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It had just turned 9 am and in Farmer Fred’s feel-good, local, family, fair-trade, organic wholefoods store, things were not going well. Leaning on his counter, Julian clutched his skull through his long and now damp hair, then looked towards the man with the clipboard who stood alongside. “Surely there’s a way around this?” His voice trembled around the dried pulse-crammed aisles of the deserted shop. “If you’ll just give me more time, I’m certain I can find the money—”
“Sorry, mate.” The man didn’t look up from his writing. “Not my decision. They just send me to record what you’ve got that’s worth anything. I don’t make the rules.”
********
Over the last few months, trade in People Town’s only health foods shop had been on the decline.
Notwithstanding an unhelpful lack of assistance from known-science surrounding the phenomenal benefits of organic, vegan produce, for almost a decade, Julian Pinkerton Smith had tried his best to convince the town’s badly-in-need-of-guidance population that premium-priced, painful-on-the-gums foods were the avenue to a healthier and happier colon.
Things had initially gone well – back in the beginning, Julian could barely keep up with the demand for expensive lentils and obscure spices sold in industrial-sized bags without any information as to their points of origin. Unfortunately, however, those halcyon days were gone.
Despite being a business that championed sustainability, the only thing Farmer Fred’s was currently sustaining was a stream of red letters and court summonses. Now at over fifty-thousand in the hole, the bank had decided to pull the plug.
********
With a purposeful scribble, the man finished his list, then clicked shut his pen. “Ok, Mr Pinkerton Smith.” He took a final glance around the shop to check he hadn’t missed anything of potential value. “You know the deal. You’ve got until noon to pay up or we’ll be back with the van to collect this lot.” He ripped off a top copy and slid it along the counter.
Pushing up his thin frame on his even thinner arms, Julian began to pace down the turmeric aisle, his sandals flapping noisily over the floor. Suddenly he turned and raced back over. He looked to the man appealingly. “Is... is there any way we could extend this for a little?” Nervously, he tugged at his wispy beard – not strictly regulation uniform in the organic food industry but in practice, as good as. “Just between me and you?”
A look of terror darted over the man’s face.
DING! Julian sent the till drawer flying outwards. “Perhaps the sum of... twenty-three... no, four... pounds and sixty... this is the money I had earmarked for the children’s home, by the way... seven pence?”
Relief visibly sweeping over him, the man shook his head. “No!” he laughed. “And in terms of bribes, that’s the worst one I’ve had this month.” He began to look up and down the ‘beetroot – perfect for realistic, guilt-free burgers’ display over by the veg wall. “To be honest, I think the bank’s doing you a favour – taking this place off you. You should be grateful I’m not a health inspector!” He pushed his pen towards the spelt flour shelf where a large dead beetle could just be seen poking out underneath. “By the looks of it, you’re lucky you haven’t killed anyone. In the storeroom, as well.” He flicked his head sideways. “The droppings?”
“Um... well...” Julian squirmed then folded his arms defensively. “...we’re a vegan establishment, aren’t we?” He began to sidle behind the revolving community leaflet rack in a bid to hide the sweat patches that had now started to manifest. “We can’t very well go around poisoning and decapitating living creatures in the furtherance of making a crust, can we?”
“Mmm,” replied the man, clearly unconvinced. “So what’s with that big mallet behind the bin out back? The one with all the little, black legs stuck to it? And the broken mouse traps and the... Oh yeah! Speaking of murdering stuff, isn’t this the place where...?” He put on a grotesque expression, then mimed taking a huge bite out of something. “A couple of weeks ago, wasn’t it? That bloke who owned the jewellers? Still no trace of him! That sort of thing can’t be doing you any favours – you veggies are famously fragile at the best of times.” Suddenly he looked over his shoulder and out of the window. “Actually, now I think about it, doesn’t it come here quite regular—”
“Look!” Julian grinned broadly. “Perhaps I was a little um... un-generous in my um... postponement-of-payment offering earlier.” He delved into his cargo shorts pocket and removed a fistful of change and a few old receipts.
The man frowned. “You’re wasting your time. And let’s face it, even if I did give you more time – which I can’t because well, the bank, but if I did – look at this place! Just gone nine – peak breakfast rush – and it’s deader than the things dried-onto your wooden hammer. And probably poor old what’s his name... Mr Winterbur—”
“Um, excuse me!” Julian hadn’t become the town’s premier and only ethical grocer by listening to the twisted logic of non-believers. If this person had no power or intention of being bribed then this charade of fawning and basic human decency could go right out of the window. Julian fixed him with a glare. “Not that I have to explain myself to the likes of you, Mr I-am-just-following-orders – and we all know what that leads to, don’t we? – but our target clientele don’t tend to have nine-to-fives; most of them seem to walk dogs for a living. So getting up... before about eleven isn’t a big thing for them. No, do you know why the business isn’t currently doing quite as well as it has done? Do you? No, of course you don’t!”
The man shrugged then lifted a bottle of Totally Harmless Cannabis-brand CBD hemp oil from the counter and looked at it. “Your prices?” he said. “Really, really expensive! I can get this in the big supermarket for fifty percent less, not mention a one-hundred percent less chance of being consumed by a gigantic, green monst—”
Julian snatched away the bottle and clanged it back amongst the others in the display basket. “Those are very fair sums for the quality being provided!” he stated. “It isn’t cheap to source organic, fair-trade products, you know. To provide the peasants of the Third World with a living wage and still make me a margin worth getting out of bed for. In the past, these things were flying – well, at least walking; we’re opposed to air travel, obviously – off the shelves.”
“So, what changed?” asked the man now making his way towards the door.
“Well, people of course!” snapped Julian. “Now they’re finding new ways to be virtuous!”
The man slowed slightly then turned. “Sorry, what?”
Julian scrunched up his eyes, incredulous that he was getting his stuff repossessed by someone who didn’t even understand basic health food psychology. “Back in the olden days,” he scoffed, “you had veganism, animal rights, and the greenhouse effect – simple, just the three. You can remember that, right? Save the whale and the ozone layer and all that other guff from school? Come on, you’re not that old. So, by shopping here you could pretty much score a hat trick with those. Tick, tick, tick. Job done. Pat on the back, fuzzy glow, all sorted!” He looked wistfully towards the ‘Quinoa (it’s pronounced keeeen waaaaahhh)’ sign on the end of the aisle nearest to him. “BUT!” He spun and fixed the man with a glare. “NOW! Now they’ve ruined everything! EVERYTHING!”
The man’s brow knitted. From the safety of his office, the hippy shop assignment with its spindly Son-of-God-resembling proprietor had seemed like a one-man-job – however, now things were getting out of hand. “Sorry, I’m... I’m not following. I... I just make the lists.”
Without warning, Julian took a step towards him – just like he had done to that security guard in the monkeys-with-highly-infectious-diseases lab back in his university days only this time it wasn’t quite as menacing as he didn’t have a balaclava and a crowbar and seven accomplices. “They ruined everything!” he hissed. “They... they saturated the market! Now there are just too many things!”
“They? Too many?”
“With causes!” Julian edged forward. “Causes to support! Things to be sanctimonious about! Not an ounce of business sense between the whole lot of them.”
The man swallowed hard and took a step away. “Ok. Well, as I said, we’ll be back at—”
Julian nodded at him. “That’s right,” he seethed, mistaking the man’s growing look of panic with their sharing of a moment. “Now they can signal their virtue with literally anything without even trying. Without even leaving the house or spending any money, for goodness sakes! From the comfort of their own computer!” He curled out his bottom lip then pretended to wipe away tears with both hands. “BOO HOO HOO!” he screamed.
The man dropped his clipboard with a clatter.
“I feel so bad about fat celebrities getting fat-shamed or war crimes or whatever!” Julian pretended to blow his nose on a People Town Alternative Basket Weavers leaflet plucked from the counter. “I’m SOOOOO sensitive! Look, I liked a picture – that’s my astounding level of non-financial, non-life-affecting commitment. I mean, seriously? How can anyone make a living out of the morality industry anymore?”
By now the man had turned squarely towards Julian and was reaching blindly behind to try to open the door.
Julian continued to twist up his face. “What about the foreign farmers who can’t afford sunblock or shoes?” he spat, now beginning to circle the man who had snagged a belt loop on a large plastic-lined wicker basket of reduced food-mile brazil nuts. “The poor wretches I selflessly bend over backwards to try to support with very, very modest gains – in recent times, at least – for myself? What about them? I’m practically a charity – without the tax breaks, obviously. He exhaled deeply, suddenly beginning to calm. “Veganism and food that doesn’t destroy the planet is old school,” he said. “And not in a cool way, either. Now you can be an attention-seeking snowflake whilst still having an enjoyable and balanced diet. It’s a tragedy.” He reached down and picked up the clipboard, causing the man to flinch. “Here. Oh, the handle is higher up; you’re nowhere near.”
“OK!” With a ding, the man ripped open the door. “We – m... me and some others, lots of others, b... big ones – will be back at 12.01,” he stammered. “Don’t do anything stupid like try to hide anything listed on that document. I know you will, but don’t, ok? Oh, and if that creature happens to come by and doesn’t look to be leaving, I’d appreciate it if you could call our office and... Look, this job is minimum wage and I’ve got kids; you understand?”
As the door closed, Julian slumped down onto his counter.
This was bad. He was out of options. At midday, he was going to lose the shop.