saxophonic (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
saxophonic) wrote2019-11-28 08:07 am
saxophonic) wrote2019-11-28 08:07 am
Holly's List
Series: CJC Week 2019
Title: Holly's List
Summary: Joseph goes Christmas shopping for Holly on Black Friday.
Rating: Teen
Word Count: 4,191
Note: Fill for CJC Week 2019, Day 5: Parenthood. X-posted to AO3 today!
Joseph pulls into the parking lot of the Target at the ungodly hour of three o’clock in the goddamn morning. It’s already ominously full of cars. He hedges his chances and secures a spot near the far end of an aisle beside another truck. There’s an outpost of a national coffee and doughnut chain in the next parking lot. If he’s feeling up to it, he’ll get a crueller before he drives home. Or an apple fritter. It is November after all.
He sits in the cab of his pickup, both hands still on the wheel, and runs through Holly’s Christmas list. A precocious child and the light of his life, he was glad there hadn’t been too many surprises. His ex-wife would handle the clothes on Holly’s list, which left Joseph with the toys. She’d named three: a new career for her doll with a set of clothes and accessories to match, the latest branded LEGO collection, and a Nintendo Switch. Splatoon bundle, if at all possible. How hard could that be?
When Joseph slams the car door, car beeping locked behind him, he realizes the queue to the front door has already doubled back on itself. He squints. Odd masses dot the line. Are those…tents? He blinks the blobs into focus. Christ. They are. Who camps out on Thanksgiving?
He sidles up behind the last person, who turns to size him up. Joseph doesn’t pay them much attention as he pulls his warm red hat over his salt-and-pepper hair. The November air is frigid and drying. He’s grateful for his thick, close-cropped beard to protect his face. He still should have brought gloves and a scarf. Ah, well. Too late for that now. He stuffs his hands into the pockets of his time-tested brown leather jacket. Too many accessories would weigh him down anyway. It should be a quick trip: get in; grab the items on sale; then wham, bam, thank you ma’am; Joseph is daddy of the year.
Eventually, the poor employees condemned to work the so-called holiday open the front doors. What begins as a calm processional explodes into chaotic stampede within seconds, tents left forgotten as people shove their way into the store.
With his stature, the squirming masses don’t have as much of an effect on him if he was a foot shorter. It’s still a struggle to break free of the crush of bodies once he’s inside. Joseph ducks to snag a branded handbasket and narrowly misses a brand-new handbag flying above his head. He chances a look over his shoulder to see two people chasing after it, already arguing.
Jumping out of their way, he bumps into someone. “Oof, sorry,” he says.
It’s a blond man about his size, a little shorter but a little broader across. He’s bundled up in a forest green peacoat and black cashmere scarf. “Watch it.” He grabs a handbasket of his own and hurries away.
“I said ‘sorry,’ man!” Joseph calls after him. After a quick scan of hanging signage, he forges a route toward the dolls and action figures section. The crowd swallows him up, a surging collective of grabbing hands and cranky tempers.
Someone shoves a shopping competitor out of the way as Joseph approaches an end cap. They begin screaming at one another over one particular deformed snowman doll. Yikes. What a scene to make over such an ugly doll. Joseph sidesteps the confrontation and the few shoppers who stop to gawk. Most, like Joseph, are too preoccupied with their own priorities to stand around and watch.
There. Finally! Dolls. Joseph ducks into the aisle. It’s not yet overrun with shoppers, so he skims the shelves for the right brand. The right career. No luck.
He tries the next aisle. This one is a bit busier than the first, but he recognizes the set he’s meant to buy when someone pulls a package off the shelf. Joseph rushes over. Only a few kits remain. He reaches for the next one.
Another hand closes over the other end of the package. Joseph looks up. It’s the man from before, his green eyes widened in surprise. “You.”
“Me.” Joseph checks the man’s handbasket. Empty. So this is his first stop, too. “I had this first.”
“I disagree,” the man says. His voice is stern and even as though the matter was settled fact. “There are others.” He doesn’t let go.
Joseph curls his lips back into a forced, polite grin. “Yes. You can get the next one.” To make his point, he gives the doll kit a firm tug. The accessories rattle in the plastic shell casing. “I’m sure your child will appreciate that one just as much.”
When the man doesn’t let go, Joseph yanks it from his hands and drops it into his own basket. He lets his face drop into a scowl. The man keeps a firm shoulder when Joseph bumps against him.
So it’s going to be that kind of morning, is it? Joseph hopes they don’t run into each other again.
Back in the main thoroughfare aisle that runs the circuit of the Target, more people have crowded into the shopping frenzy unfolding before Joseph’s eyes. The swarm around the ugly snowman dolls has grown as more shoppers have joined the fight. Some ill-fortuned employee struggles to keep order. Though he’s as burly as a bouncer, he’s only one man in the face of a deal-crazed mob. Joseph turns away with a shudder.
He walks past the LEGO aisle before he realizes it and doubles back in the crowd. Pushing against the chaotic flow of people, he manages to switch directions when someone grabs his arm. He almost swings.
“Joseph!” It’s someone he doesn’t recognize, but by her cheery expression among the capitalist hellscape unfolding in the store, she must know him. Judging by the toys stacked in her shopping cart, he guesses she must be mother to one of Holly’s classmates. Her cart seems particularly full.
“Hey there, what are the chances?” He points cheerfully at the mound of toys and clothes before her. “You’ve been busy!”
She laughs, though the din of the store swallows the sound. “Oh, you know. Kids these days and their endless lists for Santa. When we were growing up, we got one gift and we liked it!” She punctuates her declaration with a heavy wink and another titter. “I was hoping to get your help reaching something from the top shelf of this aisle.” Gesturing with her thumb, she hikes it behind her. “If you wouldn’t mind.”
Joseph doesn’t have much of a choice because she yanks him down the aisle with her the next minute. Her strength surprises Joseph. Despite her stature, she tows him along like a kite.
The woman stops abruptly and points at a movie franchise branded LEGO kit on the top shelf. “It’s the one way up there.” There are three boxes left, which have all been shoved to the back of the shelf. Joseph isn’t sure if that’s an accident from frantic grabbing or on purpose to prevent others from stealing the last few kits. “Could you be a dear and grab one for me?”
Joseph rises to his tiptoes and angles himself against the shelves as he reaches for a box. He finds himself face to face with that damn blond. “You again.”
The man blinks and offers a dry smile. “Me again.”
“Caesar! You’re out shopping this morning, too,” the woman says.
So that’s his name. He looks past Joseph and dimples at her. “Yes,” Caesar says. “You really can’t beat these deals, as much as I hate the crowds.”
“I didn’t know you two knew each other.”
“We don’t,” they say in unison.
Joseph manages to knock his fingertips against the corner of a box and swipes it off the shelf. “Here.” He tosses it in her cart. It lands and tumbles down into the recesses between clothes and toys.
“Thank you, Joseph.” She smiles. “I could have sworn you both have been to the PTA meetings organizing the children’s talent show. I must be mistaken.”
Talent show? He feels guilty for not knowing, but the Parent-Teacher Alliance meetings have never been his speed. They should send summaries or flyers for important things like this.
Caesar reaches in toward Joseph to pluck a different LEGO kit off the shelf. “I’m afraid not,” Caesar says. “I’ve only been to one, myself. The executive committee keeps pushing up the times earlier than I can manage.”
Joseph frowns, still preoccupied with the talent show news. Holly had been practicing the piano more. He should ask if she’s planning to perform. Would they make children audition? How cruel if they cut any acts! They’re children at school, not wannabe idols for television, but he wouldn’t put anything past some of the cattier parents. Joseph assumes this woman isn’t one of those.
Caesar, on the other hand? With that nice peacoat and cashmere scarf and hour-enhanced contempt painted across his handsome features? Strong maybe.
Joseph notices another person lunging for the kit on Holly’s list, so he snatches it from the shelf. They glare at him like they’re weighing a fight before deflating and settling for a different model.
“Keep struggling,” Joseph taunts. He can hear Caesar make a noise, of derision or amusement, Joseph can’t tell.
“I should be going before someone steals the last dollhouse! I’ll never live it down if I don’t get the super-deluxe beach bungalow model,” the woman says. She melds into the crowd with a wave and a cheery “See you later!”
Caesar and Joseph turn to each other, sizing one another up. “Why do I keep running into you?” Caesar asks.
“Literally or figuratively?”
“Both.” Caesar frowns quickly as he changes his mind. “Neither. It was a rhetorical question.”
Joseph shrugs. “The answer is the same either way. Crowded store. Black Friday.” He walks past Caesar to the end of the aisle. Caesar turns and follows, so Joseph says, “Why are you going the same way as me?”
“I’m not following you. I need to pick up one last toy.”
“Me too. You’re following me.”
“No.” They round the corner together in distressingly perfect form. “I’m just going the same way, by chance.” Caesar readjusts the handbasket dangling from his bent elbow to avoid knocking into someone’s back as they push through the crowd. “I wish to God I wasn’t.”
Joseph grunts. “It’s too early for this. Who was she, anyway?”
“Don’t talk to me.” Caesar stops to look at a foam dart gun, part of a set that includes a child-size bandolier full of extra darts.
“Oh, nice!” Joseph leans over to grab it off the shelf. “I would have loved to have this as a kid.”
Caesar grabs another kit from the shelf, a pair of dart revolvers, and tosses it into his basket without fanfare. “Are you here shopping for yourself or for your kid?”
Joseph returns the kit in his hands back to the shelf with the others. “My daughter, Holly.” It disappears into someone else’s hands a moment later.
With a raise of his eyebrows and a hum lost to the surrounding chatter, Caesar acknowledges Joseph for a brief moment before a group of fighting parents knocks into them. Together, they shove the convulsing knot of flying limbs away and squeeze through the crowd, putting distance between them and the fray. Red polo and khaki clad staff shove through the throngs of people, their megaphone-enhanced pleas for order blaring uselessly.
“Jesus Christ, who would fight over a toy?” Joseph laughs, incredulous. “It’s Christmas! Go get your kid another. They’ll love it no matter what.” His eyes alight on the next aisle cutting across the thoroughfare, and the different videogames stocked on the shelves. “There! Last one, then I can leave and get some goddamn coffee.” He pushes through people, holding his basket aloft to keep thieving hands out. The more people cram into the store, the closer the crowd gets to complete pandemonium. Joseph hopes he can make it out before it gets to that point.
There are fewer shoppers in the game aisle, which is still more people than Joseph is used to seeing in one place. He scans shelves as he walks, eyes glazing over until he realizes he passed the neon green and pink bundle for the Switch and the game. It’s tucked behind a normal grey console and the last one on the shelf, selection already picked clean. When he turns to lunge for it, another pair of hands closes on it at the same time.
Joseph recognizes those hands and looks up. “Seriously? This is getting old. Fast.”
“You’re telling me.” Caesar clenches his teeth into a smile as though he was baring fangs. “This is clearly mine.”
“I saw it first.”
Caesar grunts and pulls it toward him. Joseph keeping a tight grip on the prize, stumbles forward. “Doubtful, since I watched you walk past it.”
Not to be outdone, Joseph pulls it toward him. Caesar doesn’t stumble, but he’s forced to step forward to keep his balance, so Joseph counts them even. “I still saw it. Just didn’t click the first time, that’s all.”
“Is that so?” Another tug.
Joseph yanks it back. “That’s right.” He twists his body, trying to lever the game and system out of Caesar’s hands.
It doesn’t work. Damn, that man’s grip is strong. Caesar must be hiding some serious muscles under those winter clothes.
Staying upright, Caesar spins with Joseph. “That’s a load of bull.” He finds his footing and readjusts his grip on the box. “I think you should let go of my daughter’s Nintendo now.” Caesar lowers his head in a stance Joseph recognizes as a headbutt waiting to happen.
“I think you misspoke.” Joseph tightens his hold, tucking it closer to his body. Caesar shifts closer, stubborn. “This is my daughter’s. You can let go anytime.”
“What about you?” Caesar sneers. “After that speech about getting another toy?” He cocks his head to one side and raises his voice to a cartoonish mimic of Joseph’s tone. “Who fights over a toy? Get another, your kid will love it!”
Joseph grits his teeth. “I don’t sound like that.”
Caesar rolls his eyes.
“And this is different. I need this to win Christmas.”
“You don’t ‘win’ at Christmas. You celebrate it with family and friends. People you love.” Caesar scowls. “Never mind. I don’t care.” His fingernails scrape against the neon packaging. “Let go.”
There have been a few times in his life when Joseph knows what he’s about to say is a bad idea.
“What are you gonna do? Make me?”
This was not one of them.
Next thing Joseph knows, Caesar winds his head back for an attack. He doesn’t make contact, and Joseph realizes he wasn’t intending to anyway. It was a scare tactic.
But the understanding comes too late. Joseph is already reacting, dodging a headbutt and jamming an elbow into Caesar’s rib cage. It makes contact with more force than necessary for a toy store confrontation. Everything in moderation, he figures, including moderation.
Caesar sputters and wheezes without relinquishing the toy. “What the hell, asshole?”
“You were gonna hit me!” Joseph argues. He shakes the box. “Let go!”
“No!” Caesar tugs the box hard. Joseph doesn’t let go. The recoil sends Caesar’s fist toward Joseph’s face. This time, it isn’t a feint.
Knuckles make contact against Joseph’s nose with an audible crunch. Pain blooms hot and across Joseph’s face. Against all odds, he keeps one hand firmly grasping the box while the other clutches his nose. “You bastard!”
The crowd around them squishes back, out of their way.
“It was an accident,” Caesar says, coldly matter-of-fact and authentically unapologetic.
Pinching the bridge of his nose, Joseph says, “Like hell it was!”
“A preventable accident,” Caesar continues, “if only you had let go of my daughter’s game.”
“That sounds like a threat.”
Fire flashes in Caesar’s eyes. “You’re an idiot.”
“I’m not stupid; it’s like four in the morning.” Joseph sets his feet. “Everyone is a bit of an idiot at 4AM.” Content his nose is, somehow, not broken, Joseph puts both hands on the box. “Including you.” With all his weight at his disposal, Joseph wrenches the box from Caesar’s hands.
It breaks free! Joseph grins and basks in his victory.
He overdid the pull, and he didn’t set a leg our far enough to break his momentum. Joseph falls back, both hands clutching the toy as his success morphs back into tumult.
Caesar falls forward with Joseph, both of Caesar’s arms outstretched to break his fall or pull the toy free. They collapse in a heavy pile on the floor and Joseph pushes the box to safety as they both start swinging at the same time. Wrestling isn’t Joseph’s forte, but if he can knock out his opponent, he was never one to care much about form.
He blocks a punch to the face with his forearm. Caesar twists and avoids an elbow to his chin. Joseph knows he’s at a disadvantage on his back and beneath Caesar. Sitting astride Joseph’s hips, Caesar has him halfway pinned already. Joseph plants his feet and lifts through his legs in an attempt to buck him off. His lower back protests the effort, so Joseph throws a fist toward Caesar’s face for insurance.
Caesar clenches his thick thighs, pressing his knees tight against Joseph’s ribs. “You won’t get rid of me that easily!” He catches Joseph’s hand and flings it aside.
With a grunt, Joseph twists his shoulders and his knees in different directions as he tries again. This time, he manages to roll them.
“Oof!”
“What was that you said about easy?” Joseph grins, triumphant. On his knees, he plants his hands on either side of Caesar’s head. He recoils one arm when Caesar turns his neck to bite. Lucky for him that Caesar’s teeth snap air. “Jesus Christ, you’re insane.”
“You’re the one who wants to ’win’ Christmas!” An elbow digs into the tender inner joint of Joseph’s elbow, and the heel of Caesar’s other hand comes flying toward Joseph’s chin. “Now give me my daughter’s Nintendo and get off me!”
Joseph avoids the elbow attack but Caesar lands the hit on Joseph’s jaw. “Ow, fuck!” His head jerks back, knocking him off Caesar enough to let Caesar roll them back over.
“Let go!” Caesar shouts.
Joseph reaches up to scratch at Caesar’s face. “No! It’s mine!” In a back corner of Joseph’s mind, he knows Caesar’s demand is ridiculous to the point of comedy. He’s on top, after all. Both pairs of hands are occupied with fighting. No one is in possession of the box. But those details don’t matter. Joseph’s fingers find skin. To add to the mix, he starts kicking like an overgrown toddler throwing a tantrum. It’s something Holly does that was always effective the first couple times she did it.
When Caesar reacts deftly to pin Joseph’s wrists, Joseph remembers Caesar has raised a child of his own. “Nice try, asshole.”
It’s frustrating beyond belief to feel like he’s about to be bested in a fight. But this isn’t Joseph’s first brawl. He shakes his hands from side to side, finding lateral movement easier than brute force against Caesar and gravity. It achieves its purpose: Caesar loses enough control to refocus his efforts to pinning Joseph to the aisle floor again.
Which means knocking him off with a well-timed thrust of his hips works beautifully.
Caesar lands on his side with an angry yelp. Joseph follows the momentum to tackle him. They knock against a display, which wobbles dangerously without toppling over completely. Joseph notices only for a moment before he devotes his full attention back to beating the shit out of this presumptuous man. He has to get his hands on that Switch. Holly may be able to take ’no’ for an answer, sweet girl that she is, but Joseph won’t. Not when it comes to his daughter.
One knee on the ground, Joseph rushes to get one knee on Caesar’s abdomen. He wedges his foot between Caesar’s thighs, ready to apply pressure from beneath Caesar’s groin. “How do you like this?” Joseph says. He grips the scarf around Caesar’s neck with one hand and gives Caesar a warning tug.
“You wouldn’t.” Caesar grabs at his hands, at the knot in his scarf.
“For Holly?” Joseph grins and pulls again. “I would.”
With a rush of movement, Caesar pushes off the ground. The scarf goes slack and Joseph rolls again. He manages to keep his hold on the scarf as Caesar lands on top of him. The sudden weight knocks the air from his lungs. Caesar’s too, from the extent of his wheezing. Joseph tugs the scarf and lands a headbutt that makes him see stars.
When he comes to a few seconds later, Caesar’s face hovers above his own. He seems to be blinking away the collision birdies, too, his full lips parted when his jaw went slack.
“Wait,” Joseph says.
“What?” Caesar asks in exasperation.
Joseph gives his head one last clearing shake. “Where is it?”
“What?”
“Where is the Nintendo? My hands are full beating your ass, so.”
Caesar frowns. “I’m clearly winning.”
“You don’t have it.” Joseph shrugs against the floor. “Neither of us are winning.”
In unison, they turn their heads to one side. Empty. Then the other. The box lays out of arm’s reach. And beyond, peeking out from a hiding spot on the bottom shelf, behind some blue slime plushie with a soulless smile, is another Splatoon Switch bundle. “Well, well, well,” Caesar says. “Look what we have here.” He slides to one side and reaches for the far one, knocking the now-dented box they were fighting over toward Joseph’s head.
“I was about to say the same thing,” an unfamiliar voice booms from a megaphone above them.
Prizes in hand, they turn to see two of the well-muscled, bouncer-looking staff glaring down at them. The megaphone-bearing employee has a name badge with a short name that Joseph can’t make out, but the one without the speaker has a tag that spells ‘Esidisi’ in neat letters.
“Oops.”
Shaking his head, the one with the megaphone says, “Please collect your things as we guide you to the cashiers. You will finish your shopping experience with us this morning.”
“Neither of you will be permitted reentry to the store today.” Esidisi muscles Joseph to his feet. The one with the megaphone gets Caesar. “Thank you for your continued cooperation.” Both of them are forcibly escorted to the checkout lanes, and Joseph can feel Caesar’s angry eyes like needles stabbing against the back or his head for the duration.
They are unceremoniously deposited at the curb. “Happy Thanksgiving,” says the one with the megaphone. Feedback through the speaker box makes them all wince. “Thank you for shopping at Target. Enjoy the rest of your day.” He and Esidisi return to the commercial pandemonium indoors.
Joseph rubs his pinky in his ear. “We were right beside them. Did he really need to use the megaphone the whole time?”
“Who cares! I wasn’t finished shopping,” Caesar says, checking his bags. “This is all your fault, you know.”
“How is it my fault?“ Joseph asks.
He finds himself amused when Caesar rounds on him with another frustrated, pedantic explanation of all the reasons why Joseph should have been the only one to get kicked out. From the put-together appearance to brave the Black Friday morning crowds to the way Caesar handled the pleasantries with the shoppers inside, Joseph gets the sense that Caesar doesn’t explode like this often. He acts like a kettle kept too long at a bare simmer until Joseph came along and turned the knob to eleven. The imagery, along with the expressions playing across Caesar’s handsome features, inspires a chuckle out of Joseph.
Caesar stops mid-sentence, a finger jabbing against Joseph’s chest. “Stop laughing. This is serious. With my ex out of the picture, I still needed to pick up a few clothes and a pack of hair clips.”
“Aww, they sell clothes on other days, too.”
“Not at these prices!”
“You got me there.” Joseph shakes his head, grinning. “Hey, tell you what. I’ll buy you a coffee about it. One single dad to another.” He gestures across the jammed parking lot at the coffee shop. “I was going to get something for myself anyway, after I drop off Holly’s gifts in my truck.”
Looking between Joseph, the shop, his watch, and then back to Joseph, Caesar sighs. “Fine.” Joseph grins when Caesar adds quickly, “But I’m getting a crueller too. You owe me at least that much.”
“What’s coffee without a doughnut?” Joseph shrugs. “So, what did you say your daughter’s name was?” They head out across the packed lot together, cars circling like sharks for empty spots as the sun casts dawn’s first light into the grey sky.
Title: Holly's List
Summary: Joseph goes Christmas shopping for Holly on Black Friday.
Rating: Teen
Word Count: 4,191
Note: Fill for CJC Week 2019, Day 5: Parenthood. X-posted to AO3 today!
Joseph pulls into the parking lot of the Target at the ungodly hour of three o’clock in the goddamn morning. It’s already ominously full of cars. He hedges his chances and secures a spot near the far end of an aisle beside another truck. There’s an outpost of a national coffee and doughnut chain in the next parking lot. If he’s feeling up to it, he’ll get a crueller before he drives home. Or an apple fritter. It is November after all.
He sits in the cab of his pickup, both hands still on the wheel, and runs through Holly’s Christmas list. A precocious child and the light of his life, he was glad there hadn’t been too many surprises. His ex-wife would handle the clothes on Holly’s list, which left Joseph with the toys. She’d named three: a new career for her doll with a set of clothes and accessories to match, the latest branded LEGO collection, and a Nintendo Switch. Splatoon bundle, if at all possible. How hard could that be?
When Joseph slams the car door, car beeping locked behind him, he realizes the queue to the front door has already doubled back on itself. He squints. Odd masses dot the line. Are those…tents? He blinks the blobs into focus. Christ. They are. Who camps out on Thanksgiving?
He sidles up behind the last person, who turns to size him up. Joseph doesn’t pay them much attention as he pulls his warm red hat over his salt-and-pepper hair. The November air is frigid and drying. He’s grateful for his thick, close-cropped beard to protect his face. He still should have brought gloves and a scarf. Ah, well. Too late for that now. He stuffs his hands into the pockets of his time-tested brown leather jacket. Too many accessories would weigh him down anyway. It should be a quick trip: get in; grab the items on sale; then wham, bam, thank you ma’am; Joseph is daddy of the year.
Eventually, the poor employees condemned to work the so-called holiday open the front doors. What begins as a calm processional explodes into chaotic stampede within seconds, tents left forgotten as people shove their way into the store.
With his stature, the squirming masses don’t have as much of an effect on him if he was a foot shorter. It’s still a struggle to break free of the crush of bodies once he’s inside. Joseph ducks to snag a branded handbasket and narrowly misses a brand-new handbag flying above his head. He chances a look over his shoulder to see two people chasing after it, already arguing.
Jumping out of their way, he bumps into someone. “Oof, sorry,” he says.
It’s a blond man about his size, a little shorter but a little broader across. He’s bundled up in a forest green peacoat and black cashmere scarf. “Watch it.” He grabs a handbasket of his own and hurries away.
“I said ‘sorry,’ man!” Joseph calls after him. After a quick scan of hanging signage, he forges a route toward the dolls and action figures section. The crowd swallows him up, a surging collective of grabbing hands and cranky tempers.
Someone shoves a shopping competitor out of the way as Joseph approaches an end cap. They begin screaming at one another over one particular deformed snowman doll. Yikes. What a scene to make over such an ugly doll. Joseph sidesteps the confrontation and the few shoppers who stop to gawk. Most, like Joseph, are too preoccupied with their own priorities to stand around and watch.
There. Finally! Dolls. Joseph ducks into the aisle. It’s not yet overrun with shoppers, so he skims the shelves for the right brand. The right career. No luck.
He tries the next aisle. This one is a bit busier than the first, but he recognizes the set he’s meant to buy when someone pulls a package off the shelf. Joseph rushes over. Only a few kits remain. He reaches for the next one.
Another hand closes over the other end of the package. Joseph looks up. It’s the man from before, his green eyes widened in surprise. “You.”
“Me.” Joseph checks the man’s handbasket. Empty. So this is his first stop, too. “I had this first.”
“I disagree,” the man says. His voice is stern and even as though the matter was settled fact. “There are others.” He doesn’t let go.
Joseph curls his lips back into a forced, polite grin. “Yes. You can get the next one.” To make his point, he gives the doll kit a firm tug. The accessories rattle in the plastic shell casing. “I’m sure your child will appreciate that one just as much.”
When the man doesn’t let go, Joseph yanks it from his hands and drops it into his own basket. He lets his face drop into a scowl. The man keeps a firm shoulder when Joseph bumps against him.
So it’s going to be that kind of morning, is it? Joseph hopes they don’t run into each other again.
Back in the main thoroughfare aisle that runs the circuit of the Target, more people have crowded into the shopping frenzy unfolding before Joseph’s eyes. The swarm around the ugly snowman dolls has grown as more shoppers have joined the fight. Some ill-fortuned employee struggles to keep order. Though he’s as burly as a bouncer, he’s only one man in the face of a deal-crazed mob. Joseph turns away with a shudder.
He walks past the LEGO aisle before he realizes it and doubles back in the crowd. Pushing against the chaotic flow of people, he manages to switch directions when someone grabs his arm. He almost swings.
“Joseph!” It’s someone he doesn’t recognize, but by her cheery expression among the capitalist hellscape unfolding in the store, she must know him. Judging by the toys stacked in her shopping cart, he guesses she must be mother to one of Holly’s classmates. Her cart seems particularly full.
“Hey there, what are the chances?” He points cheerfully at the mound of toys and clothes before her. “You’ve been busy!”
She laughs, though the din of the store swallows the sound. “Oh, you know. Kids these days and their endless lists for Santa. When we were growing up, we got one gift and we liked it!” She punctuates her declaration with a heavy wink and another titter. “I was hoping to get your help reaching something from the top shelf of this aisle.” Gesturing with her thumb, she hikes it behind her. “If you wouldn’t mind.”
Joseph doesn’t have much of a choice because she yanks him down the aisle with her the next minute. Her strength surprises Joseph. Despite her stature, she tows him along like a kite.
The woman stops abruptly and points at a movie franchise branded LEGO kit on the top shelf. “It’s the one way up there.” There are three boxes left, which have all been shoved to the back of the shelf. Joseph isn’t sure if that’s an accident from frantic grabbing or on purpose to prevent others from stealing the last few kits. “Could you be a dear and grab one for me?”
Joseph rises to his tiptoes and angles himself against the shelves as he reaches for a box. He finds himself face to face with that damn blond. “You again.”
The man blinks and offers a dry smile. “Me again.”
“Caesar! You’re out shopping this morning, too,” the woman says.
So that’s his name. He looks past Joseph and dimples at her. “Yes,” Caesar says. “You really can’t beat these deals, as much as I hate the crowds.”
“I didn’t know you two knew each other.”
“We don’t,” they say in unison.
Joseph manages to knock his fingertips against the corner of a box and swipes it off the shelf. “Here.” He tosses it in her cart. It lands and tumbles down into the recesses between clothes and toys.
“Thank you, Joseph.” She smiles. “I could have sworn you both have been to the PTA meetings organizing the children’s talent show. I must be mistaken.”
Talent show? He feels guilty for not knowing, but the Parent-Teacher Alliance meetings have never been his speed. They should send summaries or flyers for important things like this.
Caesar reaches in toward Joseph to pluck a different LEGO kit off the shelf. “I’m afraid not,” Caesar says. “I’ve only been to one, myself. The executive committee keeps pushing up the times earlier than I can manage.”
Joseph frowns, still preoccupied with the talent show news. Holly had been practicing the piano more. He should ask if she’s planning to perform. Would they make children audition? How cruel if they cut any acts! They’re children at school, not wannabe idols for television, but he wouldn’t put anything past some of the cattier parents. Joseph assumes this woman isn’t one of those.
Caesar, on the other hand? With that nice peacoat and cashmere scarf and hour-enhanced contempt painted across his handsome features? Strong maybe.
Joseph notices another person lunging for the kit on Holly’s list, so he snatches it from the shelf. They glare at him like they’re weighing a fight before deflating and settling for a different model.
“Keep struggling,” Joseph taunts. He can hear Caesar make a noise, of derision or amusement, Joseph can’t tell.
“I should be going before someone steals the last dollhouse! I’ll never live it down if I don’t get the super-deluxe beach bungalow model,” the woman says. She melds into the crowd with a wave and a cheery “See you later!”
Caesar and Joseph turn to each other, sizing one another up. “Why do I keep running into you?” Caesar asks.
“Literally or figuratively?”
“Both.” Caesar frowns quickly as he changes his mind. “Neither. It was a rhetorical question.”
Joseph shrugs. “The answer is the same either way. Crowded store. Black Friday.” He walks past Caesar to the end of the aisle. Caesar turns and follows, so Joseph says, “Why are you going the same way as me?”
“I’m not following you. I need to pick up one last toy.”
“Me too. You’re following me.”
“No.” They round the corner together in distressingly perfect form. “I’m just going the same way, by chance.” Caesar readjusts the handbasket dangling from his bent elbow to avoid knocking into someone’s back as they push through the crowd. “I wish to God I wasn’t.”
Joseph grunts. “It’s too early for this. Who was she, anyway?”
“Don’t talk to me.” Caesar stops to look at a foam dart gun, part of a set that includes a child-size bandolier full of extra darts.
“Oh, nice!” Joseph leans over to grab it off the shelf. “I would have loved to have this as a kid.”
Caesar grabs another kit from the shelf, a pair of dart revolvers, and tosses it into his basket without fanfare. “Are you here shopping for yourself or for your kid?”
Joseph returns the kit in his hands back to the shelf with the others. “My daughter, Holly.” It disappears into someone else’s hands a moment later.
With a raise of his eyebrows and a hum lost to the surrounding chatter, Caesar acknowledges Joseph for a brief moment before a group of fighting parents knocks into them. Together, they shove the convulsing knot of flying limbs away and squeeze through the crowd, putting distance between them and the fray. Red polo and khaki clad staff shove through the throngs of people, their megaphone-enhanced pleas for order blaring uselessly.
“Jesus Christ, who would fight over a toy?” Joseph laughs, incredulous. “It’s Christmas! Go get your kid another. They’ll love it no matter what.” His eyes alight on the next aisle cutting across the thoroughfare, and the different videogames stocked on the shelves. “There! Last one, then I can leave and get some goddamn coffee.” He pushes through people, holding his basket aloft to keep thieving hands out. The more people cram into the store, the closer the crowd gets to complete pandemonium. Joseph hopes he can make it out before it gets to that point.
There are fewer shoppers in the game aisle, which is still more people than Joseph is used to seeing in one place. He scans shelves as he walks, eyes glazing over until he realizes he passed the neon green and pink bundle for the Switch and the game. It’s tucked behind a normal grey console and the last one on the shelf, selection already picked clean. When he turns to lunge for it, another pair of hands closes on it at the same time.
Joseph recognizes those hands and looks up. “Seriously? This is getting old. Fast.”
“You’re telling me.” Caesar clenches his teeth into a smile as though he was baring fangs. “This is clearly mine.”
“I saw it first.”
Caesar grunts and pulls it toward him. Joseph keeping a tight grip on the prize, stumbles forward. “Doubtful, since I watched you walk past it.”
Not to be outdone, Joseph pulls it toward him. Caesar doesn’t stumble, but he’s forced to step forward to keep his balance, so Joseph counts them even. “I still saw it. Just didn’t click the first time, that’s all.”
“Is that so?” Another tug.
Joseph yanks it back. “That’s right.” He twists his body, trying to lever the game and system out of Caesar’s hands.
It doesn’t work. Damn, that man’s grip is strong. Caesar must be hiding some serious muscles under those winter clothes.
Staying upright, Caesar spins with Joseph. “That’s a load of bull.” He finds his footing and readjusts his grip on the box. “I think you should let go of my daughter’s Nintendo now.” Caesar lowers his head in a stance Joseph recognizes as a headbutt waiting to happen.
“I think you misspoke.” Joseph tightens his hold, tucking it closer to his body. Caesar shifts closer, stubborn. “This is my daughter’s. You can let go anytime.”
“What about you?” Caesar sneers. “After that speech about getting another toy?” He cocks his head to one side and raises his voice to a cartoonish mimic of Joseph’s tone. “Who fights over a toy? Get another, your kid will love it!”
Joseph grits his teeth. “I don’t sound like that.”
Caesar rolls his eyes.
“And this is different. I need this to win Christmas.”
“You don’t ‘win’ at Christmas. You celebrate it with family and friends. People you love.” Caesar scowls. “Never mind. I don’t care.” His fingernails scrape against the neon packaging. “Let go.”
There have been a few times in his life when Joseph knows what he’s about to say is a bad idea.
“What are you gonna do? Make me?”
This was not one of them.
Next thing Joseph knows, Caesar winds his head back for an attack. He doesn’t make contact, and Joseph realizes he wasn’t intending to anyway. It was a scare tactic.
But the understanding comes too late. Joseph is already reacting, dodging a headbutt and jamming an elbow into Caesar’s rib cage. It makes contact with more force than necessary for a toy store confrontation. Everything in moderation, he figures, including moderation.
Caesar sputters and wheezes without relinquishing the toy. “What the hell, asshole?”
“You were gonna hit me!” Joseph argues. He shakes the box. “Let go!”
“No!” Caesar tugs the box hard. Joseph doesn’t let go. The recoil sends Caesar’s fist toward Joseph’s face. This time, it isn’t a feint.
Knuckles make contact against Joseph’s nose with an audible crunch. Pain blooms hot and across Joseph’s face. Against all odds, he keeps one hand firmly grasping the box while the other clutches his nose. “You bastard!”
The crowd around them squishes back, out of their way.
“It was an accident,” Caesar says, coldly matter-of-fact and authentically unapologetic.
Pinching the bridge of his nose, Joseph says, “Like hell it was!”
“A preventable accident,” Caesar continues, “if only you had let go of my daughter’s game.”
“That sounds like a threat.”
Fire flashes in Caesar’s eyes. “You’re an idiot.”
“I’m not stupid; it’s like four in the morning.” Joseph sets his feet. “Everyone is a bit of an idiot at 4AM.” Content his nose is, somehow, not broken, Joseph puts both hands on the box. “Including you.” With all his weight at his disposal, Joseph wrenches the box from Caesar’s hands.
It breaks free! Joseph grins and basks in his victory.
He overdid the pull, and he didn’t set a leg our far enough to break his momentum. Joseph falls back, both hands clutching the toy as his success morphs back into tumult.
Caesar falls forward with Joseph, both of Caesar’s arms outstretched to break his fall or pull the toy free. They collapse in a heavy pile on the floor and Joseph pushes the box to safety as they both start swinging at the same time. Wrestling isn’t Joseph’s forte, but if he can knock out his opponent, he was never one to care much about form.
He blocks a punch to the face with his forearm. Caesar twists and avoids an elbow to his chin. Joseph knows he’s at a disadvantage on his back and beneath Caesar. Sitting astride Joseph’s hips, Caesar has him halfway pinned already. Joseph plants his feet and lifts through his legs in an attempt to buck him off. His lower back protests the effort, so Joseph throws a fist toward Caesar’s face for insurance.
Caesar clenches his thick thighs, pressing his knees tight against Joseph’s ribs. “You won’t get rid of me that easily!” He catches Joseph’s hand and flings it aside.
With a grunt, Joseph twists his shoulders and his knees in different directions as he tries again. This time, he manages to roll them.
“Oof!”
“What was that you said about easy?” Joseph grins, triumphant. On his knees, he plants his hands on either side of Caesar’s head. He recoils one arm when Caesar turns his neck to bite. Lucky for him that Caesar’s teeth snap air. “Jesus Christ, you’re insane.”
“You’re the one who wants to ’win’ Christmas!” An elbow digs into the tender inner joint of Joseph’s elbow, and the heel of Caesar’s other hand comes flying toward Joseph’s chin. “Now give me my daughter’s Nintendo and get off me!”
Joseph avoids the elbow attack but Caesar lands the hit on Joseph’s jaw. “Ow, fuck!” His head jerks back, knocking him off Caesar enough to let Caesar roll them back over.
“Let go!” Caesar shouts.
Joseph reaches up to scratch at Caesar’s face. “No! It’s mine!” In a back corner of Joseph’s mind, he knows Caesar’s demand is ridiculous to the point of comedy. He’s on top, after all. Both pairs of hands are occupied with fighting. No one is in possession of the box. But those details don’t matter. Joseph’s fingers find skin. To add to the mix, he starts kicking like an overgrown toddler throwing a tantrum. It’s something Holly does that was always effective the first couple times she did it.
When Caesar reacts deftly to pin Joseph’s wrists, Joseph remembers Caesar has raised a child of his own. “Nice try, asshole.”
It’s frustrating beyond belief to feel like he’s about to be bested in a fight. But this isn’t Joseph’s first brawl. He shakes his hands from side to side, finding lateral movement easier than brute force against Caesar and gravity. It achieves its purpose: Caesar loses enough control to refocus his efforts to pinning Joseph to the aisle floor again.
Which means knocking him off with a well-timed thrust of his hips works beautifully.
Caesar lands on his side with an angry yelp. Joseph follows the momentum to tackle him. They knock against a display, which wobbles dangerously without toppling over completely. Joseph notices only for a moment before he devotes his full attention back to beating the shit out of this presumptuous man. He has to get his hands on that Switch. Holly may be able to take ’no’ for an answer, sweet girl that she is, but Joseph won’t. Not when it comes to his daughter.
One knee on the ground, Joseph rushes to get one knee on Caesar’s abdomen. He wedges his foot between Caesar’s thighs, ready to apply pressure from beneath Caesar’s groin. “How do you like this?” Joseph says. He grips the scarf around Caesar’s neck with one hand and gives Caesar a warning tug.
“You wouldn’t.” Caesar grabs at his hands, at the knot in his scarf.
“For Holly?” Joseph grins and pulls again. “I would.”
With a rush of movement, Caesar pushes off the ground. The scarf goes slack and Joseph rolls again. He manages to keep his hold on the scarf as Caesar lands on top of him. The sudden weight knocks the air from his lungs. Caesar’s too, from the extent of his wheezing. Joseph tugs the scarf and lands a headbutt that makes him see stars.
When he comes to a few seconds later, Caesar’s face hovers above his own. He seems to be blinking away the collision birdies, too, his full lips parted when his jaw went slack.
“Wait,” Joseph says.
“What?” Caesar asks in exasperation.
Joseph gives his head one last clearing shake. “Where is it?”
“What?”
“Where is the Nintendo? My hands are full beating your ass, so.”
Caesar frowns. “I’m clearly winning.”
“You don’t have it.” Joseph shrugs against the floor. “Neither of us are winning.”
In unison, they turn their heads to one side. Empty. Then the other. The box lays out of arm’s reach. And beyond, peeking out from a hiding spot on the bottom shelf, behind some blue slime plushie with a soulless smile, is another Splatoon Switch bundle. “Well, well, well,” Caesar says. “Look what we have here.” He slides to one side and reaches for the far one, knocking the now-dented box they were fighting over toward Joseph’s head.
“I was about to say the same thing,” an unfamiliar voice booms from a megaphone above them.
Prizes in hand, they turn to see two of the well-muscled, bouncer-looking staff glaring down at them. The megaphone-bearing employee has a name badge with a short name that Joseph can’t make out, but the one without the speaker has a tag that spells ‘Esidisi’ in neat letters.
“Oops.”
Shaking his head, the one with the megaphone says, “Please collect your things as we guide you to the cashiers. You will finish your shopping experience with us this morning.”
“Neither of you will be permitted reentry to the store today.” Esidisi muscles Joseph to his feet. The one with the megaphone gets Caesar. “Thank you for your continued cooperation.” Both of them are forcibly escorted to the checkout lanes, and Joseph can feel Caesar’s angry eyes like needles stabbing against the back or his head for the duration.
They are unceremoniously deposited at the curb. “Happy Thanksgiving,” says the one with the megaphone. Feedback through the speaker box makes them all wince. “Thank you for shopping at Target. Enjoy the rest of your day.” He and Esidisi return to the commercial pandemonium indoors.
Joseph rubs his pinky in his ear. “We were right beside them. Did he really need to use the megaphone the whole time?”
“Who cares! I wasn’t finished shopping,” Caesar says, checking his bags. “This is all your fault, you know.”
“How is it my fault?“ Joseph asks.
He finds himself amused when Caesar rounds on him with another frustrated, pedantic explanation of all the reasons why Joseph should have been the only one to get kicked out. From the put-together appearance to brave the Black Friday morning crowds to the way Caesar handled the pleasantries with the shoppers inside, Joseph gets the sense that Caesar doesn’t explode like this often. He acts like a kettle kept too long at a bare simmer until Joseph came along and turned the knob to eleven. The imagery, along with the expressions playing across Caesar’s handsome features, inspires a chuckle out of Joseph.
Caesar stops mid-sentence, a finger jabbing against Joseph’s chest. “Stop laughing. This is serious. With my ex out of the picture, I still needed to pick up a few clothes and a pack of hair clips.”
“Aww, they sell clothes on other days, too.”
“Not at these prices!”
“You got me there.” Joseph shakes his head, grinning. “Hey, tell you what. I’ll buy you a coffee about it. One single dad to another.” He gestures across the jammed parking lot at the coffee shop. “I was going to get something for myself anyway, after I drop off Holly’s gifts in my truck.”
Looking between Joseph, the shop, his watch, and then back to Joseph, Caesar sighs. “Fine.” Joseph grins when Caesar adds quickly, “But I’m getting a crueller too. You owe me at least that much.”
“What’s coffee without a doughnut?” Joseph shrugs. “So, what did you say your daughter’s name was?” They head out across the packed lot together, cars circling like sharks for empty spots as the sun casts dawn’s first light into the grey sky.