Not Dead Yet

66

‘What do you mean, you don’t have any?’

The man hunched over the counter in a white coat was the kind of miserable jerk who should not have been there at all. He should have quit or retired long before he’d decided he hated doing this job so much he wasn’t ever going to be pleasant or helpful to anyone who came in here. With his frayed grey hair and his thick, round bottle-lensed glasses he looked like a Nazi geneticist who’d had a career change. He spoke like one, too.

‘Ve don’t haf any.’

‘You’re a fucking pharmacist; all pharmacists sell thermometers.’

The man shrugged and said nothing.

Drayton Wheeler glared at him. ‘You know where there’s another pharmacist?’

He nodded. ‘I do.’

‘Where?’

‘Vy should I tell you? I don’t like you. I don’t like your attitude.’

‘Fuck you.’

‘Vuck you too.’

For an instant, Wheeler was tempted to punch his smug, evil face. But there were all kinds of potential repercussions from that. Not smart. He mustn’t get side-tracked, had to keep focus. Focus. Focus.

He walked out of the shop in a rage and collided with a woman pushing a shopping trolley. ‘Stupid old woman!’ he shouted at her. ‘Watch where you’re going!’ Then he stormed off up the street, everything a blur, his rage playing havoc with his eyes. He was tired. He was grungy. He was hungry. He needed food. He needed a bath.

But most of all he needed a thermometer.