I’ve never been the type of person to harp on things. I’m easy going and try not to rock the boat most of the time; non-confrontational? Yeah that’s prolly me. I don’t hold grudges, I don’t bring up stuff that’s happened in the past, I tend to let things go quite easily.
Until they’re brought back to me.
I spent this weekend shopping with some old friends. We all used to work at the GAP together, what seemed like ages ago. We got together in Brooklyn and went to our old stomping grounds, ready to get all of our Christmas shopping done. There were mad dashes aplenty for last minute gifts, last item on the shelves, getting the right color, right size, no they don’t want a gift card, no they don’t like shopping here. It was about as much fun as a small group of determined people could have, given the huge number of people in any given square foot of the mall. The best part was, it was as if we had never gone our separate ways. Our group had so much fun together, that it almost made us forget about how much we all ending up spending. Almost.
Of course, our last stop was going to be the GAP if only for old times sake. We were prolly about 8 hours into shopping and our only thoughts were, ‘What’s for dinner, and who’s cooking it?’. But troopers that we were, we carried on and entered the store.
It was here that our friendships were established. Here that we spent countless hours folding and hanging clothes that got thrown about, especially during the holiday season. Here that I folded roughly 300 pairs of denim jeans to look alike, for the corporate bigwigs that were coming. Apparently I did a stupendous job because the denim wall I created was photographed and used a model for all other stores. Here where it all started for us. Even though the store looks nothing like when we used to work there, it’s still “our”store, #705.
So we’re bouncing around the place, looking to see what’s new and of course how the salespeople are, what the fitting room looks like and what kind of coverage they have over at cashwrap. I’m about to get to the middle of the store, when everyone I’m with suddenly appears and decides that it’s time to go. Kinda strange since we haven’t even gone through the whole store yet, nor have we gone into GAP Kids or BabyGAP. But whatever, someone prolly has to go potty which leads someone else into thinking it’s time to get outta here and eat, which leads to someone exclaiming that their feet hurt from all the walking we’ve done. No biggie at all.
I turn around to head out when I notice that all 7 people that I’m with have pretty much surrounded me and are making sure I leave the store and don’t deviate from that plan. But then I hear it.
“patrick?”
“Patrick?”
“PATRICK!!”
I slowly part my human force field and see who they were trying to hide me from. Our old manager. Forget about formalities when seeing someone for the first time in about 7 years. He approaches me and says, “She needs to see you”.
“Who?” [Knowing full well who he's talking about]
“You didn’t hear?”
“About what?”
“She’s been in and out of hospitals, the past few months. It’s not looking good.”
“Hospitals? For what?”
“She’s dying. And she wants to see you.”