Free Chump Change by Dan Fante Page A

Mexican clerk behind the register watched me coming in. I speculated that he pegged me in the category of jerkoff or wino bum because his attitude was cocky and nasty when I asked where the dog food was. He spoke bad American, snarled something, and pointed to an aisle. As I walked away, at the end of his side of the long counter, I saw a woman sitting on a stool and almost hidden. His lady.
    She was Asian and older than the kid. Vietnamese or Cambodian. And very sexy. Red-red lipstick and long black hair and a black doily see-through blouse. I saw her face fully as she glanced up from her magazine. Our eyes locked for a second. Hers were hard and beautiful. Freeway eyes. I knew that mine were empty. Then, when I looked too long, she turned away. I always looked too long.
    In the canned goods aisle, I picked up a few tins of inexpensive dog food and was about to return to the counter, when I remembered that I had my wife’s credit card tucked in my pants’ pocket. I had the revelation that I could afford anything I wanted. I wasn’t just another shit-sucking loser off the boulevard.
    I put the cheap dog food cans down and walked back to the register and picked up a plastic shopping basket while the clerk’s eyes followed me. He could tell that something was different as I started randomly choosing packages of potato chips and cheese puffs and throwing them into the basket.
    I grabbed many cans of good dog food, and several bags of Fritos, and a new can opener—not the cheap-shit metal kind that hurts your fingers, but the $9.98 kind with the wide plastic handles. From there I moved on: a Genoa salami and ten kinds of frozen dinners and crackers and mayonnaise and salad dressing and a dozen brands of plastic-wrapped cold cuts were next.
    Now I was having a shopping spree. Carried away by my good fortune and the Mad Dog 20-20, I returned to the counter to drop off my full plastic basket and pick up two more empties, piling my purchases next to the register.
    The mean-spirited young storekeeper’s full concentration was on me, but I didn’t look up or stop to make eye contact.
    As I proceeded to the hardware area, I felt his glare, while I loaded up a few packages of light bulbs, telephone cords, and plastic-wrapped flash lights. When I changed aisles, he moved too, along the back of the counter to where he could watch me. He was making it hard to concentrate. To retaliate, I decided to buy everything in the lane I was in. The cookie lane.
    Oreos and Malomars went in and chocolate chips by the dozen. Bags and bags. Peanut butter and oatmeal and even twenty packages of coconut macaroons that I knew I’d never eat. I had a mission.
    The Asian girl was watching now, looking from me to her boyfriend, to the growing mountain on the counter, fully involved in the exhibition. When he saw me smile at her, it was the last straw. He snapped, “Okay majn. Bum. Jou ga monee to pay?”
    I had him and I knew it. I was in no hurry. An American citizen in possession of a gold Visa card with a $5,000 limit doesn’t have to rush. Purposely, I again glanced down the counter at the Asian girl to be sure I continued to hold her interest, then I smiled back at him. “Right in my pocket, amigo!” I shot back.
    “Shjo me,” he sneered.
    “When I’m done, senor, you’ll be the first to know. You need have no fear regarding full payment. American pesos for American products. Esta bien, amigo?”
    I didn’t wait for a reply. I wheeled around and made a beeline back to the cookie section, a little out of control from the effects of fortified wine and giddy at my own dialogue.
    I swept two more shelves full of Ring Dings, Twinkies and cup-cakes into my baskets. Each one weighed thirty to forty pounds, minimum. I had to drag them the last ten feet to the counter.
    When I began to dump the stuff on the counter he grabbed my arm. “Hole it, majn,” he said. “No more.” He leered at me.
    I shook him off, leering back. I was bigger. A