his paw coming nowhere near to touching it. He must have recognized this, because he had snorted like a giant bull with an inward laugh.

¨Picking up that thing again.¨ He had said as he pointed to the Bible.

My thoughts had tried to make sense of it all, but they just refused. The closest thing that comes to this would be like a computer freezing because its processor didn't know what to do with the info. In that instant, it was like time stood still around me. No hum of the refrigerator units or sound of cars passing in the night. When the heater kicked back on, time started back up again. Immediately, my eyes searched outside for him and his blood red truck. Not even tail-lights could be found as I had noticed the fog had began to lift. Locking the front door again, I searched for any sign of him. How the hell could he have known? Who the hell has animal paws for hands?

When dawn decided to show up, I had hastily counted out my register, and drove home in a graveyard shift daze. Before I had faded off to sleep that day, I had wondered if I had heard him correctly. Maybe, I thought, he had taken a wild guess and decided to screw with me. Yeah, that made more sense than a visit from the lord of the underworld. (Or something that was pretending to be.) I had told myself, I'll share this with my buddy Abacus [real name withheld] he likes this kind of crap. Besides, anyone else would think I'm bat-shit crazy and his tin-foil hat is always on.

¨Hey, I'll be the one to tell the bad jokes around here, 'Dave'!¨ I interrupted.

¨It is what you do, 'Abacus'. Can I finish my story?¨

So that's when I met you at the Starbucks by your favorite book store. It was frustrating, because it had taken me three months to remember what he had said. One of the most important things in this story and I couldn't recall until exactly three whole months had passed. Why three damn months, I have no clue. That same night, the night I actually remembered, two fully restored late sixties VW Bugs just pulled in front of me on my way to work. It was just before midnight, two blood red Volkswagens pulled in front of me both with license plates that read; ¨The Devil¨.

One of them had a ¨The¨ license plate and the other the word ¨Devil¨. I did try to look inside them from a safe distance, but they had tinted widows all the way around. Those windows had been so dark, it looked like they had been painted that way. Eventually, the two of them had made a left turn together and I drove straight with no interest to following them. I had wondered, why me? Some people would give anything to see this kind of stuff. All I wanted to do at that time was make a buck. It's funny how that works. I realized now, that the things are just drawn to certain people like a magnet or flies to crap. No one seems to have a choice, but maybe, we shouldn't play with fire.

end.