Money Dreams

Weeks before Bird hired the delicious Delia as a cashier, long before she popped up on his radar like an unexpected UFO, shame began early that day for him during breakfast when he listened to his wife complain about the broken dishwasher, trumpeting her endless list of grievances, their recent and seemingly chronic, insufficient cash flow, and how things would have just been worlds better had they never come to the armpit of a city otherwise known as Baltimore. She complained about the crappy public schools forcing them to pay for overpriced parochial schools, and of course, they were behind on their daughters’ tuition payments. Unlike Jillian, Bird grew up in Baltimore, and while he thought he’d never return after joining the Navy to escape his old man–he didn’t hate his hometown the way she did. After his old man died and his mother begged him to come home and take over the store, he returned with Jillian and their oldest daughter in tow, the other two born in the city Jillian hated so much. At first, Jillian acted excited about the relocation from New England where he was stationed, but her enthusiasm disappeared over time, first chased away by his mother and then by declining store profits. He didn’t understand why her dislike for his hometown translated into open hostility toward him when he had earned far less in the Navy and had spent months away from home.

The shame deepened a few hours later that day when the morning bread and produce drivers refused to deliver his orders, arguing about unpaid bills, forcing him to pay something toward the balances. The bread guy complained how his father paid every bill on time and in full and never asked for or ran a credit the way Bird did. Stupid asshole never noticed Bird’s upgrades to the store, beginning with an electronic cash register, the new deli cases, and a brand spanking new walk-in box. His father had insisted on a tattered cigar box under the counter for a cash register, believing he’d never get robbed, believing his employees would never develop sticky fingers using it like petty cash. Bastards!

When his father was alive, produce costs hadn’t yet spiked thanks to the Salad Bowl Strikes and grape and lettuce boycotts. The ACME and A&P supermarkets had not yet opened, and the Food-A-Rama supermarkets had not exploded all over the city like an outbreak of measles, including the brand spanking new box supermarket on Broad Street, a 10-minute walk from Bird’s store. Before that, cash flowed into the store like storm surge, and he didn’t need credit from suppliers, though he generously extended it to his customers, regulars who needed it and mostly paid, only a handful abusing the privilege. The store now hemorrhaged money. Everyone—except for those who needed the credit– bought groceries at the bigger, cheaper markets, relegating his place to a dash and run convenience shop. He racked his brain trying to figure out ways to increase cashflow— a gimmick to draw people into the store—but couldn’t think of a single idea to attract new customers.

On that day when shame plagued him, Joyce, his sole employee, minded the store while Bird sat behind his ratty looking metal desk in his second-floor office, sorting a pile of unpaid bills and past due notices. He hardly ever touched the dumb bells stacked in the corner anymore. As he moved bills and notices from one pile to the other—the meat supplier, paper goods, soft drinks, the potato chip company, dairy company that included milk and eggs, sour cream, cream and cottage cheeses, all his mainstay products, plus ice cream and other frozen desserts—trying to figure out which ones he can stall and which ones he had to pay, he considered firing Joyce. Actually, he considered firing her and stiffing her out her pay, a small pay back for all the shit she’d stolen over the last few years, a few hundred dollars that can be better spent on paying one of the suppliers until he could increase cashflow. Maybe he could just ask her to wait a week or so to be paid, he thought since he was getting too old to stock shelves. As he mulled over what to do, Joyce banging on the office door startled him.

She stuck her head inside the door. “Can I come in? Nobody’s in the store right now, and it won’t take long.”

Bird waved her in. It would be a good time to tell her either she won’t be getting paid for a week, or she’d be fired. He mulled over which way to go as she flopped uninvited onto the ratty red leather chair in front of his desk and flipped her dry, straw-like hair away from her face, pockmarked from long gone acne. He’d hired her a few years ago—and she proved to be an okay employee—despite initially lying about having spent time in jail for assault. Joyce had banged a woman over the head with a baseball bat in a dispute over a man, which inexplicably, he found hilarious. When Bird heard this tidbit, he laughed up his sleeve, wondering what man would be able to get passed her pock marked face and the gaps in her teeth, half believing she’d lied about that part. Joyce never talked about having a boyfriend.

“It don’t take a mental giant to see the store’s in trouble,” she said. “I seen you arguing with them delivery men.”

“And?” Bird said, surprised she gave him a great way to segue into bad news.

“Can you do my friend and me a little favor? We’ll pay you,” she said.

Bird sat up. Joyce pay him? What a joke. “I’m all ears,” he said.

“Can we keep a duffle bag here in your office for two weeks,” she said. “Nothing big. Just store it under the desk out of the way.”

Joyce looked earnest. She kept her body still as she waited for an answer.

“What’s in it?”

“You don’t need to know. We’ll pay $1,500 for a week.”

“That much for a bag? Do I look like an idiot.”

The bells on the front door jangled, and Joyce went back downstairs.

Bird wanted the money, but he won’t be a patsy, especially not for someone like Joyce. For all he knew, she could be trying to hide a corpse. Someone thumped slowly up the stairs, the footsteps heavy, pausing every few steps, and he expected Joyce to pop into his office carrying a huge bag. When he glanced up, Ivy Carmel filled the doorway, her tall black bouffant, a confection atop her head.

Bird rose and extended his hand. “What a surprise?”

He worked on several church committees with Ivy and donated generously to fundraisers. He’d have to rethink those donations and braced himself for a donation request, anticipating how he’d reject it. Ivy ignored his hand and hugged him instead before plopping into the chair Joyce vacated. Ivy picked up one of the invoice piles without looking at it and began fanning herself, dabbing a sweat sheen off her forehead with a wad of tissues as she fought to catch her breath.

“Do you need some water?” he asked.

Ivy held her hand out in a stop position and shook her head no.

“Do you need a doctor?” Bird said, smiling. “Don’t have a heart attack in my office.” He laughed, sounded as if he were joking, but he meant it.

She laughed in between breaths. “Personal business,” she said.

With all the church committee meetings they’d attended together, Bird knew two things about Ivy: Despite her massive size, she could outwork anybody with the endurance of a mule. Without fail, she staffed those church fundraisers, cooking hot foods like pit beef, hotdogs, and pulled pork in the kind of heat that beat your head like a bongo drum without a break and after her shift at Tony’s Garden the night before. Second, she spiked her sodas with rum using minis she stashed in her purse. The more she drank, the happier she became and the saltier and funnier she grew. She spiked her sodas when she thought no one was looking.

“Delia. She needs a job,” Ivy said, still breathing hard.

Bird shook his head. “No can do.”

“Why not? She’s a hard worker. She’s 15.”

“Fifteen already? She needs to be 16 and have a permit,” Bird said, unable to picture the girl. He pictured his secret apartment, his fun palace, where he escaped Jillian and the kids, where he put distance between him and his woeful inability to measure up to her unattainable standards, where he brought his fun girls, those girls who never ask him about money or balancing a check book, or his schedule, those quick pickups he met here and here, whomever caught his fancy, to his studio man cave on the 13^th floor of the TreeHouse Apartments.

“You can pay her under the table,” Ivy said, finally setting the stack of invoices back on the desk.

“I can’t do it right now.” The pile of invoices Ivy used to fan herself kept him in check. If his cash flow were healthier, he’d hired her on the spot, sight unseen. He liked being around young girls, those beautiful, soft-skinned does. Even the most unattractive ones had no idea that their youth made them beautiful– before they grew up, grew out and grew older like Ivy with her perfect pink rouge circles like a pair of taillights on her cheeks under the outdated big hair.

“Come on. You won’t regret it.”

“Tell you what–I’ll get back to you,” he said, standing, wanting to her disappear. Bird helped her out of the chair, ushered her to the office door, and spied Joyce at the bottom of the stairs. As soon as Ivy lumbered down the stairs and out of the store, Joyce sprinted up and poked her head inside the office.

“You in or out?” she asked.

“Out,” he said. “Tell me what’s in the bag, and then I’ll think about it.”

Joyce stared at him a long time, silent, unsmiling; he could see her weighing the options.

“Coke,” she said in a low voice.

“Shut the door. Let’s talk,” he said.

It’s 1978 and Bird knew the cops cared more about marijuana than cocaine, not yet on their radar. Maybe without realizing it, Joyce just solved his cash flow problems.

“Maybe I want to do more than just store some bags,” Bird said.

“That ain’t my lane,” Joyce said.

“Then who’s lane is it?”

Joyce fidgeted in the chair for a few minutes before she said, “Look, I can’t tell you. Can’t you just sit tight and start with the holding the bags ‘til we see what happens? This new side hustle can get us both killed. We can’t play with these people.”

“Why are you playing at all then, Joyce?” 

“You think you pay me enough to pay rent and live? That’s a laugh.”

Bird knew he paid her the minimum and could barely afford that.

“Does anyone know you’re planning to hide that shit in my store?” Bird asked.

“Do you think I’m crazy? Joyce said.

Bird stared at Joyce’s sad looking pock marked face and realized that no one would ever suspect her of being involved with cocaine. She wouldn’t be the kind to waste money on fancy clothes or cars. He realized that no one would suspect him either, businessman, a pillar of the community with his volunteer work and generous church donations, his status as a Navy veteran. He imagined paying his bills, stocking the store, fattening his bank accounts, shutting up his damned wife. He also imagined taking the business away from Joyce because he’d know better how to deal with the suppliers than she did, and no one would ever think that a mom-and pop grocery store in a well-known Baltimore neighborhood would harbor an off-the-grid business. Most of all, he imagined hiring Ivy’s nubile young nymph of a daughter, envisioning her behind the register and on the bed in his secret apartment. Money dreams filled his head. It felt like a fever.

“Looks like we’re in business, Joyce,” he said, extending his hand to cement the deal. “Partner.”

Smarter and more worldly than Joyce, Bird knew it would only be a matter of time before he’d take over the enterprise and keep the profits.

Joyce didn’t shake his hand. She barely looked at him. “See you tomorrow,” she said, and thumped down the stairs, the bells on the front door jangling as she left.

© Rosalia Scalia 

Rosalia Scalia has published two short story collections, Stumbling Toward Grace and Under the Radar (Unsolicited Press). Her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Medicine and Meaning, BigMuddy 21, Notre Dame Review, The Oklahoma Review, North Atlantic Review, ThePortland Review, and Quercus Review, among others. She holds an MA in writing from Johns Hopkins University and is a Maryland State Arts Council Independent Artist’s Award recipient. She won the Gary Wilson Award for Short Fiction from descant literary magazine and the Editor’s Select award from Willow Review. Her short story in Pebble Lake was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She lives with her family in Baltimore City. http://www.rosaliascalia.com.

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