The Customer From Hell

Angelina Gomez faced the day with an enthusiasm that set her coworkers on fire. She didn't really need the Monday morning pep talk, but relished it just the same. After the group completed their start-the-day self-talk and an excited round of high-fives, Angelina looked down at her watch. "Oh boy, ten minutes 'til we open. I better get this cash register going." With only a week of experience behind her, Angelina typed in the special password and brought the register to life. Words flew across the screen: "You have succeeded! Rock a customer's world today!” This was one of many prompts Vulcan Pharmacy used to prime their employees to get the customer service flowing. Every slogan followed by an exclamation point.

Angelina didn't know a thing about pharmacies, except how to use a cash register and how to talk to customers. She had readily bought into the culture and the company's catch phrase: Rock a Customer's World Today! And every customer would be a happy, satisfied customer. She would rock their world. And here came Ms. McGregor shuffling down the aisle to Angelina's counter.

Angelina swept back her black, glossy hair and tugged on the white lab coat. The silver name tag with black lettering hung level on the coat's lapel. The peppermint steadily melted in her mouth, waiting to shower people with its refreshing fragrance. She glanced down toward the little sign behind the counter—the one the customers couldn't see. It simply read in bold red letters: Smile! Customer is King! Give them what they want!

"Why, Angelina, aren't you pretty this morning," said Ms. McGregor. This was the third time Ms. McGregor had come by that week.

"And don't you look stunning yourself, Ms. McGregor. Have you had your flu shot yet?"

"No, I just came by to pick up my prescription. Left shoulder's killing me—you know, the arthritis is flaring up again."

"The flu shot is covered by your insurance, if you need one."

"Well ... I ... suppose I should. Don't much like shots like I told you before. Is it something I can do right now?"

"Yes, ma’am. I'll ring you up here and send you over to Jennifer. See the girl with the blond hair?” Angelina waved at Jennifer and she waved back with a beaming smile. Only it wasn't your ordinary wave and smile. It was a we're-going-to-please-you kind of wave and smile.

Ms. McGregor waved back at Jennifer and told Angelina, "Thank you, Dear. You're such a darling."

"It's been my pleasure, Ms. McGregor. You come back and see us again. Hope the arthritis gets to feeling better."

"Goodbye, now." Ms. McGregor shuffled over to Jennifer, prescription bag and purse flopping against her cane. Angelina was pumped. First customer of the day, and she had struck a home run. Knocked it clear out of the park. The smile she had practiced in the mirror remained plastered to her beautiful, caramel-colored face. It had become as natural as breathing, but so had the phrases: Welcome to Vulcan, Have you had your flu shot? How may I help you? My pleasure, Sir.

Angelina looked down and noticed her waste basket needed attention. As she fitted the basket with a new, scented bag, she knelt down to pick up some trash that had overflowed onto the floor. Upon standing up, Angelina discovered that a new customer had arrived. It startled her a bit and she gasped, "Oh—my gosh ... I'm sorry, Sir. I didn't see you there. Welcome to Vulcan! How may I help you today?"

The old man had appeared out of nowhere. And this customer, she had not met before. But then she had only been working there for a week. His hair was ashy white as was the skin, and the hair swept back tightly over his skull, as if fixed that way for eternity. The ashy-white colors contrasted sharply with the black goatee extending an inch below the chin. The sky-blue eyes behind the round spectacles brought color to the man's face, in fact, the only color. If it weren't for the man's parabolic smile and sparkling eyes, she thought she might have been addressing a corpse.

"Good morning, Dear. Ah, Angelina is it?” He peered at the name tag. "What a pretty name. I've known a few Angelinas in my time. And Angelas and Angelicas and even a few Angels.” He winked at her and began to chuckle.

There was a mysterious and arresting charm about the man. Angelina noticed something familiar in his expressions and yet something foreign and out of place. Like he had stepped out of time to visit her. She found herself chuckling and at the same time a little uneasy. But now back to being professional, back to the Vulcan smile, back to: "How may I help you today?"

"I need to pick up a prescription."

"Yes, Sir. The name?"

"Smoke."

"You said, Smoke?" She thumbed through five or six prescription bags. "Ah, yes, here it is, Mr. Smoke."

"Aren't you going to ask me the question?" He tapped his black cane twice on the floor and then carefully laid it on the counter in front of him.

Angelina's eyebrows arched up and the classic puzzled look fell on her. "The question? Ah ... let me see ... You mean like: What is your first name?"

He leaned across the counter and rested on his elbows. As he did, he pulled down his spectacles and looked over them at Angelina. "Noooo. That's not the question."

With his lean across the counter, Angelina noted his breath. It reminded her of the fumes that used to come off her grandmother's oil furnace. As a little girl, she loved to play hide-and-go-seek with her sister. No one would dare look behind that furnace in the basement. It was her favorite hiding place.

"Well, if you must know—it's Holy."

"What's holy?" asked Angelina, utterly confused.

"My name. Get it! Holy Smoke. Ha, ha, ha." Mr. Smoke slapped his hand down on the counter and then shot his make-believe bullets at her with a wink, followed by a deep belly laugh. He straightened up his lanky body and pulled both hands back to the counter's edge like he might turn the whole thing over, assuming he could. Instead, he gently rolled the cane back and forth.

"You are a funny man, Mr. Smoke, but it says here in black and white that you are Tony."

"Ah, you got me. The jigs up. I am Tony Smoke. Please don't call me by my first name."

"O...kay."

"No, what I thought you were going to ask me was had I had my flu shot."

Angelina cringed and crinkled up her whole face. No home run with this customer; she'd hit a foul ball, and the fans were starting to boo. "Oh, I'm so sorry. I don't know why I forgot that."

"Well, do I get my five dollars now?"

"Five dollars?"

"Now, Angelina, if you don't know it yet, I'm a regular customer here. I'm talking about the five-dollar policy. You still honor that policy—right? If someone forgets to ask the magic question, the customer gets five dollars.

"Yes, Sir. You are correct. It's just that I've never had to use that policy before. Guess you caught me off guard. I'll check with—"

"Then you will give me what I want: the five dollars?" He smiled a sinister smile and the teeth that had been a pearly white were now stained, as if he'd been swishing his mouth with black ink. "Remember that little sign behind your counter there. Point one—Smile. Point two—The customer is King. Point three—Give them what they want. Oh, and I forgot about those all-important exclamation marks." He pistoned both index fingers up and down on that last remark.

He knew about the sign, Angelina thought to herself. She was shocked and amazed. All her blood rushed to her head, only she couldn't tell if it was from anger or embarrassment—probably both. Up to this point, most of her customers had been very predictable and, well, tame. She could read them, size them up. But Mr. Smoke had surprised her and knocked her gifted perception off balance.

It was then that she breathed deeply and counted to ten. A technique she had picked up from her training (although her mom had practiced it for years). "Yes Sir, Mr. Smoke. I'm sorry for the inconvenience. Here's your prescription and here's your five dollars." Actually, she had dug down into her pants pocket and quickly fished out her own five dollar bill. Killing two birds, of course, with one stone—get rid of this creepy old fart and secure her spot as the next employee of the month. "Mr. Smoke, is there anything else I can do for you today?"

"Why yes. Yes there is, my Dear. You can sell me your soul."

That last sentence almost caused her heart to stop. Had she heard him right? Her blood turned icy cold. She thought for a second that she could see her breath. She noticed that Smoke's appearance had also taken a turn. The sky-blue eyes had become a dull red, like the color of heated steel ready to be fashioned into a knife blade or a sword. The air around his body distorted. Was he sucking the heat in or radiating it out?

Angelina looked down for a brief moment, dizzy from what she she’d heard. What she'd just witnessed. When she looked back up, Mr. Smoke looked totally normal. Normal color, normal features, normal Smoke.

"Are you okay, my Dear? asked Mr. Smoke. "You look pale."

"No, no. I'm okay. Now, what were you asking before?"

"Oh, I was looking for insoles. Can you tell me what aisle the insoles are on?"

A relieved smile bridled her face, and the blood started pumping normally again. "Yes, Sir. That would be aisle 13."

"Ah, yes. Good day, now." Mr. Smoke turned and walked away, duplicitous smile and all.

The morning hours sped by and customers came and went. Angelina felt validated once again by a series of positive, successful experiences. Her self-esteem and confidence had been polished to a brilliant shine. Still, she couldn't get Mr. Smoke out of her head. During lunch she asked several coworkers about the strange customer. Oh, yes, he was well known and well liked, a regular customer, a happy, polite, old man. A grandfather figure to some. A talker to others. Angelina didn't get it. Nothing sounded out of the ordinary with the man whose hair looked like his name.

Business droned on and around 2:00 pm, Angelina received a return visit from who might be Vulcan's number one customer.

"Well, hello, Mr. Smoke. Did you get that flu shot? This time Angelina pulled the pretend gun up and shot him somewhere in the chest. She snickered as she did it.

"Oh, no. No, I got my flu shot about two months ago. I was just testing you, my Dear. And by the way, here's your five dollars back." He held out the five dollar bill.

"No, Sir. You keep it. Apply it to your next purchase." She glanced over at a ten-by-ten picture; the caption below it read Employee of the Month, only it wasn't her picture. Jennifer Evans had held the spot for the last two months. Then Angelina wondered how Jennifer would handle Mr. Smoke.

"I need twenty bags of ice. No, make that twenty five."

"Wow, Mr. Smoke. You having a fiesta?"

"No. The place where I work goes through the ice. And the ice maker is on the blink again."

Angelina began to ring him up, but then realized something. She swallowed hard. "Uh, Mr. Smoke, I hate to break this to you, but we can only sell ten bags per customer." Her face cringed like someone was about to pop a balloon. She whispered, tentatively, "Store policy, Mr. Smoke."

"Really! Are you kidding me! But I’m—“He stopped to calm down and then took a swig of Coke from a bottle he had not purchased yet. "Ms. Gomez, need I remind you once again of who I am."

Angelina swallowed a little softer. "The ... the customer."

"Why, yes. And the customer is king. And you must—according to store policy—give me what I want. Now, what will it be?" Mr. Smoke motioned again to the little sign behind the counter and gently tapped the counter with his cane.

This created quite the quandary in Angelina's mind. She quickly glanced over again to the picture of Jennifer smiling back at the world. For the first time, Angelina faced two conflicting policies, but wasn't the overriding goal to make the customer happy? And what could fifteen more bags of ice hurt anyway?

"Angelina?"

"Yes, Mr. Smoke." And Smoke turned to the ten-by-ten picture.

"Have you been Employee of the Month yet?"

"No Sir, but I hope to be. I've only been working for about a week now."

"Well, let me do you a favor. You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. Give me my ice, and I'll speak to Jim your manager and put in a good word. Jim and I go way back."

"Mr. Smoke."

"Come on, Dear. Sometimes you have to make an executive decision. Do this for me." He smiled, but the pearly whites had turned that stained color again.

Angelina smiled and nodded. "Yes sir, Mr. Smoke—I'll do it."

"That's my girl. Doesn't it feel good to make your own decision?" The look on his face was like a father who had just witnessed the birth of his first child.

Angelina began to ring him up. He had added a few other things to the counter: a red baseball hat, a red cigarette lighter, a bottle of red wine, and a pack of Hot Tamales. What's up with the color red she wondered?

"Red's my favorite color," he blurted out. Like he might have been reading her mind.

Angelina labored to maintain her customer-winning smile; at this point she just wanted the transaction to be over with. And now, the dreaded final question: "Is there anything else I can do for you?"

"Why, yes. I'm so glad you asked."

Angelina looked up to see Mr. Smoke changing before her eyes. He handed her a business card and said, "I'm in the soul business. Would you come work for me? I've hired many souls from this drug store. Such great customer service skills." This time the eyes were a fiery orange color. It looked as if molten lava was going to ooze out of the sockets and run down his cheeks. A smell like week-old road kill filled the air, mixed with smoke and a dry heat that blurred her vision.

She looked down to the card, but it was two cards. Now three cards. It continued to double and triple and on and on. The room tilted and spun. She could have sworn Mr. Smoke's tongue was stretching toward her. Fear coiled around her, constricting her like an Amazon serpent. She was paralyzed, her breathing severely restricted. Finally, the cards merged into one now-legible business card. On the card, she read in big black letters SALES.

Mr. Smoke snapped his fingers and then clapped his hands. "Angelina! Angelina, are you alright. Hey, you've got to stop doing that, Dear. People are going to think you're using some of those drugs back there. He smiled and looked normal.

"Did you hear what I asked? I was wondering if you would come work for me. We have an opening in my sales department. Would you be interested?"

Angelina gradually came out of her fog and reason took its stand again. She rubbed her eyes and then her temples. "Possibly, Mr. Smoke. I'll think it over. Maybe we can talk later."

"Of course, Dear. Here, you take the rest of this Coke. I only took one swig. No backwash—I promise. You go sit down now. I'll get back with you on the job opening."

"Thank you, Mr. Smoke." Angelina motioned for Jennifer to come take her spot. She then stepped outside to get some air.

As Mr. Smoke walked away, he dug into his right pants pocket. Out came the five dollar bill. He pulled it taut with both hands and gently kissed Lincoln’s face.

Sometime around 4:15pm, Angelina got word she would be pulling a double shift and would help close up the store that evening. Hey, she was the new kid after all, and you didn't get your picture on the wall by doing the minimum.

The afternoon stretched into the evening hours. Everything went routinely, but Angelina couldn't stop thinking about Mr. Smoke. Was she going loco? Did she just imagine everything? Yet it seemed so real. She wondered if perhaps a coworker had slipped something into her drink. Yes, that could be it. Behind her was the mother lode of drugs, stuff that could alter the reality around her. But, no, everything came back to that one-of-a-kind—customer. After all, she had not hallucinated with any other customers. It was just those two brief episodes where she had slipped out of this world into another.

Inside her, the warning sirens were sounding. Some kernel of wisdom, perhaps her mom had taught her, or her grandmother, was sprouting, pushing its way to the light. Something was not right about Mr. Smoke and she would be watching him.

Around 10:45pm, Angelina rang up the last prescription. It was Mrs. Brown's pain medicine for a removed gall bladder. Mr. Brown smiled at her and offered a tip for the prompt service, but Angelina declined.

"Thank you, Mr. Brown. I hope your wife gets to feeling better."

"And thanks again for filling this so fast! Good night."

"Don't thank me. Thank the pharmacist, Mr. ..." She turned to look over her shoulder, but the pharmacist was not there.

Angelina began to shut down the cash register and make preparations for closing the store. It was just her, the nightshift pharmacist, and the cashier up front. As the short hand struck the eleven mark, all the lights in the store went out except for the pharmacy area.

"Hey, Joe! Hey, you know I'm still back here!" She called out to Joe at the front register, but got no reply. As she looked around, she realized that she hadn't seen Rick the pharmacist in the past thirty minutes. She looked in the break area and knocked on the restroom door, but there was no one to be found.

The overhead A/C unit turned off and the store became so quiet she could hear her own breathing. Then she heard the tapping sound. Yes, the unmistakable tapping sound of the cane, accompanied by footsteps. When she turned around to look across the counter there was Mr. Smoke.

"Good evening, Angelina."

"Mr. Smoke. What are you doing here? The pharmacy is closed for the night."

"Oh, it is, is it? Well, I'm not here to pick up a prescription, but I think you know that. I have some unsettled business with you, my Dear."

Though the three foot wide counter was between them, Angelina took a cautious step back. "Mr. Smoke, can we talk about this tomorrow? Just don't get your hopes up. I don't normally change jobs that quickly." She felt an uneasiness in the pit of her stomach, that feeling you know that could grow into something more. Angelina attempted to change the course of the conversation. "Hey, did you see Joe when you came in? You know Joe—don't you?"

"I told Joe to go home for the night, and I told Rick the same thing. Told them I would help you close the store since you had been so nice to me today. They always do what I say because I am the customer—remember?"

Angelina tried to find some humor in that. "Mr. Smoke, what do you know about closing down a drug store? Ha, ha, ha." Her laugh tapered and trailed off, absorbed somewhere in the silence between them.

"Oh, I've done it many a time," said Mr. Smoke. "I've shut down lots of things, you see."

The revelation then set in with Angelina; she was dealing with something more than just a customer or a strange old man. The tender shoot had busted its way through the crusty ground. Mr. Smoke was the Devil, the father of all lies, the taker of misled souls. Others might refer to him as the Dragon, the Beast, or the Serpent. She made up her own name: the Customer from Hell. Goose flesh broke out all over her body, and her heartbeats sped like a locomotive without brakes.

"So you know now, I see. I'm not just any customer, Angelina. I will be king. Ha, I am king." And he reached around the corner of the counter to rip away the little sign. The hand ended not with regular nails, but two-inch long talons, and it was no effort at all for him to remove the little job-aide of a sign. "Smile, my Dear. Behold your king. Now, give me what I want—your soul!" As he uttered that last sentence, his jaw dropped and fire leaped out, much like flames would blast out the tailpipe of a dragster.

All Angelina could do was silently lift up a prayer and watch. Her tongue laid on the bottom of her mouth like a mouse, dead in a trap. She could feel the heat coming off him as his eggshell-white skin began to crack all over. Pure evil was hatching in front of her.

Moans of damned souls rose from somewhere deep inside the enraged Devil. They called out to her, some inviting her, some telling her to turn back, to look away, a melody of torture and anguish. Slowly her soul was sinking, like an invisible quicksand was engulfing her. Then the firm embrace of a hand.

Deep down, even below the wildly beating heart, Angelina could feel a presence, a warmth that was building, a prayer that was being answered. The frozen mouse began to thaw and move a little. Though she feared the Devil, it seemed now that she was protected and that evil was far off away, like watching a fierce lion through the barrier of steel bars. Yes, he could still reach out and rake her with his claws if she got too close, but devouring her was unlikely.

Through no small effort, Angelina stirred her minuscule reserve of courage. The tongue was loose now and she managed to set free these words: "I quit." Then she slammed her fist down on the counter and shouted it, "I quit! Do you hear me, Mr. Smoke, Mr. Devil!"

"Angelina, you can't quit. That's not possible." He pointed to that special side of the pharmacy. "What about your place on the wall? Employee of the Month—Angelina Gomez. Has a nice ring doesn't?"

"I don't care anymore. I told you—I quit. You're no longer my customer, Mr. Smoke. I'm so outta here!"

"No. I won't permit it! You can't treat me this way! You must give me what I want!"

Angelina watched as the forked tongue receded away from her and slithered back into its den. Light as bright as sunlight had been escaping through Smoke's cracks, his mouth, and his eyes. But now the light was waning, as if something were eclipsing it, extinguishing it. She watched his eyes until all she could see was liquid blackness, what one might expect to see in the deepest depths of the ocean.

The skin continued to crack and Smoke took on the appearance of a mannequin being incinerated, until all that was left was a statue of ash. Then from somewhere an invisible force swept the ashes away—not a trace of him left behind. Like ocean waves destroying a sand castle.

And that was all it took. No fire from heaven, no secret spell or chant, no waving of a wand—just two simple words: I quit.

Angelina turned out the lights, grabbed her purse and closed the door behind her. No two-weeks’ notice, no looking back.

By Stephen Johnson

From: United States