Alone In the Pharmacy

David leaned against the counter. At this point each minute was feeling like two or even three. He had been standing there staring at a computer screen for several hours. It made him forget the number of prescriptions he had checked in the first nine hours he had been working. He slid his white coat off and laid it on the counter. Even that slight reduction in the weight on his shoulders gave him some relief. And it broke the laser focus he had on the computer screen.

But it was a brief sense of relief, soon the weariness crept back in. As he leaned on the counter, David remembered he had seen a chair in the back. Stepping away from the counter, he strode up the aisle and turned to the right. A smile crept across his face. There it was. He grabbed both sides and gently slid the chair carefully up to the computer. He wanted to pick it but, but the narrow aisle filled with medicine bottles changed his mind. One slip one way or another could knock several bottles off the shelf. At this point, he didn’t want to make more work for himself than he had to.

He eased gently into the chair with a sigh. It felt like he had been back here forever trapped in this tiny pocket of the universe. It had been hours since he had even seen somebody, the last technician who left at six o'clock and he was here until nine. “Not the best of arrangements,” he thought with a sneer. But then he shrugged. “At least it's not the busiest pharmacy. I can get a few things done and not have any interruptions.”

Even in the uninterrupted silence, his nerves were quickly becoming frayed. With all of the regular tasks accomplished, he had opted to try to get a continuing education module done. He read a few sentences, but then found himself looking towards the registers, expecting to see someone. But there was nobody there. He looked back and hear a creak, again, turning abrupt to his right to see the same view of the end of the shelves out in the store he had seen for hours now. He laughed it off and turned back to his computer screen.

But minutes ticked by with him able to focus for a few seconds and then looking over, expecting to see a customer. He wasn’t laughing about it at this point. The only thing he could hear was the soft hum of the lights above. The occasional flicker of a light over the filling station was the only variation in the sterile white glow of the fluorescent lighting. “Most places its hard to hear yourself think,” he thought, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Here it’s the opposite problem.”

Without any distractions, every detail, bore into his mind. He could easily see himself slipping into a stupor, even falling asleep leaning on the counter. He shook his head. “I need to focus,” he told himself.

He continued to scroll through information on his screen until it was time to do the quiz. As he clicked over to do that, he looked up with a start. He thought he heard the phone ringing. He listened intently, the seconds slowly dragging by. But he did not hear another ring. Then he shook his head. “I don't know why they said this is one of the easier pharmacies. Even this time of the year, when you're not dealing with the tourists and just a few regular people, it's still taxing a person’s sanity.”

He turned back to his quiz and quickly worked through it. He gave a satisfied nod at the score. He rubbed his hands together after clicking off it. “Well, that's probably all I'm going to be able to do tonight.” He looked through the checklist of things to do and shrugged. “Nothing else to do except run out the time I have left and get this place closed down.”

But then a moment of disorientation washed over him. “What time is it anyway?”

He looked down at the clock. in the corner of the computer screen. “4:30? That can't be right.” He grimaced as the realization hit him. “Oh no, the stupid thing froze. I hate it when it does that.”

He paused and gave a deep sigh, closing his eyes. He pressed his palms down. “Calm down, David. Don't panic.” He looked around. “Let's see, do they have an old school clock around here?”

Looking to his left above the racks of medications just above the counter, he saw the familiar round shape with a white face. The smile of elation that came with seeing it quickly faded as he looked more closely at it.

“2:37?” He sneered. “That's even worse than the clock on the computer screen. Well, you're no help.”

David rubbed his weary eyes. “Well, I could restart the computer. That'll take a couple minutes, but hopefully it'll boot things back up.”

He thought back to the stories he'd heard from one of his friends. Apparently, there was somebody had lost track of the time and stayed back in the pharmacy an hour after it closed. He had laughed and thought what an idiot at the time but now the realization of him being in a similar trap slowly gnawed at his insides. “Let me see,” he thought. “Darn it, I would have to have left my phone in my vehicle.

He looked at his wrist, expecting to see the familiar silver form of his watch. But the only thing that greeted him was a bare wrist. “That's right,” he thought. “I had to put a new clasp on it.”

He looked around frantically hoping for some clue. But the blank walls of the pharmacy also offered no assistance. In most places, there was at least a drive-through to get a slight glimpse of the outside world. Seeing how low the sun in the sky was would at least give him some hint as to what the time was. But this pharmacy was different. It was fully cocooned within the building. A submarine atmosphere had swallowed him up.

David found himself standing in the middle of the aisle breathing heavily. He closed his eyes. “Take it easy,” he told himself. It felt like the hundredth time he had done that.

He went back to the workstation and restarted the computer. “Well, that'll let me know once it boots back up. Of course, the way our computers are, that may take a while. I'd prefer a much quicker solution to this problem. My nerves are getting a bit frazzled.”

He seriously contemplated going out of the pharmacy to see if he could get some kind of a hint. Surely this stuck clock on the wall wasn't the only physical clock in the building. He might be able to find something. But then people might see him wandering around and start to wonder why he was outside the pharmacy before it closed. He thought furiously, trying to find an excuse for his departure. “I'm, uh, looking for something for somebody that called asking for if we had a product. No, no, that doesn’t work. They could probably hear the phone. I could just say that I'm looking to get a soda. Something to tide me over until I get off work. Yeah, that'll work.”

He paused and looked to the side, a dismayed look forming on his face. “Wait, why am I making excuses for that? I don't have to justify. what I'm doing.” He shook his head. “I think I'm starting to crack up with all the time here by myself. I'm so used to things being a constant bustle. A quiet evening is a little too much for my mind to handle.”

As the computer started to come back up, he shook his head again. “Why did I have to be so stupid and leave my phone in the car? Of all the things to do …”

His head shot up. “Wait a minute. The phone!” He looked to his side and a smile formed. “8:57. I knew it was getting close to time to close up. Ah, good old reliable phones, even when the computer locks up, at least they keep the time accurately.”

He strode over to the far end of the pharmacy, locking the door to the stockroom with a loud click. Going back to the front window, he rolled down the consultation window and then pressed the button to lower the shutters. They came down with a metallic squeal. He grimaced. “They need to get some oil on that thing.”

It shut with a soft thud and he slid the latch over. He heard the familiar sound of the computer logging in. And it finally gave the time that matched the one on the phone. “Impeccable timing,” he thought with a smirk.

He signed in again, only to sign back out. As the brief moment of excitement faded, his weariness came over him again. He quickly strode to the door and took one last look over the pharmacy. He flipped the light switch and stepped out, the door shutting behind him with a soft thud.