sleeping on the liquor store floor
Jim Ray Daniels
Having access to unlimited free cocaine seemed like heaven. Until it melted into hell.
That blank line is a snowstorm. Ask the weatherman in his dandruff-sprinkled toupee madly dancing on the greenscreen map when all we wanted was the temperature. We were working in her parents’ liquor store. Their son-in-law/drug dealer so successful with his, they bought one too! They spoke in the faux exclamation points of political couples, oblivious to Money Laundering 101 while we were getting an A for effort and free drugs—me and the sister of the woman married to the dealer. One big happy 80s couple with gold-plated his and hers razor blades.
The parents took a trip, left us in charge. After all, we ran the dealer’s store so well! We stayed up all night in the parents’ sprawling semi-mansion with our bag of Halloween candy and expensive champagne we’d shoplifted from ourselves. So progressive, they had a trash-compactor in the kitchen. Cool. I kept it busy crunching beer cans. We were not married. Don’t do it, the dealer told me. A wise guy, he carried a briefcase and a gun. Nice briefcase, I told him, staring at the gun. The gun, his favorite punctuation, better than cigarettes and menacing looks.
Fifteen minutes late, we rushed to open up the store. She unlocked the trembling door, and we let in angry customers who knew exactly what they wanted. We also knew what they wanted. We sold it to them. The customer is often wrong, but what the hell. It didn’t matter. It made the old math look like counting sticks before burning them.
I went in the back room to check the stock and curled up on the beige carpeting. I’d never been in a carpeted liquor store. If you’ve never stayed up all night doing cocaine and then had to do something civilized, just imagine it plus two (or three?) bottles of good (expensive) (three) champagne. The coarse rug scraped off my body’s edges. I’d never been so happy in my sleep. Until she kicked me: it’s your turn to press buttons. I washed my face and rubbed out the impressions the rug had made. The impressions I made on the world suddenly visible, like this loser is not going to make it to 30. The title’s lower-case. The rug made it that quiet.
The parents’ liquor store wasn’t doing nearly as well as the dealer’s. It smelled like a florist. What was the trick to make it smell like that? To make money selling liquor? I mean: To getting out alive? The paper bags designed to hold fifths and pints of booze nearly took my head off with their crackling. We’d forgotten to eat. The store sold chips and pretzels. Crumbs floated across the rug like debris after the ship exploded. My mouth so dry it stopped the clock. Then went into reverse. We were college graduates taking a gap decade. Is she still alive? Snowed in somewhere? I’d followed her to Milwaukee so she could have the abortion among friends. I liked it so much, I stayed! The dealer kept trying to give me a gun. C’mon, I’m serious, he said and took a shot out an open window.
At sixteen, I’d worked in a Detroit liquor store despite being underage. Me and liquor stores had this bad thing going way back. One night, the boss and I alone in the store. Rain. Customers ducking in and out under the rattling metal awning. Two guys linger at the beer coolers until it’s just them and us, and they don’t want to dance. Thus, the guns drilling into the sides of our heads—my long hair, the boss balding—they escorted us to the back room and invited us to lay on the floor. Tile. Muddy footprints. Is this when I die? The boss was swallowing his whole life wide-eyed across from me. My life had only been a snack. I was still a growing boy. Count to ten, they said. Trembling. But clear they’d rehearsed. I can do that: 1, 2, 3…The door swung open and closed. I still smell that floor.
Do I have one more liquor store floor in my life? At some point, we started saying I love you in between the lines of free coke from the dealer. Or I love it. The lines blurred. One night we were so happy—I mean stoned out of our fucking minds—that we took speed to stay up all night so we could get married in the morning. She called the local priest at 3 or 4 a.m. and he took her seriously while probably making a note to get his number unlisted. Doing cocaine was like body surfing until a wave thumped you face-first onto the sand.
At the end of the day, I went back and nudged her awake. She had lines on her face too. She pried open her dry-ice mouth to smile. We never got married. Already the clock was ticking again. Want some chips? I asked. Somebody rattled the door, but I’d already locked it.
Jim Ray Daniels
Having access to unlimited free cocaine seemed like heaven. Until it melted into hell.
That blank line is a snowstorm. Ask the weatherman in his dandruff-sprinkled toupee madly dancing on the greenscreen map when all we wanted was the temperature. We were working in her parents’ liquor store. Their son-in-law/drug dealer so successful with his, they bought one too! They spoke in the faux exclamation points of political couples, oblivious to Money Laundering 101 while we were getting an A for effort and free drugs—me and the sister of the woman married to the dealer. One big happy 80s couple with gold-plated his and hers razor blades.
The parents took a trip, left us in charge. After all, we ran the dealer’s store so well! We stayed up all night in the parents’ sprawling semi-mansion with our bag of Halloween candy and expensive champagne we’d shoplifted from ourselves. So progressive, they had a trash-compactor in the kitchen. Cool. I kept it busy crunching beer cans. We were not married. Don’t do it, the dealer told me. A wise guy, he carried a briefcase and a gun. Nice briefcase, I told him, staring at the gun. The gun, his favorite punctuation, better than cigarettes and menacing looks.
Fifteen minutes late, we rushed to open up the store. She unlocked the trembling door, and we let in angry customers who knew exactly what they wanted. We also knew what they wanted. We sold it to them. The customer is often wrong, but what the hell. It didn’t matter. It made the old math look like counting sticks before burning them.
I went in the back room to check the stock and curled up on the beige carpeting. I’d never been in a carpeted liquor store. If you’ve never stayed up all night doing cocaine and then had to do something civilized, just imagine it plus two (or three?) bottles of good (expensive) (three) champagne. The coarse rug scraped off my body’s edges. I’d never been so happy in my sleep. Until she kicked me: it’s your turn to press buttons. I washed my face and rubbed out the impressions the rug had made. The impressions I made on the world suddenly visible, like this loser is not going to make it to 30. The title’s lower-case. The rug made it that quiet.
The parents’ liquor store wasn’t doing nearly as well as the dealer’s. It smelled like a florist. What was the trick to make it smell like that? To make money selling liquor? I mean: To getting out alive? The paper bags designed to hold fifths and pints of booze nearly took my head off with their crackling. We’d forgotten to eat. The store sold chips and pretzels. Crumbs floated across the rug like debris after the ship exploded. My mouth so dry it stopped the clock. Then went into reverse. We were college graduates taking a gap decade. Is she still alive? Snowed in somewhere? I’d followed her to Milwaukee so she could have the abortion among friends. I liked it so much, I stayed! The dealer kept trying to give me a gun. C’mon, I’m serious, he said and took a shot out an open window.
At sixteen, I’d worked in a Detroit liquor store despite being underage. Me and liquor stores had this bad thing going way back. One night, the boss and I alone in the store. Rain. Customers ducking in and out under the rattling metal awning. Two guys linger at the beer coolers until it’s just them and us, and they don’t want to dance. Thus, the guns drilling into the sides of our heads—my long hair, the boss balding—they escorted us to the back room and invited us to lay on the floor. Tile. Muddy footprints. Is this when I die? The boss was swallowing his whole life wide-eyed across from me. My life had only been a snack. I was still a growing boy. Count to ten, they said. Trembling. But clear they’d rehearsed. I can do that: 1, 2, 3…The door swung open and closed. I still smell that floor.
Do I have one more liquor store floor in my life? At some point, we started saying I love you in between the lines of free coke from the dealer. Or I love it. The lines blurred. One night we were so happy—I mean stoned out of our fucking minds—that we took speed to stay up all night so we could get married in the morning. She called the local priest at 3 or 4 a.m. and he took her seriously while probably making a note to get his number unlisted. Doing cocaine was like body surfing until a wave thumped you face-first onto the sand.
At the end of the day, I went back and nudged her awake. She had lines on her face too. She pried open her dry-ice mouth to smile. We never got married. Already the clock was ticking again. Want some chips? I asked. Somebody rattled the door, but I’d already locked it.
