It was a hot day, and I was alone in the mercantile when the dudes walked in.
There were eight or nine of them, all probably in their mid to late 30s. The oldest guy had a craggy face and was either bald or had very short hair under his ball cap. As soon as he walked in, he said, I heard you give away really cool stickers here.
I wanted to say, We don’t give away anything cool here, but I held my tongue.
Instead I said, We’re out of stickers because I thought we were, but then I remembered the generic design we still had. Well, we do have these, I said while walking over to a display in the back of the yurt. The man followed me, but barely looked at the stickers. I don’t think he had any interest in stickers he had to pay for, and I don’t think he really believed there were free stickers for the taking.
The dudes milled around for a few minutes, then filed out of the yurt. One more came in to pay for his access pass. When he left the mercantile, he hollered at the other dudes to pay for parking, so they all filed back in.
One guy put a pint glass on the counter so he could pay for it along with his day pass.
The older guy said, I heard you get a free beer when you buy one of these pint glasses.
The mercantile doesn’t sell beer, but even if it did, I doubt people would get a free one with pint glass purchase. The dude many have thought he was just being funny, but it felt more like he was fucking with the sales clerk to me.
Yeah, I said with an absolutely straight face. Bring it to the bar down the road and let them know you’re there for your free beer.
The man smirked, and one of his dude friends still standing in line said, Really? I think he was about to snatch up a pint glass of his own.
I guess I’d sounded even more serious than I thought I had.
No, I said sadly, not really.
Love that deadpan humor, the dude paying for the pint glass said about me.
Two more dudes paid for access passes, then they all went away.