I heard the phone through the cobwebs of too little sleep, the late night cheeseburgers and more than a fair amount of scotch. By the second ring, I had nimbly thrown myself on the floor and was attempting to stand. On the third ring, I forced my eyes open and started the run to my office.
This was not unusual for me. I live in an apartment behind my office but there's only one phone. That phone sits on my desk. A private investigator gets most of his work by phone, so I had to answer it. Grabbing the doorframe on the way through slowed my speed a little. I only stubbed my big toe on the leg of the desk instead of breaking it. I was hopping around on one leg and swearing when the phone rang again. The insane giggling stopped my lunge at the desk.
"Jase, honey, now it's not that I don't like seeing you in your jockey shorts. Really, I do, but what if there'd been a client here? You really oughta look before you stagger in like that. And all that swearing. Tsk tsk."
Melody was sitting in the desk chair with a cell phone in her hand. Her whole body was shaking in mirth, and with Melody's body, there's a whole lot of nice things to shake. I usually remember that she gets to my office before I get up, but the holidays had kind of messed up my brain. I mean, how would you feel if you had to spend twelve hours a day dressed in an elf suit? I can tell you how you'd feel. You'd feel like washing down a couple cheeseburgers with about a quart of scotch while trying to understand why people ever reproduce. You'd swear all humans younger than twenty should be kept in restraints at home. You'd want to be with people who don't run you down in their quest for the latest big-breasted, alien, she-bitch heroine video game cartridge that just went on sale. That's how you'd feel, all right.
Well, that's how I felt last night anyway. I was gonna feel that way for one more day. Then it would be Christmas Eve, and everything would get back to what passes for normal in my life.
My voice croaked around the fuzzy carpet on my tongue. "I heard the phone."
"Oh, that was just me. I was trying out our new answering machine. Remember, I told you about it at Barney's last night?"
The small, quiet bar was a faint blur on the pages of my mind. I'd stopped in for dinner at seven and didn't remember when I left. I didn't really remember much after about ten.
"Yeah, sure. I remember. What time is it?"
"It's, uh... seven-thirty. Grady's won't open until nine, so you have some time yet. Now, go get yourself a shower and some clothes. There's coffee in the pot."
Even in my disabled state I hadn't missed Melody's luscious cleavage when she leaned over to see the desk clock. I'd met Melody on the stairway to my second story office/apartment a few months ago. She'd sort of moved in for a couple of days, and then decided she'd be a good addition to my staff. Up until then, my staff consisted of me, and I didn't think I could afford an assistant. Melody proved me wrong by doing some phone work that paid off pretty well. Since then, she'd taken care of the office stuff while I did the fieldwork. It was because of her that I was working at Grady's. I was part of the extra security the department store put on between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
At eight-fifty, I casually sauntered past the cosmetic counter. Well, at least I was as casual as I could be in those tights, pointy-toed, green satin slippers and floppy hat. Other than that, I felt pretty good. In about a half hour, things were going to start downhill. I knew from experience that the tights would soon have a strangle-hold on my balls, and that my feet were going to hurt like hell. Evidently, elves don't need arch supports, but I'd found that walking on marble floors for twelve hours in glorified bathroom slippers makes flat feet an understatement.
The crowd outside the entrance was getting larger. This was going to be the worst day yet. There was one shopping day left before Christmas Eve, and that meant most of the housewives in town had the pre-heaters on their running shoes, a fist full of credit cards, and were preparing to do battle over the last merchandise on the shelves. To make matters worse, Grady's had started marking down some of the seasonal stuff. I swear, if Grady's had put starting blocks at the entrance, I would have seen nothing but faces and butts waiting for the door to open. At precisely nine, the manager walked to the door, carefully stood to one side to avoid being trampled, and turned the key in the lock.
A sea of ski jackets and faux fur swept through the door. The look on each face was the same. The mouth was set in a thin, flat line of determination and the eyes swept back and forth like radar antennae. The wave flowed into the three aisles that went through the store.
Until that moment, I had never thought of shopping as a contact sport. Grady's had marked down all the Christmas decorations to half price. Women were grabbing boxes of lights and colored glass balls as fast as they could reach.
I made the observation that the taller women had a definite advantage in this game. They could reach farther and higher. Then I saw their weak spot. One little old grandmother was trying to reach a particular box of crystal icicles, but she was being edged away from the display by the nicely-shaped, jean-clad ass of a woman about a foot taller. The little old lady stuck out her elbow and jabbed the offender in the side. The taller woman turned and looked down on Granny with fire in her eyes. Granny apologized profusely, but I noticed that as she was speaking, she was also positioning herself closer to the display. All was quickly put to right, and Granny got her box of icicles.
In half an hour, the Christmas decoration display was a stripped carcass. The only items left were several ornaments shaped like dinosaurs, and three boxes of lights that spilled green wires and colored bulbs from their ripped-open ends. Things were quieting down in the rest of the store too. The feeding frenzy had changed to a strategy of seek and find.
The rules in winter store security are simple – count the items going in and out of dressing rooms – that's year around, actually - and watch the shoppers with long coats. It's a simple matter, especially for women, to take three things into the dressing room and come out with two. The third is safely hidden underneath the clothing they wore in. The store record at Grady's is held by a thirty-year-old housewife who was apprehended wearing eight bras, twelve pairs of panties, six pairs of panty hose, three knit tops, and four sweaters. The security cameras had faithfully recorded the five trips to the dressing room it took her to get all that on.
The long coats are particularly useful for shoplifters. They can have inside pockets that will hold fairly large items. The bulk of the coat hides the bulge made by the stolen merchandise. The rule is, always watch the long coats for suspicious bulges. The rule doesn't work very well for people of generous proportions. It's difficult to tell a naturally occurring bulge from a stolen pair jeans. One must watch the suspect carefully. Jeans don't jiggle.
About noon, I witnessed the first method. A young mother with a small boy hanging onto her purse strap went into the dressing room with four blouses and two bras. In about ten minutes she came back out with the blouses, but I didn't see the bras. She went to the rack and replaced the garments, and started for the door. I cut her off.
"Um, Ma'am, could you please come with me?"
I'd expected to see fear in her eyes. Instead, I saw rage.
"Why in Hell would I want to do that?"
"I work for store security. I saw you go in the dressing room with several items, but I didn't' see you bring them all out."
"Oh." She smiled a really big, really fake, smile. "Well, I must have left some of 'em in there then."
"I'm sure you did. Just come with me and I'll have somebody check. If they're in there, you can leave."
"Look, Mr..., Mr. Elf, I gotta get Butchy here home for his nap. I haven't got time to go sit somewhere while you look in that fucking dressing room."
She turned to leave, and I caught her arm.
"I'm sorry, Ma'am, but you'll have to come with me. I don't want to make a scene, but –"
"Mommy, what's Santa's elf want?"
She looked down at the little boy and smiled.
"Butchy, this man is being mean to Mommy."
