AllFreeNovel
Share Us
That’s exactly what I’ve been doing, and it hasn’t exactly been working.
“And if that doesn’t snag him, show him your tits. He’ll kiss you for sure.”
My sister hangs up the phone. I’m not entirely sure if she does it on purpose. She rarely goes through the formality of goodbyes but also often mistakes the radio button for the hang-up one.
I chuck my phone in my purse and walk to the door of Wilde Beauty, where I flip theclosedsign toopen.
It seems weird to operate this place, seeing as it sort of appeared out of thin air. But I figure it gives me a low-risk way to try out what is essentially my dream job. Skincare is my jam. I know a hell of a lot about it, as I’ve been buying drugstore skincare for Eaton’s Drug Mart for years. Plus, I have a good business head on my shoulders. Running Wilde Beauty should be a cinch.
Narrator: It was not a cinch.
At a quarter to ten, exactly forty-four minutes into my new adventure, a customer enters my shop. Middle-aged white woman, gray shirt, cropped hair.
Her eyes immediately set upon me and narrow. “I’d like to speak to a manager.”
My store is eighty square feet. I don’t know where she thinks I’d be hiding my managerial staff. She scowls when I tell her, “I’d be happy to help you out.”
She produces a bottle of moisturizer. “I don’t like the smell of this. I’m here to return it.”
I know the brand immediately. It’s from a fragrance-free line. So, kind of weird. But okay.
“Not a problem,” I tell her. “I can offer you an exchange or refund. Whatever works best.”
She marches over to the display of the same line of products, picks up a bottle identical to the unacceptable one in my hands, then promptly stomps over to my counter, where she slams it down. I can already sense that I will be calling Kiersten immediately following this interaction.
“Hi, um.” I hold up the returned bottle in my hands. “The product you just picked out is the same one you wanted to return.”
She stares at me like I’m stupid for stating this fact. “Yes, and?”
Deep breath. “Well, if your reason for the return is that you don’t care for the smell, this new one isn’t going to smell any different.”
The roll of her eyes is so exaggerated that I worry her eyeballs will get stuck.
“Well, maybe there’s something wrong with the one I bought. It has probably gone bad.”
I have a jar of this very same cream in a shoebox under the sink in the other timeline. I use it whenever I run out of my favorite stuff. It’s my backup cream and is easily two years old. It smells just fine.
I unscrew the top of the lid. “Let’s see what is going on here.”
Ah. Well, there’s a problem, all right. Just not the problem she described.
“This jar is almost empty.” I hold it out to her in case there’s been some sort of mistake.
She folds her arms across her chest. “So?”
I summon my best customer service voice and try to form kind words, but what comes out is more of a “You can’t return an empty jar.”
She glares at me. “You’re telling me you don’t stand by your products. I even have a receipt.” She tosses a white sheet of paper on the counter.
A brief glance down has me biting my lip to both stifle my laughter and prevent the string of profanities running through my head from making their way out of my mouth.
“You didn’t even buy the cream here.” The receipt is an email from one of those huge online retailers.
She scoffs. “That shouldn’t matter. You sell this product. You should stand behind it.”
I count to ten and then politely tell her to leave. She responds by threatening to ruin me with a bad Tripadvisor review. I tell her no one under forty uses Tripadvisor and to go right ahead.
It’s barely ten, and I’m already done with this day.
