Inventory is both the best and worst thing about running the store. On the one hand, I love working with the books. I love going through the stacks, through the piles and piles of stuff in the back, sorting it all, shuffling it around, organizing the books alphabetically and by genre, then the next month doing it all over again differently. Working the books like a gardener with his plants; knowing every shelf intimately, so that when a customer asks me for something I can often direct them not only to a specific shelf, but which end of it.
On the other hand is the hard, cold reality of running a business, and monthly inventory is a slap-in-the-face reminder of how much product you didn't sell in the past week. Bummer. Almost takes all the fun out of running a used bookstore.
Almost.
The phone rang as I was carrying an armful of paperbacks from the back room. I set them down on the red velour loveseat under the window between the 'S-T' and 'U-W' fiction stacks and rushed to the front counter. I picked it up on the fourth ring, just before the answering machine kicked in.
"Brin Mawr Bookshop," I said.
"Hey there, lover," Colleen said.
"Hey," I said. It was Wednesday, and we hadn't seen each other for four days since our friendship took its big turn, although we had spoken on the phone every night. I was surprised -- pleasantly so -- that our conversations hadn't turned awkward. We still chatted easily about the same old shit we always did before, although now there was a raunchier undercurrent and from time to time one or the other would make some baldfaced sexual reference of a degree that we probably wouldn't have made before, and there'd be a pause, a speedbump in the conversation, as it occurred to us all of a sudden that, yeah, we're talking to each other like this now. It still hadn't really sunk in yet.
"So whatcha doin'?"
"Inventory day," I said.
"Awww, poor baby. Your least favourite day of the month."
"Oh, it's not that bad," I said. "See, I have this theory about how it's both the best and the worst -"
"I have a theory too," Colleen interrupted. "It involves a lot of friction and a lack of underpants. I'd like your help proving it."
"Well, if it's all in the name of science," I said.
"Wanna get together tonight? I'd really like a lesson from my favourite prof."
"I'd like that a lot. I was just thinking about you."
"I was just thinking about you." She lowered her voice. "I'm not wearing any panties, you know. I'm really horny. A while ago I went to the bathroom and made myself come thinking about what we did this weekend."
My cock twitched in my jeans. "Save some for later," I said. "Don't waste it all in the bathroom."
"Oh, I've got plenty to spare," she purred. "You want me to meet you at your place?"
"Come to the store," I said. "We'll take it from there."
"OK. I'll see you around six."
"Cool." The door opened and a couple, a man and a woman, came in. "Gotta go. I'll see you later."
"Can't wait!" I hung up the phone and they came up to the counter. They were students, or student types -- the thrift-store clothes and pierced lips and eyebrows. The guy put on a smile as they approached and his girlfriend -- I assumed, they were holding hands -- watched me warily with the suspicious look of the hipper-than-thou bracing for an encounter with the terminally square. Yeah, whatever.
"Hey, man," the kid said. He opened a black binder and held out a sheet of paper.
"Hey," I said.
"We're organizing an anti-war rally," he said. "Do you mind if we put this poster in your window?" He was still smiling as he asked, but his girlfriend now was glaring at me with a sneer.
"You don't have to if you don't want to," she said. "We understand the position you're in."
"You do?" I take the poster. It has a cartoon drawing of Uncle Sam's face pasted on a pig's body with dollar signs coming out of its ass. "That's certainly considerate of you."
"It's an anti-capitalism rally," she said.
"I can see that."
"So it's OK if you're offended."
"I appreciate your permission," I said. I rooted around in a drawer for the scotch tape and handed it to the boyfriend, who was now shooting 'shut the fuck up' looks at his girlfriend. "Here. Go put it on the door, above the business hours sign."
"Right on. Thanks, man." He took the poster back and hurried to the door, as if he was afraid I was going to change my mind. The girlfriend now was glaring at me with open hostility.
"What's wrong?"
She shrugged. "I didn't expect you to say yes. You're the first one we've been to today who has."
"With a charming approach like yours, that's surprising."
She didn't seem to have heard me. "You capitalists don't usually like it when we take on your pal Bush."
I was about to point out that if she could find a penny of capital in this store that I would eat that heavy plaid shirt she was wearing -- which looked like it hadn't been washed in about six months -- but before I could say anything, she leaned onto the counter and smiled.
"I know who you are, you know," she said in a tone of voice that made me think of Solzhenitsyn and the KGB.
"Oh yeah?"
"Uh-huh. My friend Kim worked here a couple of years ago."
"Oh yeah." Kim -- she'd worked about 10 hours a week during fall term. An English major with amazing tits.
"She said you fucked like a volcano. She said you had one of the biggest cocks she'd ever seen." Karla Marx smiled and straightened as her boyfriend came back with the roll of tape.
"Here you go," he said. "Thanks again, man."
"Don't mention it." I watched them go, he leading the way, she blowing me a kiss as she went out the door.
I had been doing paperwork for about 10 minutes when Colleen knocked on the door, smiling and waving through the glass. I dropped the mess I was working on back in its drawer and let her in. I locked the door behind her and pulled down the blind, then turned toward her for a hug. We'd always been big huggers, in a chaste, best-pals sort of way, but this time as I bent down and we wrapped our arms around each other, Colleen turned her face toward me and our lips locked in a deep tongue kiss.
"Hi, sweetie," she said as we pulled apart. She was still smiling, and her cheeks were flushed.
"Well, that's certainly a lot friendlier greeting than I'm used to getting," I said. She laughed.
"I think you're entitled, considering the circumstances," she said. "So what's up? What do you want to do tonight?"
I grabbed her by the hand and led her to the back room. "Come here," I said.
"Where to?"
