Cold As Ice

Saladolsa's snowy season has, to this point, been one full of profound discomfort and chill. The temperature barely broke into the double digits most days and Fernando's large office windows were drafty portals to a frozen hellscape of blowing, gritty snow and patches of ice.

Fernando did what he could to keep the store clear of impediments to entry: he ventured outside to clear away the drifting snow and made sure to scatter salt over what his orange snow shovel could not remove.

One evening, the phone rings. "Hello, Dominion of Movies."

"Yeah, I wanted to let you know that we'll be keeping out the movies we got from you an extra night."

There is a pause just long enough that Fernando takes this as a cue to respond. "Alright, that's fine--" he begins, only to learn that he had inadvertently cut off the woman, one of Fernando's best customers.

"Our car just won't start," she continues.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Fernando says when he realizes what he'd done.

But the woman takes this to be an expression of remorse for her car troubles. "No, don't be. There's nothing you could do about it. We'll come in and pay the late fees tomorrow probably."

The jilted not-a-conversation continues with Fernando only now responding to her inoperative car woes. "That's fine. It's like two degrees out and I feel like you're not the only one. Don't worry about it."

"I'm sorry?" she asks, sounding confused.

"Wait what?" Fernando also asks, and assuredly confused.

"Maybe we should start over," the woman says.

"Probably." 

There is a pause of five or so seconds.

"Okay," she says with a nervous giggle. "Our car won't start, so we can't get back the movies we rented until tomorrow."

"That's fine," Fernando responds. "It's hateful outside and I don't blame your car for not starting. Don't worry about the late fees, since I wouldn't want to go out into this crap either."

"What, really?" she asks.

"Yes, really. Just don't let it spread that I'm not a heartless bastard."

She laughs. "You are the best. Thanks so much!"

"Welcome. Stay warm." Fernando hangs up, then looks around the thankfully empty store.

"The epitome of social class," he mutters, returning to his seat.

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.”

Correct Address

A guy comes into the store with a girl one Monday evening. Fernando has seen the girl before, but not in the company of this man. Presumably they are swapping lovejuices on a routine basis.

The guy, you see, owes Fernando forty-eight dollars in late fees, dating to about three years prior. The Keeper suspects that maybe, just maybe, the young lady had been brought along to rent for him by proxy, so that the delinquent could avoid putting any amount of money onto his debt. It's not the first time people who owed Fernando money have tried to skirt the Keeper's wishes.

The two browse the store for around ten minutes, and the guy is the one to select all the movies for the evening, a sizable pile of four titles. This lends further credence to Fernando's hypothesis that she is here as his representative-minion. At last they approach the counter, and already Fernando stands at attention on his side of the barrier. After placing the tags upon the counter, the young man hands the lady a five dollar bill.

“Did you want to throw something onto your late fees?” he asks the young man.

“Uh, I'm not renting these. She is.”

Fernando's eyes flick to the girl, then back to the guy. “I had surmised as much. But I'm not asking her, I'm asking you.”

“I, uh, I didn't bring any cash with me.”

Fernando presses his lips together and squints at the five. “Hrrm.”

“That's, uh, that's hers.”

“Oh, no, absolutely. My friends tell me to hold their money for them all the time, too.”

The two lovebirds exchange an awkward look. Finally the guy says, “Can I put a dollar on it?”

“It's a start. The largest journey begins with but a single step.”

Miraculously, the movies are returned the following day. Perhaps this mini-saga will indeed prove itself to be a story of redemption and—pssshhhhahahahahaha I crack myself up.

Spiraling Into Oblivion

A pair of new customers, male and female, set up an account. They come in on a near-daily basis over the next week and a half and Fernando has no problems at all with them.

They rent Premium Rush one afternoon. After Fernando picks it out of the drop box once he arrives at the store the next day and inspects it cursorily, its underside resembles the finished product of someone with minimal spatial or mathematical awareness trying to graph a Fibbonaci sequence. Concentric arcs of the disc's plastic have been channeled away in deep, smooth gouges. Fernando grimaces. Why can't people ever carve the summoning circles for their infernal patrons into their own property?

Fernando digs through his records for the duo's number and calls them up.

-Ring ring ring-

“Hello?” It is the male half of the love equation.

“Yeah, hi, this is Fernando from the Dominion of Movies. I'm calling about Premium Rush.”

“Oh, uh, yeah, I was gonna talk to you about this next time we came in.”

“Yeah, the disc is pretty bad off. I'm afraid I have to levy a replacement fee.”

“That's fine. We shouldn't have let our buddy borrow it.”

What in Cocytus? “Alrighty, I just wanted to touch base with you. We can take care of that whenever you guys are in next.”

“Cool. Thanks, man.”

“Thank you,” says Fernando, and hangs up.

They come in two days later to pay off the debit on their account in full and to rent again.

Huh.

Reckoning

A reedy guy who'd been to the store only maybe five times over three or so years comes in one day and rents a couple of movies. His modus operandi over previous visits was as follows: return the films a day late and take the three or so dollar late fee. Fernando diligently adds the tally to the late fee list and it sits there, a toady blemish, until Fernando reaches the point where he wants to trim the damn thing down to below four or five pages, whereupon he culls the late fees under ten bucks attached to people who hadn't come to the store in roughly a decade. Soon thereafter, through a combination psychic resonance, word on the street, and confirmation bias on Fernando's part, Timely Tim returns to the store with a clean slate and this phoenixesque degeneration starts anew.

The second-to-last time Fernando culled the late fee list, he had once again purged this debtor's history, and Timely Tim made his reappearance. This happened around October of 2012. He rented a couple of movies and they were, again, dropped off a day late. This time, though, Tim came in the following day and rented again. The conversation went roughly like so:

Fernando: “You have three bucks in late fees from yesterday. Did you want to kill them off?”

T.T.: “Oh...I only got enough money for these. I'll hit you up next time?”

Fernando: “That's fine.”

Those movies, too, were returned late. Now, though, T.T.'s late fees had no real reason or excuse on Fernando's part to be swept away, so when Fernando most recently cropped his late list T.T.'s six dollar debt remained intact.

Now it's June, 2013. Timely Tim had made like the cicada he somewhat resembles and stands in the Dominion's foyer. Fernando says to him, “You've got six bucks in late fees, if you wanted to put something down on them.”

“I do?”

“Yeah, from October of last year.”

T.T. screws up his face in concentration. “Are you sure?”

“Fairly sure. We had a talk last time. You returned some movies a little late and said you'd pay the late fees next time you were in.”

“You said that was three bucks.”

“You rented again that day and returned those late too.”

“Well, that one wasn't my fault. My friend was s'pposed to drop them off.”

“But your friend didn't. Perhaps if you ask you will be reimbursed for your troubles.”

“How much does it come to altogether?”

“Thirteen bucks.”

T.T.'s expression is momentarily cunning, then resigned. “'Kay, fine.” He squares up with Fernando and takes his movies out.

They are returned four days late. Eighteen is many more dollars than six, and Fernando looks forward to T.T.'s next visit a year down the road.

Negotiator

At around 1.30 in the afternoon one Wednesday, Fernando hears the rumble of a vehicle outside the store. He peers through a corner of the blinds. A red pickup is sprawled in the parking lot directly blocking the door. A woman sits in the cab, idling away. Her location leads Fernando to surmise that she is dropping off a movie, but after two minutes of sitting there he amends his supposition and views her as a camper.

Fernando makes himself busy in the office, straightening things which do not need straightening. 2 PM rolls around and the truck has not moved. He sighs and unlocks the front door.

The lady in the truck's cab leans out the window at him. “Oh, now you open?”

“Yes, now I open. It's two.”

“I been waiting half an hour for you to come in.”

“I get that a lot,” Fernando says, turning and striding to his office. The lady shuts off her truck and comes into the store after him.

She browses the store for about five minutes, then comes up to the counter with six tags in hand. “It's get one free day, right?”

“Indeed so.” Fernando retrieves a pen and rental slip. “Can I get your name?”

“Azerbijan Switzerland,” she answers as she fishes through her purse for crumpled small bills.

Fernando stops writing. “You have twenty-eight dollars in late fees. How much did you want to put down on them?”

“Oh...all I have is this.” She drops nine tattered dollar bills to the countertop.

“That's not even enough to cover the rentals, setting aside the late fees.”

She frowns at the pile of tags. “How much do I need to pay off on the late fee?”

“How much do you feel you ought to pay off?”

“A dollar?”

“Let's do this: you rent two of those and put the remaining five-fifty from your nine dollars towards the late fee.”

“Well....okay.”

Fernando takes her money, retrieves her movies, and watches her depart. The movies wound up two days late, so she now has two and a half dollars more on her late fee than previously.

It never stops.

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.

Spoilsport

A young man comes in to rent. “Hey, can I charge this one?”

“You have twelve dollars in late fees.”

“...And?”

“And no.”

“Spoilsport.” He leaves.

Regular Ol' Wednesday Night

Wednesday. 7:30 PM. Fernando sits at his desk and waits for 8 PM to roll around, so he can close up the store and go home. He is excited to do so, for he had conversed earlier with one of his fine comrades about some delectable chicken piccata she had recently enjoyed at a restaurant, and this discussion caused a great longing for the Italian Schitzel-analogue to fester in his belly.

As merry thoughts of breaded and fried chicken dance in Fernando's head, a vehicle pulls up. Some people climb out and a few moments later the chimes above the door tinkle.

“Hello,” Fernando greets his guests. Then he stops and squints at one of them, the only one he recognizes of the bunch. It is a man in his early 20s, the kind of person who finds injecting copious amounts of ink beneath his epidermis to be a laudable pastime. Perhaps he felt that an abundance of tats made him look more intimidating, or showed off his rebellious spirit.

Really all it accomplished for him on this night was jarring Fernando's memory and sending the Dominion's Keeper straight to his forever-ago late list. The last time this gent had come into the store had been about a year ago. He rented two movies and had been a little bit tardy in returning them. When he brought them back and rented five more, he paid off his late fee. No big deal.

Those movies had been out for a much greater length of time. While they, too, eventually found their way into the Dominion's drop box, five movies times six days times nightly late fees added up. To seventy-five dollars, in fact.

The visitors are quick in gathering tags from the new release rack and bring them all up to deposit on the counter. Tattoo Tom says to Fernando, “Hey man. What's up?”

“Not too much. Could I get your name?” While Fernando is almost positive that the bloke standing before him owes seventy-five dollars, it could very well be the case that Fernando has mistaken a newcomer with the other tattooed man.

But, no. “I'm Tattoo Tom. Been a while since I came here.”

“I'll say. You've got some late fees, if you wanted to put something down on them.”

“Really? Shit. How much?”

“Seventy-five dollars.”

“Whoa,” he says, stepping back. “Why so much?”

“You had out five movies for six days.”

“And?”

“And that resulted in seventy-five dollars in late charges.”

“Hold on,” he says. “The time before I only had like seven bucks or something.”

“Eight, most likely. Two movies, two days. But this is five movies and six days.”

“Well does he have to pay it all off now?” asks one of his companions, a rather attractive young woman.

Fernando shrugs. “I'd be content with half now, and then we can trickle in the rest bit by bit.”

“That's still like thirty bucks,” says the girl.

“Thirty-seven fifty, actually. But I'd settle even for thirty-five. An honest showing of penitence to get the ball rolling.”

“I don't know if have that much,” Tattoo Tom says. “How much do these come to?”

Fernando totals the rentals mentally. “Nineteen bucks.”

“So that would be...?” Tattoo Tom asks, scowling.

“Fifty-four dollars all together, with thirty-five on the late fee.”

This exasperates Tattoo Tom, for his blows air from his mouth. “That's a lot of money.”

Fernando shrugs.

“Let me...let me run to the ATM machine real quick,” he says.

“That's fine.” The three visitors exchange a quick look and skedaddle.

Fernando isn't quite sure why Tattoo Tom had to run to the ATM at McMurdo Station, Antarctica, to retrieve his money, but he's positive he'll be back any day now.

The chicken piccata also turned out splendidly.

Yes, Really

A lady comes into the store one rainy evening. She had rented out two new releases a few days earlier. “So, these are a little late.”

Fernando reclaims his property. “Did you want to kill off the late fee on them now?”

“Yeah, sure,” she says, pulling out her money satchel. “How much is it?”

“Fourteen dollars.”

The woman looks at Fernando in shock. “You're kidding me.”

“Afraid not.”

“I don't see how it could be that much.”

“You did have them out for five days.”

“That's just stupid. There's no reason it could be that much.”

Fernando shrugs. “Were I to have charged the full rental amount for each additional night rather than the somewhat lesser amount which I do, your total would have come to thirty-five dollars.”

“Jesus. I just forgot them in my car for a few days and now you're charging me fourteen dollars,” she grouses as she digs out money.

Fernando does not mention to her that it's not his fault that she neglected to return the movies in a timely manner. That would be crass of him.

She throws a ten and a five over the counter at Fernando. The paper flutters to the floor. “There's your fourteen dollars.”

Mmm.

Fernando stoops to retrieve the money. “Indeed.” He makes the dollar in change from the till and passes it over to her. “Have a pleasant evening.”

His politeness and responsibilities to this wretch of a customer exhausted, Fernando returns to his computer without a backward glance. The woman sees herself out.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Ah, November! Two-fifths of trees are dead, one's feet are frozen upon waking up in the morning, and everybody's favorites, the hunters, return after a year of absence!

A strange gentleman clad in camo jacket, camo pants, and a bright orange hat comes into the store one afternoon. His beard is scraggly and ill-kept, a sure sign of somebody who doesn't do facial hair except when that queer hunting season custom dictates it. “Hey, what's it take to rent from here?” he asks.

“I need you to fill out one of these-here applications. I'll need to see your driver's license.”

“Sure thing, no problem.” Huh. Normally they put up a bit more fight.

The application is completed and the guy meanders out into the store. He comes back with four tags. “How much would these cost?”

“Considering it's rent-one-get-one-free today, only seven dollars.”

“That's for one night?”

“Yes. Did you want them for two?”

“No, I think I can manage. When are they due back by?”

“Tomorrow, seven PM.”

“Yeah, I can do that.” The rentals are leased for one evening and life goes on. Fernando is not too optimistic he'll be getting any of them back, though. He felt that tingly aura of incompetence coming off the guy while speaking with him. The movies being rented were not that impressive, however. The best of the bunch was by far The Muppets, but the other three were forgettable and derivative R-rated comedies that could be substituted for just about any other R-rated comedy without any noticeable change in quality or content.

The movies go unreturned, and when Fernando calls the cell number the man provided on his rental slip (one which Fernando had no reason to believe would not work considering it was within the same area code), he hears the cheery sing-song lady announce, “This number has been discontinued.” Fernando does so love when he is right, even if the victory is as Phyrric as anything in life.

We fast-forward a week. A strange young woman comes into the store. “Hi, I'd like to set up an account here.”

“Sure thing. I just need you to fill out an application, and I'll need to see your driver's license.”

She sets to work and hands over the completed application in due course. Fernando gives it a look-over.

The address seems rather familiar to him.

“Hold on a second,” he tells her. He retreats into the depths of the office and digs through his records. Well well well. What a coincidence.

She looks somewhat apprehensive when Fernando returns to the counter. “You know Albania?” She does not immediately answer. “I see,” Fernando continues, “The good news is that you are not him, but if you should happen to see him, let him know it would be appreciated if he were to come down and chip away at his late fees and perhaps return the movies he's got out.”

“Um...which ones were those?”

Fernando produces Albania's rental slip from his ban-list pile and copies the fraction of his inventory described thereon to a sheet of paper using his absolute best penmanship. “If they should happen to turn up, it would be nice to get them back. Now, these come to four dollars altogether.”

Fernando's missing movies were in the drop box the next day. The amount of the attached late fee remains unaltered.

Repo Man

A guy who has rented at a store numerous times in the past comes in one day and takes out two movies, The Avengers and Five Year Reunion. This happens in the beginning of October.

Responsibility left the building for a good long while and Fernando eventually wrote the movies off as stolen. He appended them to the Annual Abscondments for the year and everything.

Then, amazingly, they come back in early November. The young man brings them up to the counter. “Hey. What's my late fee on these?”

Fernando rises and takes the movies into his custody, ensuring that they are in their cases and undamaged. Then he answers, “Eighty-eight dollars.”

This flummoxes the man. “What? I thought you stopped late fees at twenty bucks!”

“No. I stop them after two weeks. These were out for about a month, but I stop the late fees after two weeks.”

“Yeah, but I brought them back. That's gotta count for something.”

“It does. Now the late fee is only eighty-eight dollars instead of one hundred and thirty-eight.”

“I can't believe—I should have just fucking bought them outright!”

Fernando makes a noncommittal sound. No words he could say would change the facts of the situation.

The man clenches his fists and raises one arm. “You...fuck.” He lowers the fist and storms out.

“Have a good evening!”

Doth Protest Too Much

A quasi-regular customer browses the shelves and asks Fernando, “Hey, you got any Battleship back there?”

“No, sorry,” Fernando answers. “But I've got one copy coming back yet tonight, if you wanted me to hold it for you, then give you a call.”

“Yeah, do that.” The man leaves.

Turns out the one copy that was supposed to have come back that night did not come back, though it returns the following day. The extra day's charge is paid off and Fernando calls the gent who'd wanted the movie reserved for the previous night on the off chance he might still desire it.

-Ring ring ring-

“Hello?”

“Hey, this is Fernando at the Dominion of Movies. I got back Battleship and was wondering if you still wanted me to hold that for you.”

“You never got it in yesterday?”

“No, the person who had it kept it out an extra night. No biggie. Like I said, I've got it here for you.”

“Okay. Hang onto it for me. I'll be right down.”

The man arrives at the store about an hour later, pays, and leaves quite content.

The movie goes unreturned the following day. On the next day, the man pulls up and comes inside the store. He sets the case on the counter. “I don't owe anything on this, right?”

“Actually, it's a buck-fifty, if you wanted to kill that off now.”

“What? Why?”

“Well, you had it out for an extra night.”

“Yeah, but I had to wait to get it.”

“And?”

“If that other guy had it out longer, why can't I?”

“That other guy paid for the extra night.”

The guy's shoulders slump as the realization sets in that his argument is not working. “I don't have any money on me right now,” he mutters, perhaps contrite and perhaps in a last-ditch attempt to avoid paying what he owes.

“That's fine. You can take care of it next time you're in. I'm not going to break anybody's kneecaps over six quarters.”

In this way did Sanity remain in the Dominion.

Store Policy

A young man in his late teens pulls into the parking lot and enters the store one afternoon in late June. Fernando has never seen him before. The gent browses the older releases for a while before grabbing a pair of cases and approaching the counter.

“Yeah, I want to rent these?” he says with a strange interrogative inflection, placing the cases down on the glass.

“Firstly, I'll need you to fill out an application.” Fernando rises and retrieves said paperwork, then crosses the office to lay it upon the countertop.

“Um...that wasn't what I meant. I meant how do you rent a movie here.”

“Like I said, first you need to have an account here.”

“How do you know I don't have an account?”

“It is somewhat evident this is your first time here based on the questions you are asking of me. Added to this is the fact that you're a new face and I actually only need the tags from the cases. But worry not, the application process is painless both physically and emotionally, and in a short while you'll be ready to go.”

Fernando's jovial verbosity spread much confusion across the young man's face. “Huh?” 

Time to dumb it down, then. “I need you to fill this out.” Fernando gestures towards the application.

The young man picks up a pen and sets to work. He writes down that he is from Happyrock, a municipality which lies about thirty-five minutes away. Why he came all the way out to the Dominion is a question for the ages, but whatever. People from Jobsdaughter, thirty minutes in the other direction; or from Hephaestus, twenty minutes in the other other direction, swing by as well. “Do you really need my driver's license number?” he asks after a short while.

“Afraid so.” Though Fernando is willing to rent to people who reside well outside the Dominion's sphere of influence, he did not fall off the back of the delivery truck yesterday.

“Why?”

“Store policy. It's just the way it is.” That's an excuse Fernando hasn't been able to use in a while. Might as well dust it off.

“That sucks,” the teen says. “Your boss sounds strict.”

Oh, my. “You have no idea,” Fernando says, doing his best to emulate Jeremy Irons' Scar. However, the documentation is presented and Fernando verifies that the lad's responses were not made up whole cloth. The application is filled out to Fernando's satisfaction and the pair of older releases head out the door in the hands of a new customer. Things looked bright.

This being a Chronicle, the astute reader will no doubt already have arrived at the conclusion that things did not work out in any way which approaches the ideal.

The movies wound up late, Fernando had to leave a series of voice messages at the young man's number, and the guy who had rented a pair of older movies on a rent-one-get-one-free day managed to accrue $15 in late fees. The DVDs were in Fernando's drop box one morning in early July and Fernando figured that the irresponsible young man would never return to the Dominion out of shame or good sense, and his name would join dozens of others on Fernando's super-scary late fee list.

This being a Chronicle, the astute reader will no doubt already have arrived at the conclusion that a tale which opens with the story of a new customer has more to it than just “Ha-ha, Fernando got burned.”

In mid-September the guy returns. He heads to the new release rack and selects a pair of cases to bring up to the counter.

“Hey man,” he says to Fernando, no doubt recognizing him from his previous visit. He puts the cases down on the counter.

“Hello. Did you want to put something on your late fee?”

“Uh...my late fee?”

“Yeah. From when you were here in June and rented Who's Your Daddy and Knocked Up.”

“Oh.”

After a few moments' silence, Fernando says, “So, did you want to put something on it?”

“Do I have to?”

Fernando checks his late list for the precise amount owed. “It's at fifteen bucks.”

“Oh. Well, can I pay it next time I'm in?”

“Sorry, but I can't rent to you until some sort of good faith payment has been made.”

“Fine.” The teen digs in his pockets and pulls out a handful of change, which he dumps on the countertop with a clatter.

Fernando squints at the small pile of dimes, nickels, pennies, and pocket lint. It sums to maybe sixty or seventy cents. “I was hoping something a little more substantial, actually. Five bucks or something.”

“Come on, man.”

“Sorry, store policy,” Fernando says, remembering what he had invoked at the boy nearly three months prior.

The kid digs through his wallet and pulls out a crumpled five dollar bill, muttering, “Your boss is kind of an asshole.”

“Yeah, I know. On the bright side, I believe in giving people second chances. Optimism at work.” The guy looks at Fernando oddly but it doesn't seem as though he has registered that the asshole boss is the bloke standing before him.

Maybe next time it will sink in.

Damage Control

Cortez visits the Dominion one evening to shoot the breeze as closing time draws near. As he and Fernando discuss matters of great importance in life, a vehicle pulls up and deposits a movie in the drop box. Fernando heads over to take it out and replace it on the shelf, but when he lifts the case he hears rattling.

Ah, thinks Fernando, they've left money in there. Some of Fernando's savvier customers leave their money for late fees in the cases when they drop them off to save everyone the trouble of remembering that they exist down the road. This also allows Fernando's customers to get rid of some of their small change without being too obviously dickish about it.

But when Fernando opens the immortal plastic outer case to remove the inner jewel case and disc, two things were awry. The first was that Fernando had been mistaken about the presence of money in the case.

The second is that the jewel case came apart in Fernando's hands, spilling the movie to the countertop:

Cortez sees this horrible series of realizations unfold. “Wow,” he says after Fernando arranges the bits of the jewel case on the counter.

Fernando, meanwhile, is peering at the store sticker on the disc. “I know exactly who rented this.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. This one's six days late. My question is why bother even including the case when it is clearly ruined beyond any hope of use.”

“I couldn't tell you.”

Fernando sighs and adds another fifty cents to the tally.

Hand-Bird-Bush

A semi-regular customer rents a stack of movies once upon a time. They don't come back for a few days, so late fees accrue. They eventually make their way home.

Problem is that two of the cases are shattered. The jewel cases are one thing, because those worthless sleeves break in hapless shame when Fernando gives them a disapproving grimace. But these are Fernando's outer cases, thick husks of plastic that have a not insignificant probability of out-surviving cockroaches come a nuclear holocaust. These things do not break through accident.

Now Fernando has two of them that look roughly like someone's windshield after a particularly vile hailstorm. Since the movies were already late, Fernando just tacked on an additional charge for the ruined property. As stated earlier, jewel cases being destroyed happens all the time, and they're easily replaced, but Fernando has searched high and low for more of these immortal outer cases and they just don't exist, probably because they stand in violation of some law regulating the potential weaponization of materials.

The irony is that Fernando's transparent orange slim cases, which have potential mortality, remained unscathed.

About a month later the gentleman returns and selects another bunch of movies for his enjoyment. He brings them to the counter and Fernando says to him, “How much did you want to throw onto your late fee?”

“Uh, how much is it?”

“Twenty-eight dollars.”

“What? How?”

“You had out four movies for three days, which makes for twenty-six, and then I charged you a buck apiece for the ruined cases.”

“Ruined cases?”

“Yeah, two of my irreplaceable cases looked like somebody went at them with a sledge hammer.”

The guy's eyes widen, then narrow. His lips press together. “That wasn't me.”

“I didn't say it was.”

“I'll pay the late charges on the movies, since it was my fault they didn't get back, but I'm not paying for the cases. I didn't do that.”

“I mean, then who did?”

“I let my friend borrow them. That's why they were late.”

Fernando runs both hands through his hair. “So you're paying the late fee off today, then?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Okay, then it'll be twenty-six dollars for the late fee, plus the rentals makes thirty-six fifty total.” The man paid his bill in its entirety and the movies were returned the next day.

Fernando has enough wisdom to comprehend that giving up two dollars to put twenty-six in his till and retaining a not-pissed-off customer is a better alternative than insisting upon twenty-eight dollars and receiving instead an angry man who will owe that money for all eternity.

Daily Rate

A lady comes in and rents four movies. “How much would it cost for me to have these out for another night?”

“It'd be a buck-fifty for the new release, and fifty cents each for the older ones.”

“What about if I kept them for an extra night and brought them back tomorrow?”

“It'd be the same. First night's late fee is the same as what it would have cost to rent for two nights anyway.”

“Okay, I'll do them for one night then, then I can square up with you when I get the others back?”

“Absolutely.” Though it results in Fernando making a tiny bit less guaranteed income, he finds it sensible to grant requests like this because he is not an unabashedly greedy prick.

The next day arrives and Fernando finds two of the movies in the drop box—the new release and one of the older ones. Fernando marks down a $.50 charge on the other two and life goes on.

The day afterwards, the third movie is in the drop box. The fourth is still absent. Since this is a hella-old movie and since the lady had rented four movies and since she expressed initial concern about returning Fernando's things, he only charges her an additional $.50 for the second night as well, rather than the full dollar it ought to have been.

The next day the lady returns with the final movie. She places it on the countertop and says, “I'd like to square up whatever I owe you now.”

“Excellent. It's $1.50 altogether.”

“$1.50? You said it would be fifty cents each!”

“Fifty cents each, per night. You had two out for one night, and this one out for another night beyond that.”

She looks crestfallen. “Oh. I didn't realize."

Fernando has no response to that, so he takes her money and wishes her a good day.

Sins of the Mother

One evening a...well...”gaggle” is an insufficient group classification. A friggin' legion of 12 high-school-age girls enter the Dominion all a-giggle. Not a one of them is familiar to Fernando. They gallivant about the store with their loud talking and bickering and eventually decide on The Drifter as their evening's entertainment and come back to the counter.

Fernando addresses the gathered masses, feeling very much like a professional orator. “Under whose name would this be?”

“Can I put it under my mom's?” asks their apparent leader.

“If she has an account here.”

“She should. Esmerelda T.”

Ah. The Shutter Island people. “Actually, I'm sorry. You guys have a number of outstanding late fees from about a year ago. Sixty-something bucks worth. I can't rent to you until it's taken care of.”

“Well...that's from a year ago.”

“This only further reinforces my point. If you would care to purchase the movie outright, however, perhaps we could do business.”

“I promise we'll bring it back.”

“Sorry, but no. I'll sell it to you for five bucks, else I can't help you.”

She accepts Fernando's proposal, and Fernando not only garnered income but also freed up inventory space.

Imaginary Numbers

A pair of teenaged girls enter the store one day to rent a trio of movies. Fernando asks a name, it is provided, the transaction is going through, everything seems to be going just splendidly.

Then Dad decides to show up. Dad is a fat guy with tattoos on his forearms and the pinched face of a man perpetually angry at the world.

He trundles into the store and shouts at the top of his lungs, “You better not be putting any late fees on there!”

Whoa. What now?

“Er...what?”

“You better not be putting any late fees on there! She ain't payin' no late fees because the movies didn't work!”

Whoa. Self-restraint issues. And...what?

“W...What late fees? Which movies? I have no idea what you're talking about.”

Fernando's confusion seems to have been mistaken for acquiescence. “Damn right you don't. Cuz we ain't payin' no late fees.”

“I don't even know what late fees you're talking about. You don't have any. I don't know which movies you're talking about either. If you guys had late fees, I would know. It's my job to know. I don't have any. Now, I could make some up if you really wanted--”

“YOU BETTER NOT!” the man roars, slamming his fist upon the counter and leaving a greasy smudge on the glass.

“Please don't do that. If you break my counter, you will buy me a new one, threats of nonpayment be damned. And I was being facetious. It's called sarcasm.”

Dad storms out. Daughter meekly pays and follows.