A Coke for an MV

The bell clanged against the door harshly and discordantly rather than with its usual sweet tinkle. With the abrupt sound also came a jerk of movement from the counter; twenty-something MY NAME IS ___, the primary cashier of Lawson Mini Mart for all of four months.

Her stint as the convenience store’s four-to-nine caretaker had, for the most part, been an uneventful one; she kept the back area tidy, she would make her rounds throughout the tiny store to restock or just let her eyes relax across package labels and bright colors, and she often spent her shift curled up in a banged-up chair rescued from the dumpster to work on essays for Contemporary Literature next to the cash register. Once the broken clock ka-chunked two minutes past nine, she would uncurl herself from the chair, do a sweep in the back seating area, and then grab her bag before locking the door with two turns of the key, which would be kept under the flower pot in the back until the morning worker, whom she had never met, came in.

It was a content existence led in the Mini Mart, with only a couple of the dull-eyed regulars drifting in and out for the occasional bottled tea or frozen lunch. In exchange for a minimum wage and a solid presence at the counter, Lawson let her be, and she didn’t ask for anything more exciting. It was the most symbiotic relationship one could ask for; a life structured as a series of transactions, not much more than a fleeting glance from time to time.

So it was that any tinkle of the bell would pleasantly startle her enough to look up and start anticipating what someone might want, but tonight, it jangled too violently for it to be just an annoyed regular hustling in. Any store worker’s worst nightmare - the peaceful drag of the door being thrown off of its well worn track to slam against the wall, followed quickly by the scuffing of impatient shoes and obnoxious laughter.

Maybe just my worst nightmare, MY NAME IS ___ thought bleakly as she hunched over her computer, trying not to give into the temptation of looking up as the newest visitors shuffled inside. She didn’t even bother to throw a glance as their boyish, loud, jocular, and distinctly teenage voices shattered Lawson’s quiet with raucous Korean, but when she heard the sound of rapid feet treading toward the drinks aisle, followed by the clatter of a shopping cart, she sprang up (a reaction perhaps linked to the traumatizing memory of knocking over a crate of glass-bottled lemon sodas all over the floor).

“Hey!” she shouted, louder than she’d intended. “No running!”

The boys all halted in their tracks, turning almost simultaneously to face her, and the combined weight of their startled gazes almost made her go back to the counter, but she squared her shoulders and said, as authoritatively as possible, “You can’t run in here.”

She expected some kind of snarky response, but instead one of the boys just gave her a slight bow, which threw her off, and then said, “Sorry. It won’t happen again.”

Sarcasm? No, he seemed genuinely sincere. Her eyes flickered over the five of them, each distinct without seeming to try - different heights, different faces, hair in various states of intentional disarray, and even their clothes, which looked slapdash and scavenged - thrift-store layers clashing in unrestrained color, but it only made them brighter, like they’d carried daylight in with them. One was even wearing a knitted trapper hat, the little gray pom poms swinging to and fro from the long hat strings, and they all hovered close to the shopping cart as if it were an anchor point, a shared gravity, already piled with a decent dump of snacks.

How odd. Collectively, they were a far cry from the hormonal and hungry delinquents she seemed to remember from her high school days, or the haggard, suit-clad men who would show up for their instant meals when the sky began to darken with bruises.

“Just be careful,” MY NAME IS __ said in a more subdued tone, a wave of embarrassment washing over her. She slunk back to the counter and pretended to continue working on the forgotten writing assignment as she snuck a look at the boys, who had continued down the aisle and were now huddled by the canned drinks, beginning to argue in a blur of rapid sentences. They moved easily around one another, she noted, loose and unselfconscious, like a group that had learned its own choreography by accident.

She quickly looked away again, chiding herself for being nosy, and managed to keep her attention on the passage from The Metamorphosis that she was supposed to be analyzing. That is, until the boys’ voices switched over to lilting English, which she could catch this time.

“Get that pack.” This came from the one who had bowed to her, easily the tallest of the group.

“We could just get one can,” argued one of the others, who had a silver hoop through his left ear. “It’s recyclable.” He rolled the syllables off of his tongue.

“Yeah, but-”

They switched back to Korean, and MY NAME IS __ wondered for a second if they needed help, but before she could figure it out, the boys had settled on something and were pushing the shopping cart up to the counter. She scrambled to her feet, then paused, frowning at the chip bags, red and white cup packs, and…the singular can of Coke that the tall boy tapped onto the counter last.

“Is that all?” she asked, hoping that they hadn’t torn the can from one of the six-packs. When was the last time someone bought a Coke? It was one of many of those seemingly popular but rarely touched products.

“Yes.” The tall boy gave her a warm smile and reached for his wallet as the others hung back. The one with the earring was goofily scrunching his face up, eyes rolling back into his head, and the two shorter ones were shoving him around, laughing as they swatted at the hat boy’s dangling pom poms like cats. It was all typical juvenile behavior, snorts and smiles, but it lacked that caustic edge most arrogant high schoolers carried, and was instead unguarded and more youthful than she remembered ever feeling.

God, I feel old, she thought ruefully. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been loud on purpose either.

She took the money, filed it into the cashier drawers, and then counted out the change under her breath. “Here you go.”

“Thank you!” The tall boy took the change, clumsily stuffing the coins into his pocket.

MY NAME IS __ nodded at the Coke can on the counter. “Just the one?” She realized then how judgmental she must have sounded, but he didn’t seem to take it that way.

“Ah, that? Yeah, we’re using it for a music video.”

“A what?” She must have misheard him somehow.

“A music video. We’re gonna stick the camera onto the can.”

“Oh.” What else could she say without being rude? She never did this much talking with the Mini Mart’s sparse handful of regulars. A Coke for a music video. It sounded like a laughable school project, but she glanced at the boy and saw that he was being perfectly serious despite his fingers drumming against the rim of the can, a smile being flicked over to the others, and suddenly it seemed clear that this wasn’t a joke so much as a plan already in motion.

“Maybe you’ll need the whole pack,” she found herself saying. “For multiple takes.”

The boy threw his hands up. “That’s what I was saying!”

“Hyung, let’s go,” said the boy with the hat. “We got everything.”

The tall boy paused, glanced at the drinks aisle behind them, and then said, “I’mma grab a pack.”

“Then why did you buy just one can?” complained one of the shorter guys.

“Because you said so-”

As the five of them disappeared again, MY NAME IS __ glanced up at the clock, and saw that it was ten till nine. She automatically opened her mouth for the announcement, but something stopped her; a last-minute, instinctual pause.

Why? How hard was it to say “We’re closing in ten minutes?”

Just tell them, and get them out of the store, she told herself. Then you can get back to the essay that’s due tomorrow and you’ll have this place all to yourself again.

We’re closing in ten minutes. But if she said it, then they would hurry to pay for that pack of Coke, and then they would be gone to go make their music video while she remained alone among the Buldak noodle cups, Calbee chip bags, and melon soda bottles.

The boys hustled back in record time. “Sorry,” said the tall boy, handing over his money.

“No problem.” She handed back his change. “Good luck.”

He paused as the boy with the earring scooped up the pack and deposited it into the loaded shopping cart. “Do you want a Coke?”

MY NAME IS __ laughed without meaning to. “No, thank you.”

“Okay.” The tall boy reached for the single Coke can and grabbed hold of the tab. With a single forceful twist, it snapped off intact, and he put it on the counter in front of her while still holding the open can. “But you keep this.”

MY NAME IS __ stared down at the tab without processing it for a couple seconds before glancing back up. “Wait-”

But the shopping cart was already halfway outside the store, the five boys encircling it. “Thank you!” one of them called out in a bright voice just before the door banged shut.

MY NAME IS LINA just stood behind the counter for a long time, ears still buzzing from the sudden quiet. The store felt oddly hollow now, like a room whose furniture had been dragged out. Somewhere behind her, the refrigerator unit hummed back to attention, and the smell of the store’s fried chicken packages slowly returned to her with a heightened intensity.

She looked down at the Coke tab, then up at the clock. One minute past nine. The skinny second hand was dipping toward two minutes. She should be trudging toward her car now, the door locked and the key safely underneath the flower pot.

There was a sticky drop of Coke fizzing near the cash box from where the can had spurted; no doubt it would settle into a dark stain. She watched it for a second longer than necessary, but instead of getting out a rag, as she routinely did, she slid the tab off of the counter with her thumb and tucked it into her pocket, letting its insignificant weight linger there.

Maybe tomorrow, she would take the day off.