Hannibal, Missouri by: Amber Bell

“Follow me,” a broad-shouldered woman wearing a name tag that said Deborah told Jade.

Jade followed her through a glass door, past a man working a register, and down a hall lined with half-open boxes.

Their journey ended inside a room used as the gas station’s office, storage unit, and meeting place.

“Sorry, there is only one seat in here,” Deborah said before gesturing for Jade to sit on a stack of upside-down milk crates.

She took a pair of glasses off the top of her head, placed them on the end of her well-powdered nose, and began reading the application Jade had filled out a few minutes’ prior.

“So, what have you been doing since you left the Dollar General?” she asked.

“I was getting help,” Jade answered.

“For what?” Deborah asked while setting the application down on the cluttered desk.

Jade cleared her throat and said, “I had a substance abuse problem.”

“You still using?”

“No, Ma’am,” Jade answered while her right leg began to bounce.

“You sure? Cause I’ll tell you right now: if you are, you won’t last long here.”

“I’m not using. That part of my life is over,”

“Good. And you’re fine with the 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift?”

“Yes, Ma’am,”

“Why do you want this job? Why not go back to Dollar General?” Deborah asked.

“Well, I need money so my little girl and I can move out of my mama’s house. And if I work the night shift here, I can take a few evening classes at the community college and sleep while she is at school during the day.”

Deborah took a deep breath and said, “Well, Jerry leaves next week, and you’re the only one who has applied, so I guess beggars can’t be choosers. When can you start?”

“Anytime,” Jade answered.

“Be here at eleven tomorrow night, then. Jerry can show you the ropes. Hopefully, you’ll be fine on your own after a few days.”

“Now, if things start to go missing or you stop showing up, you’re done. That’s it. There will be no second chances,” Deborah said while pointing at her.

“Understood,” Jade responded, relieved to be able to go home and tell her mother she had a job.

“Ok, I better get back out there. The scratch-offs aren’t going to sell themselves.” Deborah said.

When Jade walked in the following night, a frail man with greasy silver-black hair was standing behind the register.

“Jerry?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he answered in a gravelly voice.

“I’m Jade. I’m supposed to start tonight.”

Jerry grabbed the keys from alongside the register, opened the door that separated his workspace from the rest of the gas station, and waved for her to join him.

Inside the tiny space that contained cartons of cigarettes and containers of lottery tickets, Jade stood uncomfortably behind Jerry.

“You can set your purse down there,” he said, pointing to the shelf underneath the cash register.

“Have you ever worked at a filling station?”

“No,” she replied.

“Well, there’s not much to it. Over here, we control the pumps,” he said, pointing to a few colored buttons.  “Once we get a customer, I’ll show you how to work the register. The worst part of the job is cleaning the bathrooms at the end of the shift, “ he added.

She nodded, Jerry offered her the stool, and they silently waited for her first customer.

The next morning, when she arrived at her childhood home, her daughter was sitting at the kitchen table, eating a heavily buttered Eggo waffle.

“How was your first day?” The little girl asked.

“It was alright. Probably not as fun as your first day of school,” she answered.

“Probably not, the little girl agreed,” with her mouth full of food.

“Do you think you’ll be alright there overnight?” Her mother asked while putting a gallon of milk in the fridge.

“I should be. They have the register behind bulletproof glass or something, and you can lock this door that separates you from the rest of the station.”

“You’ll see all sorts of things working that shift,” her mother commented before taking a seat at the Formica table.

“What kind of sandwich do you want me to make you for lunch, baby girl?” Jade asked.

“Grandma already made me one,” her daughter answered before finishing the last of her waffle.

“How about a snack? Did you pack a snack?”

“Yes, crumb cake, her daughter answered,” standing up with her plate on the way to the kitchen sink.

“You go ahead and get into bed. I’ll walk her to the bus,” her mother said.

“No, I want to walk her.”

“Grandma can take me. I don’t mind.”

“I’ll take you. Grandma could probably use a break.”

“I don’t need a break.”

“Mama, I’d like to take her,” Jade replied in a low whisper.

“Do what you want,” her mother responded, getting up from the table and leaving the room.

In the following weeks, Jade started her classes at the community college, learned it was best to wear a face mask while cleaning the gas station restrooms, and missed dinner with her daughter most evenings.

She had been working for about a month when Trevor walked into the gas station. His once chiseled face now seemed hollow and empty, but his blue eyes were full of the charm she remembered.

While she was making change for the cigarettes he’d purchased, he recognized her as well.

“You’re Leo’s little sister, aren’t you?” he asked.

She nodded and smiled.

“What’s he up to these days?”  He asked while taking his change from her.

“He’s a computer programmer in Kansas City.”

“He always was smart,” he replied.

He looked at her and then at the pack of cigarettes he was holding, and said, “Hey, do you want to step outside and have one of these with me?”

She looked around the store and then outside, saw no one else, and replied, “Sure.”

Outside, they were halfway through their cigarettes and watching traffic go by when he asked, “How come you’re working here?”

She laughed and asked, “Well, how come you’re here, in your pajama pants, buying a pack of cigarettes at 2 a.m.?”

“Touche, my fair lady. I’m a night owl. What’s your answer?”

“Well, I’ll be more truthful than you. I got into some trouble, did a stint in rehab, and now I’m getting my life back on the straight and narrow.”

“Trouble with the law?” he asked after exhaling a cloud of smoke.

“No. My mama stepped in before that happened. I was using and not taking care of myself or my daughter.”

“Your mama was a lunch lady at the high school, wasn’t she?” he asked.

“Still is,” she replied.

“Man, that was so long ago, and she’s still at it, huh?”

“She is.”

He took a drag from his cigarette and asked, “What do you do besides work here? Who are you hanging out with?”

“I really don’t hang out with any of my old friends; they are still partying. But I’m taking classes to become a dental hygienist.” She answered.

“That’s a good line of work to get into. Half of this town needs a new grill. Me included,” he said before exaggerating a grin to show his crooked teeth.

Jade didn’t have to ask what he had been up to; she knew he was the one who had supplied many of her old friends with the drug of choice. But at that moment, she didn’t mind about him. She needed a break from standing behind the register, looking down at her books, and out at the pumps.

As she put out her cigarette, a diesel truck pulled up. “I better get inside, see you,” she said before returning to work.

When the warm weather arrived, Trevor began to stop by the gas station more often.

Sometimes, they’d share a laugh while she remained behind the glass, or sometimes, she would step outside and join him for a cigarette.

It didn’t bother her when he began to sell from the parking lot. Seeing his car parked there made her feel less alone during those long shifts.

During that time, Trevor asked her only once if she wanted to get high with him. She shook her head no in response, and he never asked again.

While Jade slept away during the warm summer days, her mother braided her daughter’s hair every morning. Her mother held the back of the bicycle seat as her daughter peddled down the block for the first time, and it was her mother who was given the macaroni necklace that was made during Vacation Bible School.

So, when it was time for her daughter to return to school, only Jade was pleased.

With the start of school, they settled back into their old routine. Jade walked her daughter to the bus stop each morning, slept during the day, and picked her daughter up in the afternoon.

A few weeks into the new school year, Jade was in her mother’s kitchen, placing a snack in her now first-grade daughter’s backpack, when she saw a slip of paper in the yellow folder that her daughter brought home daily.

She took it out and saw a permission slip to a children’s petting zoo. The permission slip had a field requiring a parent or guardian’s signature, and in that field was her mother’s signature.

“Why did you sign this?” Jade asked, holding up the sheet of paper.

“Because it needed to be signed,” her mother answered while scrubbing at a pot caked with oatmeal.

“It says parent or guardian, and I’m the parent; I could have signed it.”

“But you didn’t. I did.”

“Mama, you have to let me be a mother,” Jade said.

“Let you be a mother? Nobody lets anybody be a mother. You either are or you aren’t. And I think you’ve shown us if you are.”

“I had a problem. And I got better,” Jade yelled.

“I wouldn’t count your chickens before they are hatched, honey,” her mother snapped back.

Tears of rage formed in Jade’s eyes, but before she could respond, her daughter said, “My bus will be here soon.”

Jade zipped up the backpack, took her daughter’s hand, and began to walk out. And just as she placed her hand on the knob of the door, her daughter froze, looked up at Jade, and asked, “Can Grandma walk me?”

Jade took a deep breath, bent down, and whispered, “Please let me take you, baby.”

That night at school, a teacher handed Jade back the previous session’s quiz. On top of it, in red ink, there was a note that said, See me after class.

After the bell rang, Jade waited until the room was empty and went to the podium, where her teacher waited.

“You wanted to see me?” she asked.

“I did,” the teacher said, sliding a vanilla folder into her oversized canvas tote bag.

“Your grade was the lowest in the class by quite a lot. How are your other courses going?” She asked.

Jade hesitated before saying, “Ok.”

“Are you sure dental hygiene is the career path for you?”

Jade nodded with her eyes fixed on the floor and said, “I’m sure.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?” her teacher asked.

Jade raised her head, looked at her, and said, “I’m fine. I just haven’t been sleeping well, and I probably wasn’t absorbing everything I was studying.”

“Please let me know if you are lost before we see another score like that,” she said, pointing at the quiz Jade was holding.

“I will,” she answered.

That night, when she grabbed her timecard from the rack, a torn piece of scrap paper was attached to it. Written across it in blue ink was, We received a complaint about your studying. Do that on your own time.

She sighed, clocked in, and went to the register to relieve Sharon.

“I’m glad you’re here; some scum bag has been in the men’s bathroom for the past twenty minutes,” Sharon said.

“Do you think he is shooting up?” Jade asked.

“Probably. But that’s not my problem anymore,” Sharon said, grabbing her oversized purse from under the register.

As Sharon stepped out the door, Jade tied her hair in a knot on top of her head.

A few minutes into her shift, she heard moans from the washroom. When a customer took notice, she felt obligated to do something.

She knocked on the bathroom door and asked, “Are you all right?”

Her first question was met with silence.

“Do you want me to call someone?” She added.

“No,” a male voice shouted.

“Ok,” she responded, backing away from the door and heading to the register.

Almost thirty minutes had passed when a disheveled man stumbled out of the washroom, tucking a dirty white t-shirt into a pair of jeans that consisted mostly of holes.

Once she saw him disappear on foot down the road, she left her post and peered inside the men’s washroom.

There was an empty Walmart sack in a corner, a soiled pair of men’s briefs near the toilet, and vomit on the floor.

“Christ,” she said while hearing the entry bell ring.

A truck driver had come in, and while she made her way back to the register, he made his way to the refrigerators lined up against the back wall.

After she scanned the energy drink he had chosen, he said, “It smells god awful in here.”

“It does,” she agreed.

He left, and she placed a handwritten out-of-order sign on the men’s washroom door and sprayed some Lysol in the air of the surrounding area.

Walking back to the register, tears trickled down her makeup-fee face. She knew that a disgusting bathroom was waiting for her at the end of her shift. She knew that back at home, there would be another morning of her daughter preferring her mother over her, and she knew that that evening at school, she would face more material she might not ever understand.

Standing there in the empty gas station, she questioned her ability to pass her classes. She wondered if she had chosen the wrong path while sitting in that consoler’s office. Maybe, she thought, the gas station was the only path she was capable of. And maybe she told herself her daughter was right to prefer her mother.

As she wiped her eyes, she noticed Trevor standing outside, beside the firewood, with his back to her.

She pulled out her purse, opened it, unzipped her wallet, saw she had fifteen dollars, and then looked at him.

She closed her purse and stuffed it back under the register.

Trevor turned around, caught her eye, and waved.

Jade raised her hand in acknowledgment, and after they exchanged waves, he turned back to face the gas pumps.

She watched as he shifted his weight from one foot to another. She began to pick at the skin surrounding her thumbnail.

It was when he started to head to his car that she fumbled for the keys and opened the door that separated her from the rest of the store.

She hurried past racks of cheap snacks, a spinning stand of Mark Twain magnets, and a glass case of stale pastries.

She stepped outside, with the door dinging behind her, and just as he was opening the driver’s side door to his black Camaro, she shouted, “Hey, Trevor.”

Amber Bell

Image from pixabay.com Filling station at night with the pumps lit brightly and the rest of the place in darkness.