Sir Printer Salesman

“So, what’s the catch?”

“Sir, there is no catch, this is a Baskin’ Robbins. Our two-for-five special counts on all single scoops.”

“So there must be something that doesn’t qualify. What do I need to order to make sure it’s $5?”

The young woman taking my order rolled her eyes behind the register. I was a self-aware over-analyzer, but I wasn’t going to be chummed by a fucking ice cream chain run by a bunch of high schoolers in pink polos. 

“Sir, just make your order and I can tell you if it qualifies or not,” the employee said.

I made a careful third scan of the menu before placing my order--one scoop each of Baseball Nut and Snickers. 

When the employee rang it up, the payment pad on my side of the counter totalled me out at $6. I pointed and was about to say something, but the employee cut me off.

“The discount will be added once you put your card in.”

I had no other option but to trust her words, and so I tapped my card to the screen and waited anxiously as the pink spinny wheel decided my fate. When the payment went through, my card had indeed been charged $5. 

Then a screen popped up asking me to round up my total to the nearest dollar for a kids’ charity. The fuck? My total already was on the dollar. 

The next prompt asked me if the “friendly people” at Baskin’ Robbins had “churned” me the right way, would I please add a dollar to tip them for their service? I didn’t feel churned at all. However, I had saved a dollar by getting the two-for-five deal. Was this how they got people? They saved them a dollar and then asked for it back? In the spirit of defiance, I clicked “no.”

I checked my watch. It was an analog clock with a bold gray design. From my experience in the printer industry, I knew that pewter color was achieved using a blend of 17% black, 73% cyan ink. 2:25, it read. 

After receiving my $5 scoops in a cup, I walked back out to my car and finished it in there. It was colder in my car than it was inside--not surprising for the middle of February in New England--but I didn’t like when other people could see me eat. 

After I finished the last spoonful, I reached into my side pocket and pulled out the pack of Newports I carried around with me at all times. I had the lighter in my other pocket, but I didn’t take it out. I don’t light the end of my cigarettes. I never have, even though I always have the lighter right there to use.

I sat there, in the driver’s seat of my car, chewing on the end of a Newport that hung out the side of my mouth. I looked in my side mirror at my reflection. Here was a guy who was edgy. He loved seeking thrills and winding down with a smoke. 

I removed the cigarette immediately.

I used to take lunch in the office with my coworkers when I first started working as a printer salesman, but it just got too exhausting. I hated having other people watch me eat, and I would take special care to not make any noise when I chewed. Even though the break room was always loud enough to cover the sound anyway, since my coworkers loved to ask how I was doing as soon as I had a mouthful of spaghetti. 

And yet here I was, five years later, eating Baskin’ Robbins in the same khakis I had been wearing almost every day since starting the job. My gym membership had kept me from gaining the sitting weight that many of my printer companions were victims of, and literally everything had held up to the test of time. Even though most of my business attire was from Marshall’s. 

I had started this job as a fresh-out-of-college graduate, and the salary and benefits weren’t bad, though it lacked adventure. While selling printers, you knew exactly what was going to happen. Every single day. 

I was parked right next to the dumpster. As I got into the front seat of my car, a spot of dark Baseball Nut dripped onto my khaki dress pants. Fuck. 

Why did this always happen to me? I went to get ice cream on a random Tuesday afternoon in February, hoping to take advantage of a good discount and my 60-minute lunch break. Instead, I was $5 poorer and was about to go back to work with stained pants. Maybe Deborah would have a stain stick at her desk I could borrow.

At least Baskin’ Robbins had the flavors I liked. The protein in the peanut butter should tide me over for the next three hours of printer sales at the office before I could go home and make dinner.

I left my vehicle and made my way over to the dumpster in order to be a good citizen and throw away my empty ice cream container. 

All of a sudden, the dumpster started making a racket, like the defective OfficeJet series last year that wouldn’t stop rattling every time it made a copy. It was shaking now too like something was inside it. What kind of mechanism would rattle a dumpster?

Against my better judgment, I opened the lid, and on the inside was a swirling, circular, sky-blue vortex. In the middle was what looked like a painting of a meadow from one of those cheesy movies Disney forced down our throats as kids. 

I guess I really didn’t know I was leaning into the dumpster until I was airborne. I felt like I was falling through the back of a waterfall, like the spray you get during a water ride at a theme park, and then I hit something hard, back first. That was going to leave a mark. 

I reached in my back pocket, and pulled out my phone. The screen was cracked. Um, I needed that for work. At least it still worked. The lock screen told me the time: 2:32. 

“Hero,” said a deep, echoing voice that sounded like it came from every direction. The fuck?

I shot off the soft bed of grass and looked around. I had somehow fallen into the picture, and I was now in a meadow that was pleasantly warm, with tall green trees spreading out in every direction. Where was I, Florida?

“Ahem,” said the bodiless voice. I made another 360. Nobody was there, just trees, tall grass, and sunshine. And were those…rainbow butterflies? 

“Up here,” said the voice again, a bit more agitated. I turned upward, and finally met the gaze of a bodiless blue head with glowing purple eyes. It must have been the size of an Oxidata All-in-One Print and Fax machine alone, but there was still no body supporting the head where it floated in the cloudless blue sky above me. The head was a cartoonish square shape that would have fit neatly into our company’s new Hassle-Free Fast-and-Easy© printer shipping boxes. 

“Hero,” the head started again. “I am Xerox, the keeper of all wisdom of this realm, and I have called upon you--”

“Xerox? Like the laser printer? Wait, is this one of those “What would you do’s”? Am I on camera right now? I swear I’m not ripping off the company or anything. Nothing to hide.”

“What? No, you’re not on--” Xerox staggered over his words. It seemed the whole conversation was just as confusing for him as it was for me. 

“Hero,” Xerox started again, “your destiny has called you to this place. You have been selected to become the new champion of Hulion. Follow me to begin your quest.” With a puff of purple smoke, Xerox’s giant floating head disappeared and reappeared further away from me, facing in the opposite direction. The head continued to teleport short distances in front of me, continuing into the trees. What was actually happening right now? I started to ponder if something had been in that two-for-five special. I still couldn’t believe I was anywhere other than the Baskin Robbins parking lot right now. 

I looked up the way I had come and saw only blue sky. No portal remained, only me in a fucking meadow. I looked in the opposite direction of the floating head. More trees. 

“I said follow me,” said the floating head. He had reappeared in front of me, and he was agitated. How come? He was the one trying to get me to prance through a meadow in my work clothes. 

“Look bud, whatever adventure we’re on, I don’t want in,” I said.

“You-wha-You cannot turn from your destiny,” sputtered the floating head. 

“Okay, then turn me in the direction home and I’ll get there myself,” I said.

“You may return to your world once you have completed the trials of Hulion’s hero,” said the floating head. 

Absolutely not. 

But, as I soon found out, Xerox wasn't really giving me a choice. We weren't going to get along.