Читать книгу The Checkout Girl - Tazeen Ahmad - Страница 15

I’m on a basket checkout today and mince pies, Christmas decorations, gifts for loved ones are all starting to pass across my till now. There’s not so much time for chat—due to the huffing and puffing of impatient customers congregating in the queue here because they want to get out as quickly as possible. I know they don’t want to make small talk, but there is a supervisor hanging around nearby and I wonder if she is assessing me. And so I talk.

As during my previous shifts, I find myself chatting to customers about the price of things and affordability. At least a couple of times a shift, this line of chat is followed by hushed, embarrassed queries about vacancies at the store. Today a woman in her fifties asks straight after telling me how expensive she is starting to find grocery shopping. An hour or two later, another shopper about to start training as a police officer asks me about Christmas vacancies. I’m convinced that £6.30 an hour won’t go very far for the likes of them, but I’ve got to be wrong.

Despite the number of people complaining about the price of things, almost eight out of ten customers, with a big basket or trolley full of shopping, tell me they had just popped in for one thing. One guy tells me he’s a sucker for the subliminal marketing and product placement. Almost every customer comes to my till laden with reduced bakery items, cut-price clothes and cheap booze. And then gasps at the total.

One customer tells me today that the Morrisons in town is heaving because of the discounted whisky. ‘It’s much cheaper than yours—and it was much busier in there.’ He’s got a point. For a store that claims not to be bitten by the credit crunch, it doesn’t feel all that busy. There are definitely busy times, but usually there tend to be no more than three to four customers waiting on basket tills and one or two on the trolley tills. And when it’s quiet, it can be very quiet.

There is a fundamental difference between the customers coming to basket tills compared to the trolley ones. Baskets seem to attract men in the 30-50 age group who offer grunts rather than actual words in reply to my (usually futile) attempts to chat. They only ever purchase a couple of items, one of which is, invariably, Lynx deodorant.

Truth be known, I’m scared witless of this type of customer and usually give up at the first hurdle. But today, when a grumpy thirty-something comes my way, I decide I won’t let him go without a fight. He cracks and before I know it he’s telling me that he has no plans for the weekends in the lead-up to Christmas, otherwise he won’t be able to afford festivities this year. Somehow, though, he’s convinced it’s going to be his cheapest Christmas yet. ‘There are going to be price-cuts galore over the next few weeks. PC World, Curry’s, M&S, John Lewis—they’re all either in trouble or having big sales early, so as far as I’m concerned it’s a win-win situation.’

Although he turns out to be very pleasant, if I am too slow for the blokes in this age group they bellow like animals preparing for battle. When I need help from a till captain, one charmer shouts from the back of the queue, ‘I only got in this queue because I thought it’d be quicker.’ This is met with a rumble of approval from the other men waiting in line. One man throws his basket down and storms off.

And then a young Asian guy wearing a shirt that is so tight the button sitting at mid-chest level looks like it may pop and fly straight into my eye puts two bottles of Bacardi down on my till. I look at him, take a deep breath and ask for some ID.

‘You’ve got to be kidding!’

‘I’m sorry, you look so young.’

‘I don’t carry ID,’ he says, turning himself away from me defensively and rolling his eyes.

‘OK, let me just get a supervisor.’

There are loud groans from the queue. The man behind him barks: ‘Just serve him—he looks over twenty-one.’

Two women join in the blood sport taking shape before them. ‘I’d sell it to him, he looks much older than twenty-one.’

Bolstered by the support of fellow customers, he turns himself back to me and snaps, ‘What’s the matter with you? I’m old enough.’ His frown is now menacing.

‘I’m sorry,’ I whisper pathetically. ‘Take it as a compliment.’

‘Look,’ he says, pulling up his shirt. ‘I’ve got tattoos.’

I stare at his chest and a large, dark blue scythe stares back at me. And still there is no till captain.

‘Just sell it to him.’

‘Job’s worth.’

‘I got two kids. I’m married. I got me own business.’

I repeatedly push the supervisor button and get up on my feet to see if I can get ANYONE’s attention.

Eventually the supervisor arrives.

‘It’s fine.’

He then turns to the customer and in an act of bloke-to-bloke camaraderie says, ‘It’s all right, I’m from around here.’ They both laugh and the supervisor leaves.

As for the now riled-up customer, it’s far from over. After paying, I notice he hasn’t packed his bottles. I ask if he wants a bag.

‘What do you think?’ he growls sarcastically. ‘It won’t be a very good idea for me to go back into work with those, would it?’ He aims this not at me but his supportive audience behind.

I bite my lip until I can almost taste blood. I try to explain the scale of the consequences for me but no one is listening.

The only thing that stops the shift from being a total disaster is meeting the trolley boy with an awesome ability to recall any random fact. When I say any—I mean ANY.