It was a chipper February morning. The sun was out-and it wasn't too cold. In your local Barnes and Noble things were probably very normal. Story times, coffee brewing, customers browsing, booksellers zoning, music playing, etc. All very normal and quiet. Except for one particular Barnes and Noble...
Down in farthest depths of the downstairs portion of this Barnes and Noble, a music manager, we'll call him Bernie (names may be changed to protect the identities of the survivors), was merrily receiving in his new music and DVD product for the store. He liked these quiet mornings, being so far from anyone else in the store; the music department was in the farthest, deepest corner of the store, sepatrated by a wall and plexi; the only opening being the single doorway at the northeast corner of the department. Anyways, Bernie is humming along to the Barbra Streisand instore play, going about his day to day business, unawares that today is going to be different than any other.
Out on the bookfloor Merch Manager Dena Jo was assigning out tasks to booksellers Jerry, Millie, Ruby, Caramel and Patrick. Endcaps needed to change, tables moved, customers shooed from areas that were awaiting events, etc. Phaedra was dusting and straightening away in Health and Exercise.And Patrick was cleaning up after story time. Everyone was clipping along, when all of a sudden a creepy silence came over the store, and hairs started to prickle on the back of necks. Jerry, being uber sensitive to creepiness, looked up from his project (a Mountainous Animal Endcap-appropriately displayed in the main aisle of an urban city store). He scanned the aisle with his eyes and nothing seemed amiss; so he walked toward the epicenter of the store, where there was customer service and stairways and escalators, and other signs customers wouldn't read. As he approached he realized he wasn't imagining the silence, the Babs was just over, and as soon as he got the the customer service desk, Seal blasted through the overhead speakers.
WIth a shake of his head and a chuckle to himself, Jerry pushed away the prickliness at his neck and stopped to take a good look at his second home. A gorgeous store-2 stories, the size of a football field downstairs, and open atrium allowing hte second floor to look down at the epicenter. And windows to let all of the sunshine in from the top floor. As he scanned the line of windows, he thought he'd go see how Patt, the head cashier, was doing today and headed up the escalators towards cash wrap. What he found was a most gruesome scene! As he entered the door at the end of the row of cash registers, he turned to continue into the area, which, oddly, at the moment, had a dark red stain on the carpeting-and on the back shelves, books were sprayed with what appeared to be (and he would know from "other" experiences in his life) blood. Blood all over everything! And down at the very end of the line of 10 cash registers, where the gift wrap table was stationed, he saw, what was left of, the source of all of the blood. Pieces, and I mean Pieces of Patt were scattered under and around the gift wrap table. He knew it was Patt because of the pieces of his shoes, and khaki pants that he always wore, were slightly visible. Apparently, whoever, or whatever did this had not taste for polo shirts and old leather shoes-because that was the majority of what Jerry could make out in all the blood.
What Jerry did next we won't know-because all of a sudden a piercing scream was heard throughout the whole store-and our focus would, of course, follow that person, and Jerry will jump back in when he decided to join the living. To be continued...
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