It's Made a Liar Out of Me

2014 started off frigid and full of hate. Temperatures which hovered around thirty degrees below zero Fahrenheit proved absolutely remarkable for business, and the Dominion saw a fine surge of custom despite the fact that the bulk of releases were crap that only saw limited theatrical release which nobody in the Saladolsa area had ever heard of. The year seemed destined for brightness and mirth.

Then one of Fernando's regular customers came in to rent one evening and all the good omens were flipped topsy-turvy thanks to Fernando's wretched penmanship and said customer's notions of entitlement.

This person had been coming to the store for years and years, since well before Fernando took over as the Dominion's steward. She was not a perfect customer (few are), but she had never stolen anything nor broken anything and any late fees which she racked up would, eventually, be paid off in slow one- and two-dollar trickles. She came in on this occasion to rent some movies and she also decided to purchase one of Fernando's extra copies of World War Z. She selected, in addition to the purchase, three new releases and two older titles.

Fernando writes up the slip like he had for this woman countless times before, only this time she opts to pay with a check. That's fine; Fernando has no reason to suspect anything out of the ordinary with regard to her bank account's credit. She fills out the check while Fernando mills about the shelves retrieving her stack of movies. The total had come to sixteen dollars: eight for the purchase, and eight for two of the new releases. It was a rent-one-get-one-free day, so the other three movies were rendered gratis beneath that aegis.

She writes the check out for $15, doubtless because Fernando's penmanship is a blight to the world about on par with endometriosis, and Fernando remarks on this when he returns to the counter. "You're a dollar short, but it's no big deal. Check's already written," he says.

"What do you mean, a dollar short?" she asks.

"It's supposed to have come to sixteen dollars. But, like I said, it's no big deal."

"Wait, why sixteen?"

Fernando blinks. "The purchase is eight, and then the two new releases."

"Wait, I thought I get one of those free."

"You did."

"Then why is it sixteen? Shouldn't it be fourteen?"

It does not even dawn on Fernando to ask why she would make the check out for fifteen dollars in that case. Instead he is at a loss for words. "Er...no."

"Why?"

"Because you have the purchase, and then two new releases. They come to sixteen."

She half-closes her eyes for a moment. "I just did the math, and it comes out to fourteen. You're charging me for the one new release when you shouldn't."

Fernando is confused. "I'm sorry, what?"

"Shouldn't I get two of the new releases free and then pay for one of the old ones?"

Fernando tries to put things as politely as he can. "Er...no. The rentals have always been done in tiers like this."

"Tiers?" she asks. "I don't under...." She trails off in confusion while scratching her cheek.

"It goes by the number on the tag, descending, for which ones are free."

"Wait, so I'm paying for the new ones before the old ones."

"Yes."

"That doesn't seem fair at all."

Fernando wallows in a mire of pure consternation while putting on a facade of geniality. "It's been done this way every single other time you've come in to rent."

She ruminates on things a bit more. "And you do it like this to everybody?"

"Yes. Not just me, but the owners before me, and the owner before that, and probably even going back further all the way to when the store was first founded. That's the policy."

"It sounds like you're ripping people off."

Fernando cannot even find the energy to get upset at her noxious accusation. He is quite effectively trapped, for any justification he could give for why he insists on being inflexible--primarily that Fernando is not going to make an exception for her which would doubtless be abused, nor is he going to permanently change things so that he runs the risk of earning up to fifty percent less income on a rent-one-get-one day by letting old titles go first--would be taken in the worst possible light, for she has already convinced herself that Fernando is in the wrong and she is in the right.

So he shrugs and reiterates, "That's the policy and always has been the policy."

She then thinks for a little longer, and says, "I probably won't come here anymore."

Fernando shrugs again. He might perhaps have apologized that she feels this way, but he does not particularly feel like lying to her. Instead he tells her, "Have a good evening," and waits for her to perhaps ask that she be refunded.

Instead she takes her movies and leaves.

Annual Abscondments IV: In Closing

2013 was a busy, busy year for Fernando's more roguish clientele, though the nefarious acts of thievery came in bursts: first late February/early March, then a second wave in July, and finally an end-of-year push in November. It proved Fernando's worst year yet in terms of lost inventory; twenty-one of Fernando's beloved and not-so-beloved movies were torn from his loving embrace and taken into the unexpected custody of a great wide spectrum of ne'er-do-wells.

This is their obituary.

Expendables 2, Wanderlust, The Notebook: A lady comes into the store, one who hadn't been in since the days of the old Keeper. She had some late fees from that elder age, $21. Fernando informed her of this fact and, against all odds, she agreed to pay them off.

So how'd that work out for you, Fernando? You earned $30 only to lose about $60 in inventory. Look on the bright side: if you keep this up there may be room for you on the executive board of a major financial institution. And on the brighter side, you no longer have a copy of The Notebook available to recommend as a dumb-silly romantic chick flick.

I Am Number 4: High school kid comes in and sets up account, rents one movie, never returns it. He came back to the store on one occasion in the company of some of his less-lawbreak-y peers and Fernando shamed him so thoroughly that he actually put down five bucks towards his debt. 

He still owes Fernando $35.

The Greatest Game Ever Played: Because if you're a thirty-something woman setting up an account whose sole purpose, apparently, is to steal something, best make it a mediocre movie about golf that had otherwise never been rented in all the years Fernando worked at and owned the Dominion.

New Year's Eve, War, 24: Redemption: Remember the guy from way, way back who trashed a copy of Ice Age and then visited the store not long after Fernando took over in the misguided hopes that new ownership would erase his debt? Yeah, he, Fernando later learned, at some point hooked up with a gullible young lady who set up an account and, apparently, rented for him by proxy. Three pieces of Fernando's inventory went missing but at least two of those three were uninspiring renters even when they were fresh and new and the third, while a decent, testosterone-laden popcorn flick, was not of any particular importance in the grand scheme of things.

But hey if either of them ever return to the store down the road I can feel justified affixing the "saga" tag to this affair.

Warm Bodies, Cabin in the Woods, 127 Hours: Kind of a twofer with the next entry. See below.

Beautiful Creatures, Real Steel: Okay, so, two guys in their late teens/early twenties come to the store at the same time and both of them set up accounts to rent some movies. One of them is from Happyrock, about thirty miles away; the other is more local and claims an address in Melvinsburg. Fernando checks out the licenses and gets phone numbers from them (one of which is a local land line) and rents to them.

When the movies had been out for three days, Fernando calls them up in turn to request that they bring them back in. The cell phone goes to not-set-up voicemail and Fernando leaves a message. The other one rings and rings and no one picks up. The following day, Fernando tries again. Still voicemail, still no response.

This repeats for a number of additional days until, finally, somebody picks up on the landline, a woman.

Fernando explains the situation to her and asks that she inform the young man that his movies are still out and if he could return them promptly. The woman tells Fernando that he is "out of state for work." Fernando asks that she pass along his request and to check around if, perhaps, the movies were sitting there at home. She agrees to do precisely that.

Buuuuut she never called him back, and Fernando also never did get in contact via cell phone with the guy from Happyrock.

Stand Up Guys, Prometheus: A middle-aged woman comes in to rent a pair of movies and they don't make it back. When he calls her up to find out what is going on, she tells him that she gave them to her son to drop off on his way back to school. Fernando lets her know that her son never did drop them off, and that he would appreciate it if she could double-check with him to make sure they make it back the next time he comes home.

Nope.

Star Trek: Into Darkness, The Muppets: Okay, sometimes people wake up on the stupid side of life. This pair of customers set up an account back in April, after having just moved into the area, and had been absolutely exemplary renters up til then. They were genial, treated Fernando like an actual person, and almost never late; when they were, they killed off their late fees immediately.

Then, one afternoon, they rented the above movies and they didn't make it back over the next three days. Fernando found this peculiar, so he called them up. One of them answered and told him that their car had taken a dump on them and that they were terribly sorry about everything, and that they would bring them back promptly once they found someone to give them a ride down to the Dominion, for they resided well into the boonies. This sounded good to Fernando, so he wished them the best and told them they could hash out everyone once the movies got back in.

Alas, they never did, and all of Fernando's subsequent calls went unanswered. What a pity, what a waste.

Now You See Me, Despicable Me: The girl who'd gotten a sorta-but-not-really divorce from her boyfriend a few years back dropped by and rented these movies, which never came back. She ignored Fernando's requests to return them, and now Fernando's sympathies lie with her jilted ex, wherever he may be.

The most embarrassing part is that she used a full stamp card for a free rental on Despicable Me. Would she have had it if Fernando had been less kind when she initially asked him to divvy up their communal stamps?

The Purge, Disaster Movie: Fernando tries not to judge people based on their last names and familial relations, but sometimes circumstances make it so incredibly hard to do. The young lady who rented this, by all appearances, comes from a family of thieves: her parents rented some things back under the Old Keeper's watch and never returned them. Then her older sister rented some things a few years back and never returned them.

Now, of course, she has rented some things and never returned them.

Fuck it, the next time somebody with that last name stops in, Fernando is going to be King Dick and let his prejudices run their fullest course.

Not a day goes by on which Fernando does not lament the passing of every one of these unfortunate abductees. Yes, even you, The Greatest Game Ever Played, even you. In fact, your loss is felt most keenly of all.

The question remains: What promises does 2014 hold? This Fernando cannot say. Truth be told, he seems to have driven away most of the assholes and recent weeks down at the Dominion have been, well, enjoyable. No entitled women coming to manipulate him into free things. No characters from days gone by stopping by to put into motion their inscrutable goals. No curious and random new faces with wretched spatial judgment.

Just the normal, genial customer base who rents movies, returns them mostly on time, and clears up any small late fees with a humble apology.

In short, the Chronicles seem to have wound down. Like in every closed system, the occurrence of random and interesting things decays as entropy increases and said system approaches a uniform, vacuous state. Rather than continue to draw out the unnecessary by milking a franchise (such as this is) until even its bones have been rendered down and snorted by a dwindling number of consumers (such as it is), as is the case with a certain industry that revolves around the production and distribution of motion pictures, it is time, I feel, to bring this book to a close.

There shall be other happenings, other tales of woe and dread, and even occasional tales of uplifting experience, I'm certain. Entropy is almost inevitably stalled out in the short term by random occurrences. Perhaps a fluctuation in fate will jar a new wave of content appropriate for the Chronicles of Fernando H. Stevens.

But until and unless there is such a time, let me tell you of a man who, in the late summer of 2010, made the lifechanging decision to cast his lot into the realm of weblogging through the collation and recording of happenings of great intrigue and of possible interest to souls other than himself. The wrangling with irate word processing programs, the mostly-kept rigor of deadlines, and the random acts of God which threatened the stability and structural integrity of his Chronicles did not daunt him. 

That man was one Fernando H. Stevens.

He had a blast, and he hopes you did too.

One Hour

Fernando sits at his computer one evening when a minivan pulls up and a guy comes in. He had rented some movies earlier that week and returned them two days late, racking up a neat twelve dollars in late fees. He picks out a couple of films, comes up to the counter, and says to Fernando, “I also have some late fees.”

“Yep, twelve bucks. Did you want to put something down on them?”

“Yeah, I'll pay that off.” So he does, and Fernando hands over the change, and the man leaves.

Not one minute later, a woman storms into the store and waves the cases at Fernando. “How much were these movies?”

“Those came to eight dollars.”

“They're four bucks each?”

“Yes.”

“And why was the late fee twelve dollars?”

“Because you had out three movies for two days.”

She slams the cases down on the counter and crosses her arms. “Two nights?”

“Yes, they were returned at around eight on the second night out. The movies are due back at seven.”

“And you charged two nights for that?”

“Yes.”

“For one hour?”

“Yes.”

“I want my money back.”

“Alright.” Fernando shrugs, rises, and heads on over. He places the movies she'd just rented on his desk and then pops open the till to hand over eight dollars.

She looks down at the money, then back up at Fernando. “What is this?” she hisses.

“Your refund.”

“I want all of it back.”

“I'm sorry, the late fees which were assessed are a debt that needed reckoning.”

“I want all of it back,” she repeats.

“Sorry, I'm not giving you back the twelve dollars in late charges you owed me.”

“I'll tell the police you ripped me off.”

“Go right ahead. I have the signed rental form back here and the daily rate of late charges posted here, there, and there.” Fernando points for emphasis.

“We're never renting from this place ever again!” she shouts as she storms out.

“And I wish you all the best. Have a good evening.”

Peek-a-Boo

A pair of high school age young men come into the store one evening. Fernando has never seen either of them before. They are loud and abrasive and general annoyances who run up and down the new release aisle opening case after case, then replacing the plastic DVD houses on the rack, still ajar.

“Hey, how come these are empty?” one of them asks after they've gone through and peeked inside the case of every film on the Top Ten list.

“I find it a risky proposition to keep my wares out on the floor where anyone can help himself to them without oversight. Is there something I can help you with?”

Rather than take Fernando up on his offer, they depart.

Still Not a Time Traveler

The Conjuring is a film that a not insignificant portion of Fernando's customer base had been waiting on for some time. When, sometime in September, he was finally able to give people a release date, he was inundated with requests to reserve a copy for whomever on said date. Fernando pointed out that he wasn't even sure how many copies he would be getting, exactly, and that he did not want to pull an airline and overbook the reservations and leave some poor souls hanging, so he told the people, “Come back mid-October, like the fifteenth or so, and ask again then.

So, it's now mid-October, and an older woman comes into the store with grandchildren in tow. Fernando says “grandchildren” because this lady is, for all intents and purposes, a rental proxy for her daughter, someone Fernando rightly told off way back in the day when he informed her that she had thirty-eight dollars in late fees dating back to 2006 and that, no, he would not rent to her unless she put money towards it. Fernando still rents to her, since she pays off the inevitable late fees racked up under her name.

The kids are set loose in the family section while the matron wanders the floor yammering into her cell phone and getting snappish with her conversational partner, since all the movies said partner desired (The Heat, Hangover 3, and This Is the End) were absent from the rental racks, and they stubbornly remained absent even after the old lady asked Fernando if he was hiding copies behind the counter. The matron also took the opportunity to make a passive-aggressive jibe to the person on the phone at Fernando's expense, because, after all, “the guy running the joint doesn't know anything.”

Then she asks, “Do you have The Conjuring?”

“Sorry, that doesn't come out until Tuesday.”

“It says there that you have it.”

Fernando's eyes rotate in their sockets to double-check his sign in case someone had tampered with it, but, no, the header still reads UPCOMING RELEASES FOR OCTOBER 2013. “It's not yet the twenty-second.”

“I seen it on display at Wal-Mart.”

“Perhaps you could then go to Wal-Mart and buy a copy. I'm not surprised they have access to better time travel technology than I do.”

With that, the woman returns to the rental racks and eventually decides to rent This Is 40.

Conspiracy Conspiracy

One afternoon Fernando is trying his hand at Dungeon Crawl: Stone Soup when a man enters the Dominion. He approaches the counter and Fernando greets him.

“Yeah, do you have any documentaries on 9/11?” the man asks.

“Not really documentaries, no,” Fernando replies. "I've got the Oliver Stone picture, off the top of my head, if that was something you would maybe be interested in.”

“No, I'm looking for ones that are about covering up the truth.”

“The...truth? No, sorry, I know I don't have anything you're looking for with that particular...slant.” Documentaries are piss-poor renters to begin with, and the most recent one in the store is Michael Moore's Sicko...which came out around two years before Fernando even took hold of the Dominion's reins of leadership.

Notwithstanding most social and political so-called “documentaries” are attention-whoring malarkey with an investigatory and explanatory outlook about on par with the average 24-hour news channel, in that the creator holds to a normative position, rather than an empirical one, and then seeks out examples to shore up this preconceived notion. No scholarly or investigatory work can be wholly objective, as the researcher always imprints some of his or her views into the investigation at hand. But biased, histrionic bullshit is what sells to the average American; and even then “sell” is grossly overgenerous. As stated above, the Dominion's customer base doesn't care to watch the newest Michael Moore schlock; and Fernando would rather spend money on titles that turn a profit rather than pandering bullshit which, while it aligns itself politically with the plurality of nearby ignorant customers, they still don't rent.

Anyway, the guy wandered the store for a few minutes and then left.

Imaginary Karma

One Friday afternoon the skies have opened in a cacophony of static bliss and rainfall. Fernando sits in his office at around quarter after one, nursing a cup of coffee. He needs to buy more creamer, as he just used the last of it in the current cup.

As he sips, someone knocks at the door. It is not a polite, regular knock, but instead one which is staccato and brutally insistent, of a like quality as if someone with the exact opposite talents of Dave Grohl had taken up drumming and chose plate glass as the percussive medium. Fernando ignores it, hoping that it will go away.

Alas, the knocking migrates from the front door to the office windows. Fernando's body is doubtless visible to anyone peeking in under the drawn blinds and he would rather face his problems head-on over hiding from them, so he swings his chair around with a resigned sigh and heads to the door to investigate. It could perhaps be one of the cultists who pass through the area around this time of year, though Fernando doubts they have the spiritual dedication necessary to peddle their theological wares in a thunderstorm.

But, no, a tanned, middle-aged man waits there, one who has never visited the store. Fernando pops open the door and leans against the metal frame. “Can I help you?”

“Yeah, I want to rent movies,” the man says. His eyes are intent and locked on the store's interior beyond Fernando, and he takes a step towards the Dominion.

Under other circumstances, Fernando might have welcomed the wanderer inside the store's walls, as Fernando does much enjoy earning income off the leasing of his properties, but today he does not budge. Spite and ire have taken root and Fernando is having none of it. “I'm sorry, I'm not open yet.”

“The hell, you're here.”

“Yes, but the store is not yet open. It opens at two.”

“What time is it now?”

“About quarter, twenty after one.”

“So if I come back in about half an hour, you'll be open.”

“If you come back at two, I'll be open.”

The man either does not hear or chooses to disregard Fernando's clarification, but the important thing is that he backs away and Fernando is able to retreat into the dark, comforting embrace of an empty store for a while longer. He does not depart, no, but instead chooses to wait inside his vehicle, which sits out in the parking lot.

Approximately half an hour later, at 1:48, Fernando relates the earlier portions of this very tale to one of his companions via the marvels of the internet. Suddenly, someone pulls at the door. Not a gentle tug, no, but a righteous heave the likes of which have not rattled the office's movie shelves in nearly five years. But the Dominion's hymen holds fast, and the invader is denied.

This flusters the mystery guest, who says to himself (loudly enough that Fernando can make out the words through the wall), “This asshole, tells me to come back in half an hour....” Then Fernando hears a car door slam. An engine starts up and revs a few times, and the vehicle pulls out with a defiant and monstrous roar.

Moments later, Fernando hears the piercing shriek of a cop dude's siren from somewhere off to the Dominion's right, perhaps from the lands claimed by Sweaty Bill or Lint's Gas. Its scream lowers in pitch and recedes into the distance. Fernando heads to the front door to check out what is happening, but Cop Dude has vanished around the bend in the highway by the time he reaches his destination.

Fernando chooses to believe Cop Dude was upset at Fernando's untimely visitor for throwing a tantrum and making a loud nuisance of himself when he did not get his way. It is a rewarding untruth, one that leaves Fernando clinging to the hope that justice does exist in some fashion in the world.

Butter-Two-Face

Paula Deen said some bad things recently.

The fact that an old, southern woman might have within the language centers of her brain the capability to use words in a fashion commonly deemed as racially inappropriate seems to have come to a complete shock to America at-large, who are, astoundingly, treating this as more newsworthy than Kim Kardashian having recently whelped and naming the kid after the latter half of a Hitchcock movie, after she drew the Apples to Apples card referencing it during her last family game night. Everybody is fucking outraged that Paula Deen planned to organize a wedding themed with a level of social ignorance/ineptude I could only dream to attain. And then, by Mimir's Well, all the so-called journalists and investigators have dredged through this woman's life history for every single race-related social faux pas she'd perpetrated over the course of her long existence.

I'm not defending her; she said and did some stupid shit and she should suffer the consequences thereof. I'm not excusing her poor decisions based on her age or the social cues and mores she'd picked up during her upbringing that stuck with her, perhaps overtly and perhaps only subconsciously, the rest of her life. That said, America, get some goddamn perspective.

Why are we suddenly giving so great many fucks about the Queen of Butter and her verbiage? “Probably,” one might say, “because it's symptomatic of all the things we suspect about southern people but can't really prove.” The South does get the short end of the stick on racial issues more often than not (rightly so or otherwise I'll leave as an exercise for you to puzzle out on your own), and on such occasions the rest of the country can come together for snide chortling at the South's expense. After all, though Americans pretend otherwise, we are among the pettiest and most Schadenfreude-seeking people on the planet. We crave stories of other peoples' fuck-ups. How the hell else could reality television thrive?

The thing is, the media has treated this Paula Deen fracas with all the gravity of the average Entertainment Weekly So You Think You Can Dance? article. Editorial-writers (people doing the exact same thing as me, except their works are presented via ostensibly well-regarded publications or institutions) poo-poo their noses at the poor reflection on her character which this horror provides. This is inappropriate and wrong, and this sixty-six year old woman's racist history which we've gone out of our way to (re)construct, why, it's just scandalous!

Okay....and now what? Let's agree it's scandalous that this thing happened. Do we use our fervor to some noteworthy end or....No, we don't? We'll just be incensed for a short while then, watch things invariably die down, and return to a daily slog identical to the one before this media buzz began, except maybe Paula Deen is out of a job? Okay then.

Here's my take: Let's stop pretending that we as a society have a responsibility to engage in this farcical moralizing. Stop being disingenuous with your surprised cries that this isn't how Real America does it, that we're not all like this, and that Paula Deen is a social anomaly. Don't post to Facebook or Twitter how sad and shocked you are that someone like this exists in modern America and swear up and down that you'll never buy a Smithfield ham or cook anything in butter ever again. Don't even bother wringing your hands at the travesty of it all if you can't or won't nut up that shit like this is commonplace all across the country among all age demographics and not limited to people living in Bumfuck, Missalabameorgidennesstuckansolina who happened to have one black friend while growing up under Jim Crow.

Or, we could take this opportunity to have a frank discussion on race and racism in this country, both of the overt and institutionalized varieties. This would require that the members of the American media take something resembling an objective, empirical approach to the matter, like maybe bringing sociologists or political scientists who do research in that area onto their news programs rather than reinviting those old-hat demagogues (and you know who they are) who provide absolutely nothing of value and instead offer up only their own biased claims and exclamations.

One of these options is the much easier and more likely of the two, and that's why this screed is the only fuck I'm willing to give on the matter.

This Shit Again

Holidays portend bum-fuckery of the highest degree because everybody takes the day off, so nothing is accomplished and everyone needs to frantically scramble over the following few days to catch up on the missed work, instead of, say, having done the work ahead of time like a responsible adult. Fernando is the one who suffers, for is it not always the case that the most competent individuals in a group are dragged down to the fetid mediocrity accepted by the masses?

This happens on every holiday, but it's worst when the days in question fall on either a Friday or a Monday because then the weekend is immediately adjacent and it provides a minimum of three nonproductive days for the failures to gestate into a tentacled beast which threatens to choke the joy and life from him.

Memorial Day always occurs on a Monday.

Fernando sits at the store that Tuesday. He awaits delivery of his movies and has been at the store for a few hours now, as it is rather important that he procure his inventory so that he might arrange for profit to be made off it. Coffee at the ready, he kills time alternating between browsing Fark and playing browser-based tower defense games. He has his blinds open so he can easily catch glimpse of the delivery truck and, more importantly, so its driver can catch glimpse of him. He takes a great risk in doing this, since open blinds attract ne'er-do-wells and lookie-loos who think that because Fernando visible within the store, the store is open for business.

At around 11.30, the UPS truck pulls into the parking lot from the printing place next door. A second man is perched within it, sitting on the steps leading up to the cab. The truck slows up as it cruises past the store, then vanishes out Fernando's line of sight. The deceleration led Fernando to infer that it would be pulling up somewhere in the parking lot.

Fernando rose from his chair and walked around the counter to meet the driver. He peeks out the front door.

The truck is in the process of pulling back out onto the highway. Fernando attempts to flag it down and shouts, “Hey! HEY!” but he is paid no heed. The truck speeds away to the south.

“For FUCK'S sake!” Fernando yells, loudly enough for some old people coming out of the restaurant about two hundred feet away to look in his direction. He growls out a sigh of consternation and storms into the store to plop down before his computer and pull up contact information for his local UPS syndicate.

Again.

Fernando calls the nearby customer center which serves his area; he learned last time that the nearest physical UPS Store is unwilling to provide any meaningful service to him. Fernando allows the phone to ring seven times before he hangs up.

Perhaps he dialed a wrong number. Such things have been known to occur. Fernando tries again, double-checking each digit as he taps it out on the numerical pad.

Fernando allows the phone to ring six more times before he hangs up.

“God damn it so much,” he mutters as he pulls up the webpage to UPS proper. He dials the customer service number and is greeted with the prompt which implores him to choose one of a limited number of options, none of which will assist him. When the computer-lady finishes asking if he'd like to press nine for Spanish, he growls, “Representative.”

“We can help you with that in just a moment,” chirps the automated message. First, though, they would prefer that I elect one of the previously listed options.

Fuck that noise. “Representative.”

“One moment please. Your call is very important to us.” Fernando hears the fuzzy click as his call is rerouted. “UPS customer service, this is Australia.”

Fernando tells the man his name, his business, and why he is calling.

“I'm sorry to hear that,” says Australia. “Have you tried contacting your local customer center?”

“I did. No one answered.”

“Sir, what was the tracking code so I can check into that for you?”

Fernando rattles off the line of 25 letters and numbers. He hears faint tapping, then Australia says, “The delivery is scheduled for today.”

“Right. I am saying that the truck drove right past the front of the store.”

“Sir, perhaps it was a different truck out on a different route.”

“Possible, but unlikely, seeing as there's but the one route here and the truck had just pulled out of the printing press next door, into my parking lot, and past the store.”

“Sir, items which are scheduled for delivery on a certain day are not guaranteed for a set time. It is possible that the item is still awaiting delivery and will be out to you by the end of business hours today and was not on the truck in question.”

“I checked the shipping status online. It is marked as in transit. Why would it be marked as in transit and scheduled to be delivered if it is not, in fact, in transit and scheduled to be delivered?”

“Sir, I appreciate your concern, but the item is scheduled for delivery by the end of business hours today.”

“That doesn't answer my question.”

“Sir, could I put you on hold for just a moment?”

Fuck no. Fernando felt the suspicious tingle that if he were shunted into customer service limbo he would never escape its noxious embrace. “I would rather you didn't.”

“Let me pull up the contact information for your local center and send them a message. It will just be a moment.”

“Very well.”

Fernando hears typing as Australia composes his message, or something which resembles a message. This takes about two minutes, during which both Fernando and Australia are silent. Then Australia says, “Sir, I have sent a message to your local center and you should expect a phone call from them within an hour regarding the status of your delivery.”

“Sounds good. I look forward to hearing from them.”

“Sir, I apologize for the problems you seem to be having with this delivery.”

“It's not your fault. Thank you for your help.”

“Thank you, sir. Good-bye.”

“Bye.”

The waiting resumed. But look, now it's opening time and Fernando did not receive his promised phone call and still does not have his movies!

The saga continues.

Dick Move

Some semi-regulars come into the store one afternoon. These semi-regulars fall squarely into the revolving door-late fee variety, in that they perpetually owe Fernando money, pay off a fraction of what is owed whenever they come in to rent, and end up just about right back where they started because the things they'd just rented are late. This was never a value too-too absurd in scope, and these people, for all their perpetual tardiness, were good about making slow headway on the damn thing and even had short spans of time in which they were free of any debts owed to the Dominion and its Keeper.

The last time they had rented, though, they'd been much later than usual, and their late fee had blossomed as a result. When the pair approaches the counter with their tag in hand, Fernando asks, “Did you want to put something down on your late fee?”

“How much is it?” asks the female half of the duo.

“It's--”

“God I probably don't even want to know.”

“--Twenty-eight altogether.”

The other one of them looks at Fernando with disbelief writ across his features. “You're shitting me.”

“Afraid not, sorry. The last time you were in you kept, what was it, Breaking Dawn 2 out for nine days. And you still had a little bit of late fees from before.”

The first one looks down at the money she had placed upon the counter, six dollars in total. “That's all I've got on me. Put that towards it I guess.”

“That can be arranged. We can nibble away at it. I've got no problems with that.”

“Twenty-eight fucking dollars,” the other repeats, probably to himself. “At this rate I should just not come here anymore.”

Fernando chose to believe the latter sentence was addressed to the three gathered people at-large, so he had leave, nay, obligation to respond. He does this with his usual tact: “Frankly, that would be a little bit of a dick move.”

Both of them look in Fernando with absolute shock. The Keeper shrugs. “Just saying.” He takes the money resting upon the counter and places it in the till.

Actually Late

Django Unchained is a fairly popular movie. Everyone wants to see it, and it behooved Fernando to make this film available. To this end, he procured many copies of the film. On the day it was released, all of them went out within half an hour of opening time.

The unfortunate latecomers were filled with sorrow that they could not have the item they so greatly desired, but Fernando informed them of a service he would provide. Indeed, he would make the film available to them on the following day! He would call them when one arrived and they could come and pick it up without worrying that a poacher would snipe it before they could visit the store and pick it up themselves!

There was but one tiny detail which Fernando discounted in crafting this masterful plan. It required the competence and cooperation of his customer base. Instead of all, or even most, of Fernando's copies of Django Unchained finding their way back to the store, none of them did.

At four the Keeper was yet unworried. The workday had not yet ended, and many people routinely returned their movies between the hours of four and six. Fernando waited and took the concerned telephone calls from the people whom he had promised a rental. No, he doesn't have any in right at this moment. Yes, he is expecting them back. Yes, he will call once one arrives.

By six Fernando had grown perturbed. Had more than zero copies of the film found their way home, he would have had lower stress levels, but the prospect of having to deal with multiple ornery customers who had been denied their film—legitimately ornery customers, as Fernando had given his word and staked the reputation of his Dominion in this matter—filled him with dread.

When seven rolled around and still no copies of the movie had been returned, Fernando walked up to his late fee list and began jotting down names. Normally he waits until closing time to do such menial bookkeeping, but he needed a way to vent his frustrations, and what way is better than to scrawl words upon paper in jagged script? Mixed blessing: the phone calls stopped coming at around 6.30 PM. Rather than having to be Cool Customer Service Guy, Fernando can just wallow in the guilt brought on by a number of customers whose wants had remained unsatisfied being forever linked to Fernando's business.

At 7.57, three minutes before closing time, a vehicle pulls up. A man steps out. He had been to the store yesterday and rented Django Unchained. He enters the store.

“I'm not late, am I?”

“You are, actually.” Fernando's voice is curt.

“I got it back before you closed.”

“Movies have to be back by seven.”

The man squints at Fernando and considers arguing with him. He then reasons through the consequences of going into it with Fernando given the glower upon his face and changes his mind. “I'll catch you later.”

“Indeed.”

The number of people who wanted Django Unchained the following day once Fernando called bearing the good news and apoligies? Zero. They'd all gotten copies somewhere else.

Your Attention, Please

A young lady enters the store one afternoon and selects a movie to rent. She had been in before, but always as a second fiddle to another of Fernando's customers, and this is her first time being the name on the slip. Unfortunately for Fernando, he has no idea what her name is. He retrieves the movie for her in the hopes that she'll finish the matter which demands all her attention by the time he returns.

Alas, she does not. “Could I get your name please?” he asks her as he returns to his place at the counter.

The young woman is, however, still engrossed in texting, perhaps with another of Fernando's patrons who had experienced some ineptitude when it came to social niceties. She does not look up from her important work and mumbles something which sounds vaguely like “Tannnnnyehlleh.”

Fernando presses his lips together. “I'm sorry, I didn't get that.”

She ignores him.

Okay then. Fernando fills out the slip for a Tascribblescribblescribble. It is not as though his penmanship would have rendered the proper name in any way more legible. She still has given Fernando no attention. “There is an additional service charge, you know.”

“Kay puttionere.” She still has not looked up nor paused in her texting, and doesn't seem to care that Fernando is making things up whole cloth.

“It's fifty dollars.”

“What?” She looks up, finally, but she does not seem upset by this grossly inflated number. She hadn't heard Fernando, but she does place a five dollar bill on the countertop.

“It's fifty dollars.”

Now she's confused. Still not outraged, like most people might be, but it's a step up from apathetic. “Why is it so much?”

“You ought to start paying attention to the words which other people say."

“Wait what? Hold on.” She returns to her texting.

Fernando takes the bill and puts it in the till. One reaps what one sows. “You're all set.” She ignores that too.

Fernando walks away and returns to his business in the office. At some later point during the day, when he happens to glance over his shoulder at the counter, the young lady had gathered enough of an attention span to collect her movie and walk out.

Sigh

Fernando has just fixed a cup of coffee in the back room and is returning to his post within the Dominion's office. As he navigates the racks of rental cases, a pickup truck with a closed-up bed pulls up in front of the Dominion. The driver parks parallel to the store's front, which is not usually a problem, except that he is directly in front of the Dominion's door. A middle-aged man and his wife clamber out.

Fernando has just reentered the office and set down his coffee when the chimes jingle. Without preamble, the man, who is a tall and broad middle-aged sort with a battering ram of a paunch fastened to his abdomen, booms out, “You got any good wilderness movies?”

“Um...I'm not sure what you mean. You mean like The Grey?” That seems to Fernando like a decent wilderness movie, insofar as it has wilderness as an antagonistic force acting upon the protagonist.

This is insufficient for Fernando's guest. “No, I don't want none of that shit with vampires and werewolves. Try again.” Maybe he thought Fernando had made reference to Fifty Shades of Grey, which doesn't even exist on film at this time. At least Fernando assumes Fifty Shades of Grey involves vampires, since it's Twilight fanfic that transmogrified into the next big thing containing flat female characters the mostly-female readership can use to live vapid and perfectionist fantasies. It could be that it doesn't, and Fernando lacks the basic interest to even search Wikipedia for a synopsis of the book's plot.

Regardless, Fernando's guest's words left the Keeper a bit stunned. Fernando had expected to be rebuffed, since this man seemed like a alpha-male kind of guy who asserts dominance over others through contrarian behavior. He hadn't expected it to be so curt and effective. This leaves our hero speechless for a few seconds.

A few seconds is all the boisterous visitor needs to continue his verbal assault. “Can't think of anything?” he asks. “The hell kind of guy are you, working at a movie store but you don't know what people want?”

Fernando is now gearing up to dig deep into his snark reserves and set this confrontation on the express lane to Hell. Instead, the man's wife steps in. “Honey, look. Paranormal Activity 4.”

The man doesn't even turn around to look at her when he says, “Quiet. I'm talking with the man.”

So that's nice.

The woman's attempt to defuse the situation has given Fernando additional time to take stock of his situation. He probably would lose in a head-to-head clash. Fernando must be as water, to absorb his guest's ridicule with stoicism and to avoid being baited. He shall be the bigger man. So Fernando says, “The Grey is actually Liam Neeson and his plane crashing in the Alaskan wilderness. There are wolves, but they're the normal kind, not the were-kind.” Fernando did not use the adjective “lycanthropic.” In hindsight, he ought to have.

But the guy ignores Fernando's words and ambles into the store. The next few minutes are a span of time which will forever leave a dark stain upon the Dominion's generally welcoming and jovial aura. The wife points out a wide variety of movies which might be taken for rental. In every case, the man rebuffs her choices as being “stupid” or “retarded.” When she stumbles upon Rise of the Planet of the Apes and points out the existence of this film, her husband says, “We're already living in a country run by one. Don't need to watch a movie with a planet run by 'em.”

So that's nice.

Finally they reach a consensus, and by that Fernando means that the man found Larry the Cable Guy: Delta Farce and told his wife that this is what they're going to watch. He selects the tag and brings it up to the counter, his wife trailing. Fernando sets to filling out the rental slip. “Can I get your name?”

“Morocco Mali.”

Fernando says, “One second,” and checks in his records. He exists therein. Damn. Fernando checks the late fee lists. He's not on there. Double-damn.

So Fernando fills out the rental slip and takes the monies which are owed him. Once the couple leaves, he collapses into his chair and shakes his head.

Apparently two dollars is now enough to compromise one's scruples in the business world.

Cop Dude

One afternoon Fernando sits. It is a slow day, wretchedly so, at the Dominion. Five o'clock and only two customers? On a New Release Tuesday? Granted, it was a shitty New Release Tuesday, but still.

Fernando heads into the back to empty his bladder and when he comes back up front he is glad to see one a young woman, one of his quasi-regulars. “Hello,” he says to her.

“Hi,” she responds. She has in her hands the case for one of Fernando's movies that had come out about a month prior. “How are you?”

“I'm well enough. Slow day, though. Even the traffic on the highway has been oddly tame. There's not any kind of surprise sports thing going on tonight, right?” Any sports would be a surprise to Fernando, who keeps up to date regarding them about as well as the average person follows the development of D&D Next.

“Maybe it's the cop in your parking lot.”

This is also news to Fernando. “Cop in my parking lot?”

“Well, not right in there. A little ways down, more towards The Distraction.” The Distraction is a restaurant which lies between the Dominion and the gas station, one which produces pizzas which have given the world a unique unit of measurement for pizza grease: the Bill. One Bill of grease is equal the amount flop sweat produced by a fat guy working in a ninety-degree environment for one hour. Pizzas from The Distraction range anywhere from .3 to 4 Bills, even among pizzas which contain the same toppings. It's quite bizarre.

Fernando presses his lips together, strides out to the front of the store, and peeks outside. Lo and behold, a blue police car squats maybe fifty feet from the Dominion's front door. “Yeah, that could very well do it, I guess,” he grumbles once he ducks back inside. But there is little Fernando can do to fight the law. The law would win.

At the end of the day, Fernando's take-home was only slightly larger in size than the average Grinch's heart. It disheartened him.

Cop Dudes, if you want to set up a speed trap, don't do it near my store. Don't do it near anybody's store. Public safety and doing your job or whatever, yeah, I get it. You still scare off customers.

Ire of the Keeper

Rise of the Guardians proved to be a pretty popular release. Fernando had many people ask that he hold a copy for them during its first week on the shelf. Fernando did such reservations, and gladly, for he much enjoys making money and providing good service to his customers.

One evening a gentleman comes to the store and asks if Fernando has any copies available.

“Sorry, not right now. I am expecting some back yet today, if you wanted me to hold one.”

“Yeah, that'd be great. Give me a call when one does.” He leaves.

One does come in, and Fernando dutifully contacts the gentleman. He leaves a message, sets aside the movie, and waits. Alas, he never came in. Fine, life happens. The next morning Fernando takes the copy and returns its corresponding tag out to the floor. Customers come and go and all of the Rises of the Guardians Fernando has in vanish in short order.

Early in the evening the man comes into the store. “Yeah, you got that movie for me?”

“Rise of the Guardians? No, all my copies are out.”

“You said you'd hold it for me.”

“That was for yesterday.”

“No it wasn't.”

“...Yes it was.”

The argument having reached its conclusion, the man selects another film. “Okay then, save me another copy once one gets in.”

“Can do.”

None are returned over the remainder of the evening, but all of them are nestled in the drop box the following morning like Peeps in their house. Seeing as the gentleman must return the movies he'd rented the day before, Fernando calls him to ask if he ought to perhaps save one of the movies for such a time. He tells Fernando “Not right now.”

Okay, cool. Back out onto the floor they go.

Around six in the evening the man brings back yesterday's rentals. The first words out of his mouth: “Got any Rise of the Guardians?”

“No.”

“What about the ones you said you had earlier?”

“I put those all back out on the floor when you said you didn't want me to hold one, and other people picked them up.”

“Oh. When are you expecting some back.”

“Tomorrow.”

“Call me as soon as one gets in.”

The cycle repeats itself. Copies rest in the drop box. Fernando gives the man a call and is once again shunted to the answering service. He tells the man that a copy of Rise of the Guardians is available for him to come by and pick up.

The other copies make Fernando money, but the last one sits behind the counter, sad and alone. Other customers come in asking about that movie, if Fernando has any available, but Fernando cannot let the one remaining copy go because he gave his word that it would be kept available, and Fernando does not renege on his promises.

Come closing time, it is still resting behind the counter. Fernando sighs and shakes his head.

It is now a few days later. The man pulls into the parking lot about an hour after opening time and enters the store. Fernando has copies of Rise of the Guardians in. Nothing can go wrong this time.

The man gives the new release rack a cursory glance before approaching the counter. “Hey, you got any Zero Dark Thirty back there?”

This...this was not how things were meant to go! The previous knot of incompetence and failure was to have been solved Gordian-style! “No,” answers Fernando.

“Could you hold one for me?”

At this point Fernando's frustrations over being jerked around over roughly the past week bubble to the surface. “Will you come in and pick it up this time?” he asks rather crossly.

Fernando's guest has the good grace to at least appear a mite sheepish. “Something came up,” he offers by way of excuse, though not apology.

“Indeed.” Fernando thinks for a moment. “Tell you what, it's rent-one-get-one today. Pick something out now and I'll call you later once I've got a copy of Zero Dark available for you, and that can be the free one for today.”

This plan sounds good to the man. He picks up a copy of The Hobbit and departs.

Fernando just happened not to have any copies of Zero Dark Thirty which were to be made available to this particular man come in that day.

Nope, Still Not Family Video

Fernando sits in his throne one evening having an enlightening conversation with his geographically-separated buddy Laurentia about cat nicknames. She had just dubbed her two critters Princess Peach and Meowser, because one is a dainty girl-cat and the other one is “huge and thick and chases her around all the time.”

This being the best idea ever, Fernando heartily approves and as he informs Laurentia of his opinion, a pair of customers, one regular and one semi-regular, enter into the store. They shoot the breeze with one another for a while and share eldritch life-stories as they browse the aisles. One of them asks the other one if he knows where “a movie that has Jeff in it” is located, rather than asking the guy who owns the store and is more intimately connected with its inventory than he ever has been with any woman.

Fernando takes it upon himself to track down Jeff Who Lives at Home so that the two men can be on their merry ways with a minimum of fuss. “Is this the one you were thinking of?” Fernando asks, handing the second man the case in question.

“I think so. This is the only movie with Jeff in it?”

“Pretty sure. If I've got another one here then it's news to me.”

“Cool. Thanks, man.”

While Fernando returns to his place behind the counter to complete the rental procedures for his two guests, he hears the clatter of movies being deposited in his drop box. Fernando gives a quick glance over his shoulder at the sound. He sees a blue plastic case slowly slide through the opening like an azure turd.

I don't have any blue cases, Fernando thinks. They're all either clear, or red, or orange, or yellow. “Excuse me one second,” Fernando says to his customers.

He crosses the office and lifts up the blue-cased film. In the interim, other movies, some in blue cases and some in clear, continue to sneak inside the Dominion's walls. The film in question is Gangsters, Guns, and Zombies. Fernando has this movie in his inventory, but it's currently nestled on his shelf in a bright yellow case. This can't be his.

The barcode sticker which reads FAMILY VIDEO provides further evidence of that fact.

“Hey, hey, hold on!” Fernando shouts as he gathers the now-six films into his arms. He hustles out of the office and out the front door. A scruffy man in his early twenties bends over before the drop box with a bulging plastic Menard's bag dangling from the fingers of one hand. A self-rolled cigarette rests between his clamped lips and Fernando can smell the unmistakable aroma of plants in the genus Cannabis from ten feet away. The strange man shoves another movie into the slot even as Fernando speaks.

“Hey, uh...I'm not Family Video.”

“Wha?” he asks, tilting his head and looking at a place somewhat to Fernando's left. He mechanically inserts an eighth movie.

“I'm not Family Video. I can understand the confusion, seeing as we're both in the video rental business and have signs out in front of our respective stores, but I'm definitely not Family Video.” Fernando extends the six movies toward the man. He has no desire to deal with Family Video if there is any way for him to avoid it. “You should take these back.”

“Oh, thanks man.” Pokey Joe takes the six proffered movies and turns around. He begins walking to a beaten-up green sedan where another man, the getaway driver, sits behind the wheel.

“Let me get you those other two,” Fernando says. “I'll be right back.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Fernando reenters the store. His customers have wry smiles upon their faces as Fernando swings around the counter and back into the office to collect the remaining misdelivered discs. Then he heads back outside and turns them over to Pokey Joe's driver, as Pokey Joe himself had taken a seat in the passenger's side of his best friend's ride. “There you go. Have a good one.”

Pokey Joe's driver grunts, shifts gears, and pulls out of the Dominion's parking lot.

“I swear--” Fernando begins saying as he reenters the store. He is cut off by the unmistakable nng-tak-chrak-tak-chrak-tak of snowmobiles cruising across his parking lot.

“There's no snow!” Fernando shouts to nobody, except maybe a hidden Guardian Spider.

“You sound like you have a problem with those guys,” the second of Fernando's customers states.

“I really don't care as long as there's something appropriate for them to mobile across, but there isn't any, and those aren't asphalt-mobiles!”

Both of Fernando's guests laugh and pay and continue on with their lives. Fernando sits down to compose the anecdote. And here we are.

After Hours

The blessed time has arrived where Fernando may rise from his throne and lock down the Dominion in an elaborate closing ceremony. Fernando has a bit of after-hours work to accomplish, some checks that need to be written and some bills that must be paid, in addition to his daily accounting ritual. Fernando does not enjoy doing any of this while the store is open, as he prefers to remain undistracted when doing actual work and hopes to avoid the possibility of overly curious souls asking stupid questions.

He has just flourished a signature upon a check which is to be sent to the old Keeper as payment for debts incurred when Fernando hears tapping at his front door. Since it is by now fifteen minutes past eight, Fernando's desire to earn three or so dollars is vastly overshadowed by his desire to not have to deal with the public for the rest of the evening. He ignores the tapping and seals the check within an envelope instead.

The tapping transitions to arrhythmic pounding. Fernando continues ignoring it.

Then Fernando hears pounding upon his office window. The shades are drawn. “Hey, I know you're in there! I can see you!”

Fernando shoves his chair back and trundles down one of the aisles into the back room. He has just been filled with the mighty need to consume coffee. As a tangential benefit, maybe now that Fernando cannot be seen, this unwelcome annoyance will forget he exists.

Maybe it worked the way Fernando envisioned, maybe the guy just got frustrated and left, but nobody was there when Fernando returned to the front with a fresh mug of miracle liquid.

Don't go to a restaurant when it's closed expecting to be served a steak, and don't bother Fernando when he's not on the clock.

Play to Win

VHS Guy had been making regular appearances at the Dominion of late, just making Fernando's day complete by showing up to not rent movies and walking out some minutes later. Fernando's interactions with him ranged from curt to smarmy.

One evening he enters the store and pretends to browse the Adopt-A-Movie Box. “Hey, uh, how come I ain't won this drawing all the years I been coming in here?” He sets a brown paper bag on the ground before the counter. Whatever its contents are, they rustle loudly as the weight settles to the carpeted floor.

Unfortunately, another person is browsing the shelves so Fernando cannot be as dismissive as he likes. “Oh. Well, one needs to enter the drawing in order to increase one's odds of being drawn.”

“Alright. I'm just gonna fill out this winning ticket then.” VHS Guy snatched up one of Fernando's pens and paws through the box of paper slips he keeps near the drawing bucket, probably seeking the largest rectangle he can find.

“Um, it really doesn't work that way. You need to rent or buy something in order to enter.”

“I been coming here.”

“Yes. But. You haven't rented anything. I run this as sort of a thank-you to my customers, the ones who come in and help me to keep this place open.”

“I been coming here,” VHS Guy repeats, because this has always been a successful argumentative tactic.

At this point there is little more Fernando can think of to further clarify what the words he has been saying mean without coming off as a right massive boner to his other customer and the entire rest of the planet. So he does the same thing VHS Guy had just done: repetition. “The drawing is for people who've rented or bought something.”

VHS Guy ignores these words and babbles to himself. “What goes on here? Name? Name's good.” He folds his slip of paper with a flourish and deposits it in the bright red drawing bucket. “Okay then.” He leans down to scoop up his crinkly bag and walks out.

Silence fills the store.

The other customer speaks. “That was a little bit weird,” she says.

“You have no idea.”

Spoiler alert: VHS Guy doesn't win the drawing.