Words: Livingroom Johnston
I went to Times Square and got a fake I.D. card and a prepaid cell phone because I was sick and tired of struggling with bullshit jobs, etc. I was getting too old for that kind of shit anyways. The next morning, bright and early, I went to a supermarket 23 blocks away with the fake I.D. and a fake resume that had bullshit statements and bullshit references. I talked to the manager and submitted the resume. He was painfully stupid, with a big ol’ medallion and chain around his neck and probably leased a car he couldn’t afford on a supermarket manager’s salary. His whole get-up and demeanor was based on what he perceived to be “Black Culture in America,” far the fuck away from Calcutta.
After submitting the resume I went home and answered the phone as Phil’s Electronics and told the manager “Harlem Farfromsquare” (me), was a good employee and that it would be a good idea to hire him because “Harlem” had moved to New York from North Carolina over the last six months—and he could possibly use the job. Then I answered the prepaid cell phone with a similar line but in a different voice.
Two days later I went in to start my first day at the supermarket as a cashier. I rang in every item on time with no mistakes, keeping my eye on the security cat in the booth above the pharmaceutical area. He wasn’t paying attention to shit. Good.
I timed the security guard after one more day. He went to lunch the same time I was scheduled to go to lunch. The rest of the staff were young, dumb fucks who did not notice me go up into the booth and boldly walk out with the surveillance tapes beneath my shirt, held by my belt. Then I walked right into the manager’s office while he was talking to some haggard-looking bitch by the vegetation stand, and retrieved the paperwork containing copies of my fake documents and took the papers to the restroom, wet them and flushed them down the toilet.
There was a long line at this point. The young girl at the other register sucked on her greasy lips and rolled her eyes, which resembled a frog’s under her hot orange eyeliner. Then I rang in the long line of customers and put their cash into a brown paper bag I had kindly placed beneath the register and told the bitch at the other register that I was going out to smoke a cigarette. She rolled her frog-like eyes again and snapped the fifth piece of sugarless gum in between her cavity-ridden teeth. I had counted the wrappers on her register.
I got into a cab and watched the knot-headed manager run down the street looking for me and didn’t feel sorry for him. He was going to have to answer to someone. Better him than me. I had the bread and was on with my motherfucking goddamn business. Life is what you make it, and I had just made it make me just under a $1,000 over the course of a few days, and then maybe, just maybe, I would work an honest job, after all. I had bills to pay and ain’t not a mother fucker was going to pay them for me.
The moral of this story is either you get or get got in a hot city. Believe it.
Sincerely yours,
Harlem Farfromsquare.
