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She visibly relaxes, her shoulders dropping from where they had hiked up nearly to her ears. “What do you mean you reacted to them that way? Like… how did it stand out to you, feel different, than if maybe I told you to sit still?”
I tilt my head to the side and back, looking up toward the ceiling but not seeing it. Instead, I’m visualizing through my mind’s eye, seeing and hearing the way he spoke the directions and then watching myself act on them.
“I… I guess because once I realized I was in the middle of doing what he said, I was conscious of the fact that I was doing it just because he told me to. Not because I would’ve anyway. It was almost like, even though he wouldn’t know I did exactly as he told me to, I still wanted to do it just to… please him. Like… if he were to find out, it would make me happy that it made him happy I followed his orders.” I blink and shake my head before meeting her eyes across the booth. “I know it sounds weird and like I just talked in circles. I don’t know how else to put it.”
She’s waving off my regret before I even finish. “No, no. I get it. I totally know what you mean. Sarge will order me to write five thousand words within five hours and send them to him… ‘or else,’” she adds, using her fingers to make quotation marks and making her voice all sultry on the last words. “And even though I need to do that anyway, and probably would without his order, I find myself… more excited, maybe even more willing, to do it, since it’s ‘for him.’” She makes finger quotes again, and I nod.
“Exactly! Yeah, I would’ve washed my hands with the antibacterial soap, but I probably would’ve been lazy about it. Procrastinated. Fucked off on my phone or played with my plants before moseying into the bathroom to unbandage it and wash it off. But since he specifically said to do it when I woke up, I was in the middle of scrubbing them clean before I even opened both eyes.”
She grins. “You need to find out who this mystery man is. Shall we go on an adventure to the home improvement store to see if we can discover his identity?” She rubs her hands together mischievously, but I’m already shaking my head.
“No. No way. It’s one thing to be caught balls-deep in garbage in the dark of night with nothing but a streetlight to reveal my hot-messness. It’s entirely another to show up during the day with the sun shining or at night when the whole store is lit up.”
She frowns at me. “You say that like you’re some creature from the dark lagoon or something. You do realize that you’re hot, even when you’re balls-deep in garbage, and even if you were to be doing that particular activity in the light of day, right?”
I roll my eyes. “You have an obligation to say that as my bestie.”
She scoffs. “Bitch, you know I’m always the first person to be like ‘what the fuck are you wearing?’ Don’t give me that shit. I only speak the truth to you. I just do it in a way that doesn’t cause emotional damage.”
I smile. “And that’s why I love you the most.”
“Okay, enough of that gooey crap. I see you brought your laptop. What are we researching if we aren’t going on a mission to find this guy?”
Reaching for said laptop, I pull it out of my bag and get everything situated in front of me while I tell her the devastating news. “Before I actually drove off last night, Dumpster Daddy told me there’s a new manager who is cracking down on all the rules, policies, and codes at their store. He let me know that they’re going to be tightening up on lots of things that had been lax, and one of those things is the store after hours. People have been coming and taking the empty pallets in the back of the building, the empty metal shelves, perhaps honestly thinking they were trash. But if they’d done their research like I did, they’d know some of those things are just rented. Like the vendors pick up the empties when they bring the new inventory.”
“Okay, so we’re researching the codes and policies so you can find loopholes and continue dumpster diving there?” she guesses.
“Nope. Dumpster Daddy informed me that the asshole store manager is going to set up drive-bys with the police to check the property—specifically the back of the store where the dumpster and pallets are kept—multiple times a night. And if I’m caught by the actual police, I might get a warning the first time, but after that, I will be charged with trespassing. And ya girl can’t afford bail or a ticket or whatever monetary consequence that might entail,” I reply.
