Woah, Woah, Sir! That’s Not My Stuff!

“Can I have three pounds of bacon?” an elderly man asked the cashier, as if the checkout lane was a restaurant and she was taking orders for his table.

“Sir, you’ll have to go back and get it. I can’t leave my station,” she said.

He moved slowly around the cash registers in pursuit of the missing meat.

“I paused his sale. Let me ring you up since you only have a few items,” she nodded to me.

Sweet.

I ambled around the man’s cart as she rung up my granola bars, bananas, packs of gum and some other stuff.

“Thanks,” I smiled as I met her gaze. A bag man put some of my items in a bag and put them in the older man’s cart which was still positioned at the end of the checkout counter.

“Woah, woah.”

He didn’t hear. Working quickly and efficiently, he placed the rest of my stuff in another bag and put it in the man’s cart. He pushed the cart toward me helpfully.

“Woah, that’s not my stuff,” I said.

Confused, he took all the bags out of the car and placed them on the counter.

“I mean, some of it is my stuff,” I said, investigating each bag.

“Sir, is that your cart of groceries?” a beefy security guard asked, the old man shuffling up behind him.

“He’s trying to take my food,” the old man yelled in a strained voice.

“Well, two of the bags are mine.” I said.

“Then why are you taking this man’s groceries? He’s on disability.”

“I didn’t. The bag guy was mistaken…”

“What bag guy?” the guard asked. The bag man has mysteriously disappeared.

Eventually, I was told not to come back to that store or I would be arrested.

On the way out, I saw the bag man out of the corner of my eye at the other end of the store. He held up some bananas, smiling.