The Headshrinker's Dilemma

Chapter Four

She was not shy. At all. After a great tonguing session on aisle four, the cashier took him by the hand and led him into the backroom just like before when she escorted him to the bathroom. But this time they ducked through another door and took several steps up to a loft-like room. It was empty except for a few chairs, a sofa, an old refrigerator, and a couple of television sets, the old school ones with the piece on the back that made it hard to carry and impossible to put in any place except a corner. The cashier led Dale over to the sofa and laid him down on it. She climbed on top, straddling him, kissing him crazily, all over his face and neck. In many ways, it was like a scene from a movie but the awkwardness of it, her touch and the way she kissed, sloppily and without any form or rhythm, made it clear that she really hadn’t had a whole lot of experience in that department. Dale thought it was endearing though. There was a kind of newness about her, something very primal and raw, untampered and again very free. And who was he to complain or think otherwise, he certainly didn’t have a lot of experience either. Besides, it felt good. She felt good. Her lips on his, her tongue is his mouth, it was a good time and then she stopped. She pulled back from him just a little, her face still close to his, nose almost touching nose, she breathed heavily, almost panting like she’d been running a race.

“Do you…” she started. “Do you have any…? You know… Protection?”

The question caught Dale off guard. If he was being honest with himself, no one had ever asked him that question. Ever. And that wasn’t because he was just some kind stallion in the bed to be so cavalier as to actually not care to have them or not, rather he just had never really found himself in the expected position to need one. He wasn’t a virgin. But he was no Don Juan either.

“Uh… Nah,” he answered.

Disappointment. Despair. She begrudgingly got up and sulked over to the door. Dale hadn’t noticed that she had already begun to get undressed: her khaki pants were unbuttoned and hung down near her hips, and her button up white shirt was undone four buttons down, he could actually see her bra. Black. Which was sexy to him for some reason. She looked at him. s*x was in her eyes. It was a sensual look, crafty, shrewd, even more so coming from a girl that was cute but not what you normally would have called sexy, her plain face and freckly skin.

“I guess I’ll go get some…” she sighed out, throwing her hands on her hips unsure.

Dale stood up to protest her going, it seemed like the man thing to do, despite it being the store that she worked in.

“Nah, let me –”

He started towards her but then stopped. The two television sets in the room caught his eye. He noticed then that there were a couple machines hooked up to the televisions sets off to the side, their cords running to some other boxes and that the television sets weren’t for regular programming. Rather on each set were six windows or panes, each capturing an image from the grocery store. Dale couldn’t believe his eyes or his luck! He was in the exact place that he needed to be in: the footage was there for the taking, he just needed to get the cashier out of the room.

“On second thought, you work here… I’m – I’m just gonna hang out here and, you know, get ready,” Dale did a little shimmy to emphasize what he wanted to get ready for upon her return.

The cashier smiled big and then did a little jig of her own. She ran over and planted one on Dale, her lips falling sloppily over his and her tongue missing its mark, landing inside and outside his mouth all at the same time. The cashier then hurriedly ran away.

“I’ll be right back…” she said just before skipping out.

***

Dale had the tape. It was over. Done. There was no longer anything that could tie him to the body of the thug if they ever found it under the produce section. But Dale couldn’t bring himself to leave. Not now. Not after watching what was going on in the grocery store: two more thugs had entered the store. They looked very much like the one Dale had killed by shrinking his head, heavy jackets and bandanas. One of the thugs was randomly walking through the store, while the other had stopped the cashier to ask her a question. Dale didn’t know how bad his luck could have been, to finally get so close to finishing all of this and being free only to have more thugs like the one he had killed come in. Judging by how the one thug that was walking the store as if he was looking for something or someone, Dale guessed that it was the dead thug that they all had in common, probably what the other thug was questioning the cashier about.

Shit, thought Dale. He would just leave. That would work. He would just sneak out the back way. Go down stairs, find the back exit and sneak out. But it was too late. The other thug had rounded up the group of college kids and was bringing them back up front. He was aggressive with them, pushing them and shoving them along to make them move forward. And there they all were, the group of college kids and the cashier, huddled up, the two thugs on each side of them, pressing them for information. Dale already knew what that information was and only he knew.

He watched as the thug manhandled the girls, even the cashier. Dale wanted to do something about it but didn’t know what. Also, he knew it was probably best to just lay low until some kind of authority came through – a security guard or someone that could actually handle these guys. He remembered the one thug actually did have a - GUN!!! One of the thugs had just pulled out a gun and put it in the cashier’s face. Suddenly, Dale felt a surge of energy hit him. A wave of anger. He wondered why he was hiding. He could literally kill people with his bare hands. Dale made up his mind right then and there that he was going to leave. He was going to help, some how he was to save the cashier and the group of college kids. He had been the villain of his story long enough, it was time for him to become the hero.

***

Dale didn’t understand how his powers worked. All that he knew was that when he touched people with either hand or both on the face or head, something magical and devilish began to happen: he could shrink heads. It was a perplexing power to have as he didn’t really know what to do with it. And although he desperately wanted to figure out a way to utilize it now to help some people, he didn’t see how he could without putting himself in harmsway. But maybe that was exactly what he had to do. Heroes always confronted their enemies. Maybe that was the problem. All this time he had been hiding, trying to avoid using his power, afraid of what it had done and could do. Dale realized that this ability that he had to shrink heads had only made him more isolated, it had made him even more of a recluse than he was before. As a matter of fact, everything about him was worse. But it wasn’t the ability to shrink heads that had caused his deprivation, rather he had allowed something strange and weird to exacerbate his own insecurities about himself. It was a stark revelation, and now that he knew it, he had a choice.

Dale checked in on the footage: The thugs had lined them all up and was going down the row talking to each one. The other thug stood in the background. Dale noticed that there was a microphone switch on one of the machines. He pressed the switch upward and a red light came on. He could hear what was happening in the store.

“Well one of you gotta know what happened to him. My dude came in here and never came back out. We waited. And nothing. We’ve searched the whole goddam store….” one of the thugs was preaching at the group.

“I can tell you one goddman thing though… Ain’t nobody leaving here until we get some answers – ain’t that right, dawg?”

The other thug nodded: “Right.”

“And if we don’t find out something in hurry, we gonna start peeling away at some things until we get the answers, you understand?”

Dale stepped back from the screen and the microphone. He knew what he was about to do was crazy, but it was the only chance he had of saving everyone. He stepped forward, back to the microphone.

“I – I know where your friend’s at – at,” he didn’t mean for his voice to crack.

He watched as everyone’s head turned to peer up at the ceiling, it was as if God had spoken to them.

“Who is that?” snapped one of the thugs, pointing the gun in the cashier’s face.

Dale didn’t like seeing that. He stepped forward to the microphone again, this time more confident.

“Get the gun out of her face, you loser,” he commanded.

Both thugs were riled up now. It was obvious that they weren’t used to being talk to that way.

“Is – Is that your boyfriend? Huh? Up there in the video room I bet!” said the one thug, spit flying out of his mouth.

Dale watched as the cashier smiled. It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. Also, the most crazy and devilish. She peered up at the ceiling, making sure to look at one of the cameras, her eyes were beaming. Dale knew what she was about to say… The pause, the stare, the way she was looking at him through the camera as if she knew that they were looking eye to eye.

“Yes!”

His heart leapt.

And then the thugs took off running towards the back. They were running towards him. They were coming for him. It was then that Dale realized what he had done and he couldn’t understand completely why he had done it. All his life he had been the one to hide, to try to find another way of doing things to avoid confrontation and harm and hurt. Even when it came to all of his relationships. But now, it was different. And now, he had two gun toting thugs on their way to kill him but he was no longer looking for a place to hide.