I drive a meandering route to the convenience store near my house, checking my rearview mirror. I put my heart back in its box and I endure a ten-minute argument with my base female self. Was I too friendly with Keith? Too casual, too naughty and rude and loose with my smiles? No, fuck him.
I rework different conversations that I’ve had with him, cringing at how easy and enjoyably platonic I found them. Maybe I even used him as a substitute for my brother. Did I pay Keith twenty bucks to be my friend?
Oh God, I’m pathetic.
I wonder how many Keiths are in wedding portraits I’ve done over the years. I prod my stinging wrist. It’s a good reminder that no matter how careful I am, it’ll never be enough. I am going to need a lot of wine tonight.
I pull my car up at the curb. This used to be a piece of parkland, stitched into the seams between my childhood home and Loretta’s cottage. Progress was unavoidable, but a neon-bright 7-Eleven store just feels insulting. I still can’t drive past my old house. It’s been painted mauve. Still, I could probably stand to look at that purple palace before I could make myself turn and look at the run-down white house across the street.
Feelings again. Wine. Wine.
“Not again,” the cashier, Marco, says when I walk in. “Not. Again.”
“I’m too tired for your shit so don’t even start.” This place is as convenient as the neon sign out front says. Otherwise, I wouldn’t endure this. Marco read a book about sugar and it changed his life.
“Sugar is white poison.” He starts telling me a fake-sounding story about sugar-addicted lab rats. I choose a cheap bottle of sweet white wine and a can of fish guts for Diana, and then go into my favorite aisle in the entire world.
“They chose the sugar over food and eventually died of malnutrition.” Marco sells a pack of cigarettes to someone without comment.
I put my head up over the aisle. “That’s what I plan on doing. Please stop talking to me.” I hate that I’ve been stuck here long enough that a store clerk even knows who I am. I will not let him ruin this. This moment is special.
It’s incredible the forms that sugar can take. It’s art. It’s science. It’s cosmic. It’s the closest thing to religion that I have.
I am in love with these cartoon colors. Acid gummies crumbed in granulated cane sugar. Patent leather licorice twists, happy bags of Skittles. Pink and white marshmallows, softer than rose petals. It’s all here, this rainbow spectrum of sug
ar, and it’s waiting for me.
“Diabetes . . . cancer . . .” Marco is a radio being tuned in and out.
My friend Truly—my only friend from school who still lives here—thinks that women should buy themselves an indulgent weekly consolation prize. You know, for putting up with the world’s shit. She buys herself flowers. As my treat, I jack up my insulin and blood alcohol levels.
Sunday night is my personal weekly Halloween.
I walk along slowly and drag my fingertips along the bars of chocolate. Goddamn, you sexy little squares. Dark, milk, white, I do not discriminate. I eat it all. Those fluorescent sour candies that only obnoxious little boys like. I suck candy apples clean. If an envelope seal is sweet, I’ll lick it twice. Growing up, I was that kid who would easily get lured into a van with the promise of a lollipop.
Sometimes, I let the retail seduction last for twenty minutes, ignoring Marco and feeling up the merchandise, but I’m so tired of male voices.
“Five bags of marshmallows,” Marco says in a resigned tone. “Wine. And a can of cat food.”
“Cat food is low carb.”
He makes no move to scan anything, so I scan each item myself and unroll a few notes from my tips. “Your job involves selling things. Sell them. Change, please.”
“I just don’t know why you do this to yourself.” Marco looks at the register with a moral dilemma in his eyes. “Every week you come and do this.”
He hesitates and looks over his shoulder where his sugar book sits under a layer of dust. He knows not to try to slip it into my bag with my purchases.
“I don’t know why you care, dude. Just serve me. I don’t need your help.” He’s not entirely wrong about my being an addict. I would lick a line of icing sugar off this counter right now if no one were around. I would walk into a cane plantation and bite right in.
I’ve been working on this jet-black disguise for many years now, and it’s bulletproof. But some people can tell that I’m a weakling, and they try to baby and help me. It must be a survival-of-the-fittest thing. But they’re all wrong. I’m not a lame gazelle; I’ll be the one chasing the lion.
“Give me my change or I swear to God . . .” I squeeze my eyes shut and try to tamp down my temper. “Just treat me like any other customer.”
He gives me a few coins’ change and bags my sweet, spongy drugs. “You just remind me of how I used to be. So addicted. When you’re ready to quit, borrow the book from me. I haven’t had sugar in nearly eight months. I just sweeten my coffee with some powdered agave . . .”
I’m already walking out. No sugar? Why is life just about giving things up? What have I even got left that I enjoy? The heavy-sigh feeling inside me gets worse. Sadder. I pause at the door.
“I’m writing to your head office to complain about your service.” I’m a hypocrite, pulling the customer service card, but hey. “You just lost yourself a customer, sugar.”