Constructive criticism would be sorely appreciated. “Well, I guess it could be worse.” He really seemed to mean that. I opened my eyes, looking up from my place on the carpeted floor of my room, into the white light of the ceiling fan. I moved my gaze toward Jonah, crusty, bespectacled, his long curly hair dangling down over his face. Older Jonah, with dirty blonde hair in bangs, and five o clock shadow darkening his angular jaw. Dressed in a dark gray smoking jacket and matching shade of Converse All stars. He was crouched over me. “It could be worse, Jonah, yes.” I replied. “But truly, how much worse should it really be?” I said grinning. I sat up. “Well, just think about other people.” “Right. Some people have no luck at all. And I on the other hand, have a little tiny bit of luck, for sure.” “And we should appreciate that.” he said with a smile. “Well, better to appreciate than to not appreciate, I guess.” “Definitely. Certainly. TRULY.” he said, his voice shining with laughter. “And you may have gotten caught.” he said. “And your mom may have lost all faith in her son's innocence forever, and you may even be blacklisted from TerraMart forever too, but at least you had the balls, the fucking cajones, to try it. Even if you sucked at it in a major way.” “And I made it through the door. I was OUT-SIDE.” I said, with a wistful sigh. I remembered back to the incident. I was headed towards the store's exit, the place where all the last minute bargains hung out as one approached the end of one's shopping experience. And my anxiety was distorting things noticeably. I couldn't speed up because I was afraid I'd look like I was rushing out, but I really wanted to move faster. I was in some kind of limbo, teetering on an edge. Did I look alright? Should I slow down? And if I did, would that look too slow, like I was compensating for panic? I didn't want to have to read it on another person's face to find out, so I tried to just follow my breathing instead and I thought about playing Battlefield 1942 on my laptop. Sniping Nazi's in the sands of El Alamein. Taking a machine gun nest by surprise with my Thompson. I smiled at the thought and then was suddenly hit by a wave of frenzied fear, shrinking into myself under my skin as I passed a sour faced middle aged woman at the checkout counter who glanced up at me for a half second while sliding a long box of English muffins into a bag. She looked back at what she was doing, and reached for another grocery item. Okay, cool, I'm just a person leaving I thought. Some stoned teenager who had just wanted to kill some time playing the latest Viscera-9800 game on display in the Electronics Department and who was laughing to himself at the memory on the way out. I fingered the quartz of the watch in my pocket, and gleamed the slightest bit of comfort from it's surface. Smooth, and classy. Retail value three hundred and fifty dollars. A man in a suite was staring intently at a cereal display, tapping his chin inquisitively with a pale finger. He was apparently intensely at odds with himself over the merits of Life Cereal versus Cookie Crisp. There was someone smiling by the door who was there for a charity, a tall black Vietnam war vet who I had given a quarter and other assorted change to on my way in. It seemed everyone was trying hard to just calmly be themselves. I braced myself further as I reached the home stretch. Alright, I was almost out. I brought my hand towards the metal rod that was there on the door to be pushed, and I pushed it. Ishoved it open. And I could feel scorching daylight on my skin, and I knew I could have easily made it out to of the parking lot and beyond to my house from there, but I turned, and I looked back over my shoulder. The war vet. He was smiling at someone in a dark blue Yankees jacket who had just passed him by. And...he saw me. I winced. In the most obvious way ever. The door hadn't even closed, and I was not outside, not beyond it or beyond anything, because I was still holding the heavy door, leaning into it. He saw me, and he just nodded, in slow motion. I stared at him, and it must have been for a full twenty seconds, and he seemed to squint at me, as if sizing me up. I found myself thinking “it's okay, you got me I guess” and he took his first step towards me. I was staring off into the pointed ear of a Batman insignia on Jonah's shirt that was showing from under his unbuttoned smoking jacket. “Yeah but in the end, you chickened out.” Jonah said with a chuckle. “I chickened out.” “You could have made a break for it. You could have gotten away with it, and kept your squeaky clean reputation intact.” “Truly.” I said with a smirk. “And I didn't But now, the biggest question I face, where the hell am I going to walk to now to buy ginormous boxes of Cracker Jax?”
("...reads well and I like it..." mentioned the goblin, adding "...yet I tend not to critic stuff though I didn't see any obvious mistakes now...")
