Free Never Use a Chicken and Other Stories by Jim Newell

travel agency and before the third jewelry store, the place opposite the ladies wear store. There’s a kiosk in the middle of the mall there where they sell lottery tickets and cigarettes and tobacco. The area was quiet at that hour of the morning, not many people around, which may be why the sight of the kiosk triggered my memory.
    “ Don’t forget cigars .”
    I was almost past the place when I remembered. I made a right turn to go over to buy cigars and saved my life. First thing I noticed was the expression on the face of the man looking at me. When I saw the barrel of that .38 raising up to point at my ribs, I jumped. Jumped right over the side of the kiosk, into the cigarette display, into the man behind the counter busy selling something to a customer. His yelling was louder than the crash of both of us falling to the floor under the cigarettes and other stuff that came down on top. The screams of some old ladies who saw the crash were even louder. The few people around made up in noise what they lacked in numbers. Not that I had time to listen too carefully.
    The guy with the gun didn’t wait to help us up. He left. At the time, I didn’t know who he was or where he went, and I didn’t hang around to find out, either. As soon as I got my brain working again, which took five or ten seconds before I realized I wasn’t going to die after all because the jump and the crash spoiled his aim and he couldn’t shoot, I realized he would be gone. So I pushed my hand into the face of the cigar-stand guy and that stopped his yelling. I could see other faces peering down at us over the counter, but I didn’t wait to see if they were faces I should recognize. I just kept shoving the kiosk operator’s face, which made him squirm away from me giving me a chance to get untangled from him and get free from the mess of stuff that had fallen with us. It took him until I was almost on my feet before he began yelling again.
    “Hey! What’s going on? What the Hell do you think you’re doing? You trying to get us killed or something? What’re you doing jumping on me? Look at the mess in here! Hey! You! Where’re you going? Get back here! Hey! Somebody grab that guy! Hey! Hey!”
    I didn’t wait to hear any more. In fact I’m not even sure those were his exact words. By the time he got that far I was down the mall heading for the exit nearest the place I had left my car in the parking lot. I wasn’t running. That would attract too much attention and most people were looking toward the man who was yelling and waving his arms. But I was walking fast. I didn’t look around to see what was happening at the cigarette and lottery kiosk. I figured I had won the lottery by jumping over the guy’s counter back there and I wasn’t planning to push my luck.
    Just as I was about to go through the outside door to the parking lot my brain kicked back in gear again and I made a fast U-turn back into the mall. That move almost knocked over a couple of senior citizens loaded down with packages, most of which they dropped. I didn’t know nice old people used gutter language like that. Especially women. Maybe they weren’t your typical nice old couple. Such people don’t use the kind of words they used. To give them credit, they weren’t expecting the sudden change of direction I made, but really, when I was a little boy, my mother would have washed my mouth out with soap if I had used words like that.
    The reason for my abrupt change in direction was the sudden realization that heading for the parking lot was not a very bright move. In fact it was a very dumb move. Whoever the man was who had pointed that .38 at me a few minutes before, he obviously knew I was in the mall. He must have followed me there from somewhere, so he also knew where my car was. He would have to be pretty stupid not to go back there and wait for me. I would have to be pretty dim to go back there and give him a target. I know that I am not the sharpest knife in