I debated for several minutes if swords were allowed in Vile and Co. Grocery store. If she wasn't brandishing it, I don't see what harm it could do. I watched the pretty blue-haired pirate from my vantage point in checkout number 6. She wasn't extremely tall, perhaps 5'5". Sort of thin with a frame that screamed Japanese Anime. Her bright blue hair was short and curled under her ears. Little spiky tufts of it stuck out of holes in her perfectly black pirate hat. I was totally fixated with the young women.

"Excuse me, young man."

I ignored the voice.

"I said, excuse me… Jed?" The woman's hot orange, inch long manicured nails flicked my nametag. I turned and was aghast. "Are these eggs fresh? I only use fresh eggs in my keesh surprise."

It was one of those lizard women. You know the type. Spent most of their lives smoking filter-less cigarettes and drinking vodka rather than ingesting anything that is remotely good for one's body. Her skin was leathery and I seriously wondered if she slept in a tanning bed, because how could just the sun alone do that to her appearance? No harm in using week old eggs because she'll probably be dead in a year.

"Yes, we just got them in today," I lied.

This seemed to appease the great lizard woman and she dropped the eggs into her basket and wandered away. No one ever said thank you anymore.

My attention returned to the sweet little pirate girl. She fumbled with a few magazines on the nearby rack. She had on a curious smile with a vertical bar labrea piercing. It wasn't the only metal on her face; she had also an eyebrow ring above what I can only assume was her "good" eye, being that there was an eye patch over the other. I think the reason I took such an interest in her over the other customers was her crazy getup. Very Yo-ho-ho-and-a-bottle-of-rum-like. Never mind that there were no lakes, let alone any high seas near Smalltowne. Besides the hat proudly displaying the Jolly Rodger, she had on a puffy white peasant shirt with a little blue vest all laced up. Her skirt was short, black and shredded. I particularly liked the purple and black striped tights that covered her long legs. She was beautiful. I tried to mentally will her to come over to talk to me. All I knew is that I wanted to hear her voice and find out her name. She kept flipping up the eye patch that covered her right eye, the "bad" eye, and looking over her shoulder. I wondered if she were being followed because she sure acted like it. The pirate girl suddenly dropped the magazine and sprinted for aisle 13, the produce section. She rounded the corner and nearly tripped over her own tall, chunky, black leather boots. Its not every day at Vile and Co. Grocery store that you get pirates for customers.

I leaned over my register and called out to the kid on checkout 4, "Hey Rodney! Did you check out that blue-haired girlie? What's she playing at, dressed up like a pirate?"

Rodney looked up from his well-worn tennis shoes and gave me a blank stare, "Pirate? I didn't notice."

Now Rodney was about as smart as a box of rocks, but how could you not notice this girl? Her persona was like a ray of light in this dreadful store. He stood slightly off center in his checkout area, his shoulders slouched and his head sort of cocked to one side. Rodney's eyes were a little too close together and his mouth was a little too far from his nose. Nice kid, but being a checkout boy at Vile and Co. was probably all the farther he was going to go in life. They could have at least given him a vest that fit.

I watched for her to emerge from aisle 13. The other customers seemed to float through the store uninterested and uncaring. Slipping cans of soup and packages of spaghetti noodles into their baskets, ho-humming about the long tedious day. What's with everyone today? It was like everyone else in the store was in a trance but the pirate and me. Well, I guess that was just how Smalltowne was. Everyone was so wrapped up in their little lives, in their little town, with their little crisis, that the world beyond their nose just didn't exist. I couldn't wait to leave. This job at Vile and Co. was only a stepping stone to a bigger and better life somewhere far away from Smalltowne. Where was she? The pirate girl had been somewhere in the back of the store for over ten minutes. I shifted uneasily in my checkout. I started to think about any possible reason to go over to that section of the store to see her again. I started losing myself in daydreams. Running through beautiful meadows hand in hand with the little pirate girl.

There was a long series of thuds to my left on the counter. I turned sharply, irritated that my attention was being shifted from watching for the girl. I let out a little yelp at finding myself face to face with her. She yelped in return and then winked, or perhaps blinked - I couldn't see her right eye. It was then that I saw what she had been dropping on the countertop. She had her arms full of potatoes, several of which were overflowing onto the floor and counter.

"This must be every potato we have in the store," I said pleasantly, hoping she'd say something in return.

She nodded and giggled. She leaned in and whispered slowly, "I'll be back for the instant ones later." Her voice was musical. Those few words sung in my ears. Again, she flipped the eye patch back and looked around the store. I started fumbling with the pile of tubers and tried to ring up a few at a time. On her vest was embroidered, "Pibbers - Pirate Wench". Pibbers. It must be a nickname. I suddenly realized that I wanted to know everything about her, including how she got the nickname Pibbers.

It was then that the back door creaked open. I knew Mr. Eggburt, the store manager, would be coming out. Although I didn't mind the little blue-haired cutie carrying around a sword and depleting our potato supply, I knew Mr. Eggburt would. I started rushing to get all of the potatoes into a brown paper bag. His heavy footsteps and wheezing cough came closer. I could see that the girl was getting nervous as well, her right hand started to make a break for the handle of the sword. Mr. Eggburt looming form rounded the corner of the end cap on aisle 14. The pirate girl gasped and let out a silent scream, the corners of her mouth twitching slightly. Now Mr. Eggburt definitely was not a very attractive man, but I didn't think it warranted that sort of reaction. He was fairly heavy set and always seemed to be sweating. His short sleeve yellow dress shirt was already drenched. His hair was sort of a mucky brown and it never quite lay straight on his head. I could see that he was having a similar reaction to seeing the pirate girl, as she had him. His normally pasty skin was taking on a very purplish hue.

He stammered, "Who let her in?" He waddled quickly over to my checkout; I thought he was going to have an aneurysm. "Jed! How could you let this… this… thing into our store?! And look! She's trying to take all of the prisoners…er…I mean potatoes!"

He waved his wet fat hands frantically in the air. "Listen to me wench-" It was one thing to see it embroidered in thick red thread on her vest, it was another it hear it out loud. "I want you out of this store immediately and never, never interfere with our business again…" he spoke quickly, his mouth filling with spit.

Pibbers grabbed as many potatoes as she could and scowled at Mr. Eggburt. "Not without these! Mark my words, Eggie, your day will come! We'll be back and you'll pay for your evils. You can't keep them in the dark for long!" The little blue-haired girl was fuming with anger and holding the potatoes, threatening.

"Don't you think you're being a little rash, Mr. Eggburt? Maybe she just likes potatoes," I said in her defense.

"Likes potatoes? Po-TATE-oes?" He said as if the idea were rancid.

Mr. Eggburt pushed the blue-haired pirate through the door, howling at her. She braced herself against the doorframe and caught my eye.

"Take off your glasses!" she screamed as her hands scraped across the metal.

Glasses? I don't wear glasses. What an odd thing to say. I reached up to my face and was flabbergasted when my fingertips hit thin cold frames. Why was I wearing glasses? How strange. I slipped them off my nose. Rose tinted, of course. I flipped the pink spectacles repeatedly in my hand. I looked up to ask Rodney if I had been wearing them long, but my voice died in my mouth and all that escaped was its death whimper. The walls of Vile and Co. Grocery store were no longer pleasantly white. In fact, nothing in the store was as it had previously been. It was as if it had warped into some sort of den of evil. The walls were like fluid green goo, pulsating with a sort of neon glow. The floor was thick mud. Where was the horrid linoleum? Even horrid linoleum is better than mud. I was seeing the store for the first time as it really was. It was like I had been transported onto some level of hell. Rodney, still wearing rose glasses, slid a glowing slimy package across the scanner for an elderly couple that rang up as cheese. Then my vision fell upon Mr. Eggburt. The horror! He was no longer the nasty little man I had come to loathe, but was in fact an eggplant. A huge, seething eggplant. I knew that they existed, but here? In Smalltowne? How had such evil corrupted our home without anyone knowing? I backed against my counter, arm outstretched pointing and shaking.

"You… You're a… Here? Good Lord!"

He slid towards me and spoke with a distorted voice thick with drool, "Put your glasses back on and continue working, drone."

"Stay back! Stay away from me!" I tossed what was formally the magazine rack between us as I raced for the door. "I quit! I quit! Your cursed store has no hold on me anymore!" I threw the rose tinted glasses to the floor and opened the door.

"You'll be back! You won't be able to handle this reality! You'll crawl back and beg for me to disguise the world and restore your ignorance…" Mr. Eggburt screeched as he picked up the glasses with his long freaky arms.

"Never!" I yelled hoping the blue-haired girl was still outside, waiting to help me out of this wicked place. I knew that if I was with her I would be safe. She would know what to do. I scanned what used to be an empty parking lot, now an empty river of sludge. She was gone. It was too late now; I couldn't stay in this place. Rodney continued checking out customers as if the scene weren't taking place. What did he see? What did any of them see?

"This store is EVIL!" I yelled, "EVIL!"

No reaction.

I turned and ran. The world had changed. I was alone.

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