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[color=black][b]“I guess a litterbug could be considered a type of pest,”[/b][/color] muttered July under his breath as he gave Ada a once-over, not realizing that she was actually going to do the work that had been assigned to them. If it wasn’t for the overalls, she looked like she would’ve been pictured in a stained glass window with a radiant halo surrounding her choppy hairstyle. Truly, she was a saint if she’d offered to clean up the parking lot. He returned her smile with the tight-lipped smirk of a garter snake. His plan, which wasn’t a plan so much as it was just a lie, had worked. He glanced sideways at Rory and then quickly averted his eyes. A wretch like him should only be allowed to catch glimpses of something so heavenly in the reflection of the half-dome mirrors hiding security cameras. 

[color=black][b]“Problem solved then, my Lord,”[/b][/color] said July to Rory. The [i]my Lord[/i] was supposed to have been a sarcastic dig at Ada’s weird choice of words, but when he said the phrase to Rory it just sounded natural. 

Before July could fully pledge his fealty to the assistant manager, a pot-bellied trucker approached the cash register. Although Ada had denied him her aid on his quest, he was beaming as if he had managed to find his own personal holy grail. In a way, he did. July glanced down at the magazine called [i]Big Booty Pirates[/i]. It was strange for a treasure hunting magazine to be in a blacked-out bag to prevent browsing, and then it clicked inside of July’s head as he scanned the other choice items the trucker had purchased. He was both mildly disturbed and deeply intrigued to discover what exactly “The Jolly Rogers Edition” meant. It was the kind of self-discovery that’d haunt him for the rest of his days, assuming he made it past the first night shift.

[color=black][b]“Let me bag that up for you,”[/b][/color] said July after ringing the man out for his smut. He wished he had forceps to handle the items, or at the very least a pair of gloves. 

“No need,” said the trucker, grinning. “You got bathroom keys?”

Oh god no. July sometimes went into that bathroom. Rory sometimes went into that bathroom. He was pretty sure Ada was the one stuck cleaning that bathroom, which was already a herculean task that didn’t need to be made any worse. He couldn’t let the trucker perform his dark rituals in their already debased sanctuary. July glanced behind him at the pair of keys attached to a piece of wood with the grimy effigy of a man carved into it. He looked back to see the trucker eyeing the keys with the same lustful look that he had thought people would give him when he’d started playing guitar (but never did).  

[color=black][b]“Oh sorry,”[/b][/color] said July, sucking in air between his teeth as if to express true regret. [color=black][b]“The bathrooms are currently out-of-order. Both of them. Some kid flushed a bunch of M-80s down the toilet and what came up with the explosion still keeps me up at night. Unfortunately, until the HAZMAT team arrives we’re stuck using nature’s toilet.”[/b][/color]

July jerked a thumb out the Expanse.The trucker grumbled under his breath and took his goods. July sighed in relief as the man left the store and climbed back into the cab of his truck. July put a hand to his beating heart. Not all heroes wore capes. Some of them wore another person’s name tag and a crappy vest. With no more customers, the night shift entered a kind of state of stasis where he couldn’t tell if one minute had passed or one hour. The speaker he’d so graciously left for the other employees was dead, murdered by their own hand’s inability to plug in the charger, so he couldn’t even enjoy the sounds of the inner circles of Hell as he stood around the register and attempted to open his body and mind up to becoming possessed by the spirit of someone who knew how to look busy. 

Wait, didn’t someone have to take care of that slushie machine? Should he actually work? 

The devil and the angel that warred upon his shoulders soon laid down their arms and sought shelter from the smell that had wafted into the Gas-Way as the door ring-a-dinged open. July tucked his nose into his elbow, looking somewhat like Dracula who had forgotten his cape, as he tried to avoid staring at the Squatter. He had been warned about the man. All of them had. However, only July had been warned about the man by his mother. While she didn’t even know of the Squatter’s existence, she’d often threaten him that if he didn’t start acting like an adult that he’d one day end up becoming a vagrant like the Squatter. At least his mother thought he’d become something. It was a nice thought. July stepped away from the register and tried to disappear behind the display of keychains as the Squatter approached. 

“I see what you’re all doing! You’re all fools.”

Damn it, he should’ve just ducked under the counter. July stepped back out onto the worn-down mat in front of the register and sucked in his lips as the vagrant began to rant and rage. If the smell wasn’t so bad July might’ve appreciated being in the company of someone who looked as ghoulish as himself, but with the stink the best he could do was try not to appear horrified. However, he didn’t have to attempt to hide his horror for long as the man continued rambling on like an English rock band that had stolen it's riffs from old American blues artists. July’s face softened as he realized the man wasn’t speaking gibberish. He was reciting poetry. Shit, they could make some pretty killer lyrics, too.

July grabbed a pen and a pad and began jotting down whatever he could about rainbow butterflies in the sky and ice-skating worms of the brain. This man was a poet! A fellow artist! Here, in Nowhere! July had truly not expected to meet a peer. His pen halted as the vagrant mentioned how they’d regret eating Mexican. What? Oh, it was a dig at how American corporations “eat up” the cheap labor force of migrant workers and then pin the blame on the needy workers instead of the greedy bosses that hired them. July definitely didn’t expect the thought provoking social commentary from the Squatter, but all art needed meaning. Now they just needed a platform to spread the message. Maybe he knew how to play drums.

“Ughhhhhh…..that was a bad trip….” 

Oh.

“Any of you youngsters got a spare buck for a Yoo-hoo?” 

Right.

Sometimes the insane ramblings of a homeless man were predictions of encroaching doomsday or the fall of society brought upon by its own hand, and sometimes they were just insane ramblings. July frowned and rubbed his chin. If screamed, they would still be good lyrics. That was the beautiful thing about screaming in songs—no matter how asinine the lyrics were, nobody would be able to call them meaningless since nobody would be able to understand the words anyway. 

He looked at the Yoo-hoo can on the counter, and then at the flickering lights outside. Fireflies? Weird. July thought they were going extinct. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually seen some. Then he breathed again and was laser-focused back on the Squatter. Okay, this chemical warfare had to stop. It was like they were being kept hostage by his stench, the Squatter being a biological terrorist whose list of demands only included a watered-down chocolate milk. Fine. He’d buy the guy a Yoo-hoo if it meant that the Squatter would leave. Only he was as broke as the Squatter himself. Hell, he’d love a can of Yoo-hoo too. Was his mother right? Was this a vision of the future?

[color=black][b]“You know what, man?”[/b][/color] July leaned in to whisper to his future self. It was a big mistake, but he kept his composure as he powered through the smell. He slid the bottle closer to the man. [color=blue][b]“It’s on me. Just make sure to drink it out back so I don’t get chewed out by management.”[/b][/color]

And so that he’d stop poisoning the air. And so that he’d stop terrorizing poor, lovely Rory. July glanced over at the orange lights again. The little burning embers reminded him of the tip of a cigarette, which further reminded him that he was in need of a smoke break. Once the Squatter left, it would be nice to get some fresh air while he propped the door open and let the odor out. The dancing lights were taunting him. Yeah, he definitely needed a smoke break after this. He turned back to the Squatter.

[color=blue][b]“What do you say. Deal?”[/b][/color]