Kinky at the Kinko's

Two or three times per month I walk into the Kinko's to photocopy checks. I have my Kinko's card. I know my route down the steps, left, to the copy center, right, to the first machine on the right (black and white) or the third on the right (also black and white), whichever is open. My card goes in. My check's on the machine. Press COPY. Collect everything. Go. The whole visit from locking my car to returning to it usually takes no more than two minutes. It unfolds nearly with the robotic, right-angled movements of Matt Damon's Jason Bourne portrayal.

Some days are just different though.

Today I parked on the side street, per usual, and sallied up the alley, past the fish distributor with its god-awful dumpster odor. A sweaty woman paused about to light a cigarette, as if I'd caught her doing something she shouldn't be doing. She seemed to be waiting for me to pass, and indeed after I did I heard the match light and she sighed.

Now: Through the gap in the fence, into the Kinko's parking lot, into the store. ...

The copy area had a busy look, though this vision was aided, certainly, by the presence of two employees, which is about two more than usually man this zone. One guy stood there hands on hips, legs akimbo in a khaki-pant-wearing manager pose. He surveyed his kingdom.

A girl from the college, I'm assuming she was from the neighboring college, was cutting up magazine pictures and taping them to white paper. She seemed to have added word clouds and captions around some of the images. She wore a gypsy skirt, a head scarf, a white tank top and a cache of bracelets on one wrist. She was a pretty little creature. As she worked, the bracelets slid up and down her slight forearm.

Her back was to the first copier, my number one. She glanced when I turned into the area. It was the moment my eyes had turned toward the cut-out work she'd been doing. Not to seem rudely preoccupied with it, I nodded to her, said "Hey" as if maybe we knew one another. I went about making my copy.

(Oh, to insert an old Rob Schneider clip here, Betsy: "Making copies ..." By the way, did you read THIS about him? The second paragraph says enough. It screams SCHNEIDER!!)

So the paper spit out. I collected my copy card and returned it to my wallet. I collected my check and photocopy and stepped backward one step as I opened my satchel. All things like clockwork.

But at the same time, this girl took a step back. We bumped.

"Sorry 'bout that," I said flatly.

Then I did a double take. There was just something curious about the angle of her head. She said, deadpan but clearly restraining a grin, "Our butts touched."

They had.

Never one to back down from spirited repartee, and really wishing it occurred more often, I said, "God truly works in mysterious ways."

I'm claiming the victory on that one for her tongue pressed from behind her lower lip, as if to supress a smile (though the smile won out when she turned away) and she nodded in an "Uh-huh, I see" fashion as she returned to her work. I left grinning.
-cK