Walmart: A Dangerous Place

It was at that moment when he walked through the doors of the Westfield Walmart he realized that his life would change forever. Kevin is just your average guy at five feet eight inches tall with brown hair and hazel eyes. He always kept his hair short and perfectly combed and trimmed. Kevin recommends that you always look your best because you never know what opportunity might cross your path. You’ll never know who you’re going to meet and where you might have met them. Kevin has the best qualities possible. You know, the kind of stuff every girl wants in a man: honest, trustworthy, caring, the best possible one out there. He was even one of the sweetest of them all, but if you messed one thing up, and with Kevin everything had to perfect, he would lash out at you. Everything and anything that he owned had to be neat and tidy and everything had to be put away in a certain order and all that. Everything had to be done the way he liked it, like if you make his favorite vegetable soup for example; you had to put the carrots and green beans in first, then the meat and potatoes. If you do it any other way, he gets mad, even though he knows the outcome is the same. I guess that perfect guy has to have some downfalls, even if he himself has to have everything perfect.

Kevin started going to Walmart with his mom back when he was little, probably around the age of seven. Now 35, Kevin is a regular to the store. He goes everyday at six o’clock in the morning and 3:30 in the afternoon. Kevin was a minute late when he walked in today. He was the kind of person who was never late. Even when there is a ton of traffic he always managed to get here right at 3:30. Today, being a Saturday, the store was extra crowded. The store was always really crowded on Saturdays and after eleven o’clock in the morning on Sundays. There were people bumping in one another, kids screaming and running around, parents arguing over which one of their kids had the toy first, customers yelling at the store associates for no apparent reason, and there was just a lot of ruff housing. I think there was even a drug deal supposedly happening that day. I heard that on social media. Those gangs always posting their crap on Facebook, Twitter and what not. One of these days those damn cops will smarten up and check there for suspicious activity. But, you know, none of that was going to stop our dear friend Kevin. Nothing can stop Kevin except for ketchup packets, murderers, dryer lint (and pocket lint, of course), corn on the cob, dust, squeezable mayonnaise, dark chocolate, diabetes, heart disease, obsessive compulsive disorder, murderers, and spiders.

Kevin always knows exactly where to go in Walmart. I bet he could even go there with his eyes shut. He would never go anywhere in the store that he didn’t need in that section. It was aisle eleven, the tie section.

Kevin buys ties everyday, and I mean everyday. At least two of them, everyday. No more, no less. There is not a single day that he didn't buy a tie. Do you understand how many ties that is at the end of the year?! Just take a moment to think of how many ties that could be. 730 ties! A year! Think about how many he’d buy in a lifetime? If he started buying ties at 18, and he’s now 35. That’s like 12,410 ties in only 17 years!!! Think about if he does everyday until he’s 100 years old? It’s almost 60,000 ties, its like 59,860 ties to be exact. He could open up some sort of tie business, but what could he truly do with all those ties? More importantly, where could he put all those ties? Maybe in like some kind of tie closet or cellar. You know, kind of like a wine cellar, but for ties. He might as well buy another house for all his ties. Maybe he has like collector's ties in his collection, and he could sell them to make money for his tie house. Ties, man, they get to you. Some have sentimental value and all that. I don't really know, I'm not a tie collected like Kevin. I think he might be overly obsessed with ties. He should see someone about that. I don't know what they would do about that though.

Kevin buys ties after work, never before. It's kinda of like a good luck, bad luck kind of thing. Kevin thinks that bad luck might after if he buys them before work. Kevin made his way through the crowded entrance way. Kevin being a fairly tall dude, as I said before, he's like five foot eight to be exact, and also a twig, is able to see over 75% of the people. He is able to squeeze through some tight spots. He was going through a crowd of obese people when one lady stopped him. Yes, because obese people like to stick together, almost quite literally.

"And just who do you think you are, shoving through like that?" she questioned. The lady had on an everyday fuzzy robe and fuzzy pink flip flop type slippers, and she had a few curlers in her hair. She had those really big boxes of cereal and many frozen dinner in her cart. She had five packages of paper towels and six packages of toilet paper. She might as well of had a second cart, she had so much stuff. It looked like she was preparing for a zombie apocalypse.

Kevin just looked at her and said, "I'm more important they you'll ever be," and climbed over her cart and continued through, like he was on a mission of sort. Like I said before, nothing can stop Kevin, not even a crowd of obese guys and ladies.

She scuffed, "Well, fine then. Have it your way, Mr. Know It All," and continued shopping.

There were so many people that at one point around the produce section, Kevin came to an absolute standstill. There was a lot of fuss happening in this general area. At Kevin's height one would be able to see a small fraction of what was going on, but from the looks of things, it wasn't good. To Kevin, it looked like the crowd was formed into a circle with a couple of guys in the middle. Kevin said "Excuse me" as he pushed his way through the tight crowd to get a better look. There were two guys beating the snot out of each other, and not figuratively either. One literally had blood coming out of his nose and the other just had a black eye. Kevin looked around at the crowd. There were a lot of dudes of multiple ages around the circle. Some were cheering and others were chanting, "Fight! Fight! Fight!" You could tell some of those dudes were high because their eyes were beat red, and I mean it wouldn’t surprise me that they were. Anyone not trying to break up a fight must be on some kind of illegal drugs. The guy's around the circle ranged anywhere from age 18 to thief late forties, early fifties. For the two guys fighting, however, one looks like he was sixty, but he could have been younger. It looked he did a lot of weed and heroin when he was younger. He had needle tracts going up and down his arms from shooting up. The other guys looked pretty young, maybe late twenties, early thirties. Both had short brown hair, and the whites of their eyes were red probably from smoking. Who really knows what caused that fight. Maybe that was the drug I heard about on Facebook, and it didn’t go too well. Who knows?

A police siren could be heard in the distance. Walmart has its own police officers that patrol the store looking for trouble. Because, you know, anything can happen in Walmart. They even have these little like go cart kind of vehicles that they’re allowed to drive around the store. It’s really hard for them to operate at times like this, but they’re always watching from the various security cameras precariously perched throughout the store. The sound of the police siren became louder as the crowd dissipated. Kevin was pushed along by the crowd. Kevin couldn't see quite what was going on behind him as the crowd continued to push Kevin farther and farther away from the scene. Kevin tried and tried to get out of that feeding frenzy of people, but to no avail. He was able to get out just before his stop, the tie aisle. With it being close to Christmas, the tie aisle was packed with housewives and employees of bosses with very large companies, all looking for a tie for their significant other or boss or coworker. This aisle was probably the least packed of them all. You could at least have some room to walk down this aisle. Yet it was still very hard to get by people, with their shopping carts and all that.

I guess ties aren't as popular as the other things this store has to offer, Kevin thought to himself. There are many things I find odd in this world, but Kevin's obsession with ties has to be of the utmost strangest. Not everyone wears ties anymore. It's all about these bow ties. Once in a great while Kevin will wear a bow tie to spruce things up a bit, but he will never wear a bow tie everyday. He thinks that bow ties are too hip, too casual, and most importantly, not very professional even if they were paired with a cardigan or sweater vest. That's way he only wears them once in awhile.

Kevin has so many ties, as previously mentioned, he could change them every five minutes and still have enough clean ties for the rest of the week. He has one dresser at his house that is just filled will ties. Each day of the week has its own drawer and since he doesn't wear ties on the weekend, his five drawer dresser works wonders. Each drawer is label Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in that order from top to bottom. He would normally buy ties for the day that he would wear them on. I f he buys ties on a Thursday, the ties he bought would be reserved for Thursdays. Since today is Saturday, the ties he are going buy can be reserved for any day he would so chose. Kevin normally would buy Saturday ties for Monday and Sunday ties for Tuesday if it was the first of the month. If it just so happened to be the second week of the month, Saturday ties are reserved for Tuesday and Sunday ties are for Wednesday and so on. This normally starts at the first of the year and continues throughout. Some months he is able to start at the beginning with Saturday being Monday.

Kevin owns a lot of the ties this Wal-Mart has to offer. Some days they have more to choose from and other days not so much. He search the racks that held the ties up for everyone to see. Most of the ties he has looked at so far he already has multiples at home. He never has an odd number of ties. For that reason, he will only buy two ties at a time. Kevin made his way through the aisle, but he could not find a single ties that he doesn't already own. When times like this happen, Kevin usually resorts to the internet. createyourownties.org is the website Kevin will use. He has created some pretty strange ties using that website. One tie was covered with strips of bacon. It normally doesn't take long to receive the ties once one was to order them. One can choose a date and time that they would like to see receive their ties. Kevin usually chose Monday at four o'clock so he can be there when they are delivered. Kevin uses this website almost on a regular basis, just as much as he goes to Walmart.

Kevin walked to the end of the aisle and looked around. What was a very crowded store turned deserted. He looked behind him, not a sole in sight. "I wonder where everyone went," Kevin. said to himself. Well, since this is my story everyone vanishes, for the time being, at least. Kevin started to walk around the empty store. There was no one there, not even the store employees. It's like everyone in the world just got up and walked out. Because that's what happens in my world.

Kevin walked around the Walmart looking for signs of life. He went down into the produce section. There were shopping carts full of stuff just left there, no one to watch them, but the lone tumbleweed that would occasionally roll by. Tumbleweeds do exist in Walmart, only when the store is empty, which never happens except for today that is. The tumbleweeds consist of dust bunnies, gum wrappers, and anything else that might get stuck in them. The produce left on the ground had already started to rot. You know, because Walmart produce doesn't last long. Without signs of life, the produce felt worthless, and decided to turn brown. Produce has a mind of its own.

Kevin continued on throughout the store, walking around all the unattended shopping carts. It was quiet, too quiet. He walked through the deserted store to the clothes section. There were hangers and shirts left on the floor. Clothes racks tipped over, and many shopping carts lining the aisles were somebody once was standing. The shelves were all torn about. Shirts and pants just thrown around like a child's play thing. There were pant legs hanging over the edges of the shelves. Stuff was just thrown everywhere. I don't know how to describe it. It was an absolute mess.

Kevin made his way to the back of the store. Now, kids remember this part. It'll all make sense in the end. Now, listen, so Kevin found this thingamabob, a thingamajig, if you will. It was black and kinda of a half sphere in shape. Not very big either. Probably about the size of one's brain. Now, I forget exactly where this is going, but I do know I'm supposed to tell you about. Anyway, he picked it up and examined it carefully. It was a dark black kind of color on the bottom, and a peachy kind color on the other side. There were three markings outlined in black on the more rounded side. It seemed as if each marking had its own button, like they did something or another and they had to be pushed upon to be activated. Kevin looked down at the floor around where he picked up the strange object. There were crumbled up candy wrappers, gum stuck to the floor, and pocket lint everywhere. Oh how Kevin absolutely hated pocket lint to the point where it made him shudder at the utmost disgustingness of the pocket lint. I kind of agree with Kevin in a way. I mean, you don't know where the pocket lint has been. It could have been belly button lint for all you know. I definitely don't like it when you stick your hand in your pocket and there it was all squished up in a nasty pocket linty ball. And it’s real nasty when it is wet. That is probably the grossest possible.

Kevin continued to search for clues. I betcha it has something to do with the nasty pocket lint? Maybe, I don’t know, I didn’t right this. He headed to the bathroom a little ways down the aisle to see if there was anything there. Bathroom for some reason or another always have many hidden clues. That and beds rooms, Kevin's gonna check in the bedding section of the store after. When he walked into the bathroom, it stunk like a skunk snuck in and sprayed someone in there. Kevin couldn't stand the smell any longer and ran out gagging. He stopped searching for clues and left the bathroom. He grabbed some of that air freshener. You know the kind in the spray bottle, some similar to Febreeze. He found it just outside the bathroom. He grabbed a couple of clothes pins, and plugged his nose. He ran back in and started spraying everything in sight. His nose started to hurt from the clothes pin, so he took it off after probably like 10 to 15 minutes later. It didn’t smell as bad, and he could finally breathe in there. Now that he can breathe, it was time to get serious. He started by checking in the stalls, in and around the toilets, on any left over toilet paper, and on the plastic, sticky things you call walls or stall dividers. All he seemed to find was toilet paper thrown about and stuck to the walls of the stalls, pooped smeared on the back of the toilet on the wall, and green slime crap everywhere. Now that's pretty nasty. He started to search around the by the sinks for something, anything that might explain what this thing might be. Strange this like this always have some kind of hidden explanation somewhere, you just have to find it.

When Kevin was examining the sink area, he ended up finding some suspicious looking scrap of paper or something and another shoved behind the mirror. He tried to slowly pull it out from behind the mirror, but it started to rip. He stopped pulling at it. Kevin looked around at the mirror trying to figure out how to get the paper out. He noticed that there small clips holding the mirror to the wall. He started messing with the clips, and he noticed that they were able to slide past the edge of the mirror. He pushed each of the eight tabs past the edge of the mirror, and carefully took the mirror off the wall and put it on the floor next to the sink. The small piece of paper fell I to the sink, and Kevin quickly and carefully picked it out of the sink. When he looked up, he noticed the hole in the wall. There was a huge compartment back there behind where the mirror was. It was probably about two to two and a half feet deep, and filled with many things, a couple notebook and reference books, quite a few cans of tomato soup, water, and a few hand guns. Kevin was very surprised to find this.

How has any never seen any of this. There's a lot of stuff back here. I wonder if there's anything behind the other two mirrors. Kevin pondered to himself. He put the little paper in his pocket, and started to move the other mirrors away from the walls. There were more of the compartments behind the mirrors filled with more food, books, and weaponry. With that being said, Kevin took the little paper out of his pocket, and unfolded it. The same symbols that were on the object were the same as on the object he found. There was a description of what each symbol meant. There was a sun symbol on the paper that matched the one on the object. Next to the object out said that the sun symbol meant that when you push that button, the world will resort back to the dawn of time. Going clockwise around the object, the next symbol is the tree symbol. The tree means that everything will go back too the present, original time before anything bad happened. The tree kind of acts as a reset function, but it only resets back to the last check point. The final symbol is one that isl a circle, but based on the other symbols, it must be the moon because it says that the whole world is to disappear when that button is pushed down. The only thing with that is it leaves someone behind that knows exactly nothing of what they would have to do to reset the mess. Not everyone in the whole world can solve anything like this because they don't know how. I guess when who ever designed this thing and choose who was going to remain behind, they didn't take into account how smart Kevin is. I guess they didn't think someone in working in a little cubicle could pull off a stunt much like this one. To come this far in so little time, the average person would have still been down in the tie section still moping over everyone being gone. Kevin's level of calmness is much higher than his level of fear.

If the sun resets everything back to the beginning of time, and the moon ends everything, Kevin thought to himself. Then the tree should bring everything back to the present time. Kevin took his chances and pushed the tree button. There was a big flash of light from the thingamabob, and Kevin was thrown back against the wall. He hit the back of his head on the tile. I guess that looks like the end of our hero right? Well not yet. He was only knocked unconscious for a few minutes. When he woke up, it was like nothing had changed. heh was still in the bathroom where he was before he was knocked out by the strength of the flash. Kevin waited a minute or two before getting up. When he finally decided to get up he couldn't. It was like he didn't have the strength to. Before he knew a crowd of people came rushing in, mostly guys in their early forties, late fifties. You know, the kind that can't hold their bladder as good and even still have trouble going. Either way, they all ignored Kevin. It was like he wasn't even there. There were some young onespecially in business suits talking to some unknown person through an earpiece in their ear. Most have the Bluetooth device in their right ear, but few have had it in their left ear. A few of them were carrying some type of tablet device, and they seemed to be I. a rush to get in and get out out.

I got to fix this. Kevin thought to himself. There has got to be a way out of this. I have to get that thing, but it is so far away. I doubt I'll be able to reach it. Kevin started to reach as far as he could possibly reach. He could almost reach it if only he was a little bit closer. He tired scoot closer as far as he could go, but to no avail. He couldn't reach it. He felt like someone was going to step on him. Someone almost did, too. Someone did, however, step on his hand, but it was like they didn't. Kevin didn't feel a thing. It's like he's a ghost. The guy's foot went right through Kevin's hand. He couldn't believe it. He didn't exist anymore. I guess that's what the catch was to this. Nothing better than not existing and not being able to move at that anymore. Someone had kicked the object closer too Kevin and he was able to grab it. Maybe if I push the t tree button again, everything will go back to the way it was before all this happened, at least, I hope. I can't stand not having all these not around, and it sucks right now not being able to touch them or talk to them. I wish I was able to move more though. That would be very beneficial.

Kevin pushed the tree button harder than before and another flash bursted bigger and brighter than before. All the people in the bathroom were pushed against the walls, including Kevin. This time the force of the flash did not knock Kevin out and he was able to see everything that was going on during the flash. It looked like there was a hole that started to rip open through the time supposed continuum. A whole bunch of crap started to fly into the hole in the air. As fast as it was going in, the stuff was getting thrown back out. It all happened all within sixty seconds. It happened so fast, Kevin couldn't keep track of it all. Before he knew it, everyone around him started to wake up, and move about all questioning what had happened. Kevin himself started to try to get up unsure if he would be able to. He started to move his legs. He bent them and pushed himself against the wall behind him. He used what strength he had left to use the wall to stand up. Kevin was very surprised when realized he was able to stand this time. He couldn't believe it. one of the guys next too him bumped into Kevin. It was at that moment when realized he wasn't a ghost like figure anymore.

Everyone being dazed and confused started to wander out of the bathroom and into the store. All the people were back and it seemed like there was more than before. Kevin couldn't believe his eyes. There we're so many people, nobody could move anymore. It was like the whole store came to a gigantic stand still. People started pushing and shoving again. There was really no way through the crowd. The group of guys and Kevin were forced back into the bathroom. I swear it was like the whole town decided to go to Wal-Mart that day. If not the whole town, the whole county. All the neighboring cities and towns packed into one place with no way to get in and no way to get out. When the guys went back into the bathroom they looked for a way out. They looked around and found a small window above one of the stalls. One guy climbed on top of the toilet to see if the window could open. There was a small latch holding the window closed. When the guy moved the latch, the window popped open, and the window was able to open. It opened like a book. Most of the guys were able to crawl out through the window, except for a few obese guys. For the ones that made it out, they were pretty happy. They congratulated our fellow for finding the window.

"Say man, what's your name?" Kevin asked the guy who found the window as he walked closer to him. He wasn't as tall as Kevin, maybe five four. This guy was not very fat, he was in fact pretty slim. He wasn't a twig, though. It seemed like he was active pretty often, yet with that slouch though. I don't really know. He looked very fit in that red shirt, matched with those black sweat pants. He had short, black hair and brown eyes.

"Me?" He questioned as he took as step back away from Kevin.

"Yeah, too saved us and all," Kevin motioned toward the other guys. "It's only a proper way to thank you if we know your name," Kevin replied.

"M-m-my," He starts to stutter. "My name is Greg." He was nervous about telling anyone who he was because he was afraid they would recognize his name from the paper or television or some other third thing. He didn't want to get caught, not yet at least.

"It's great meeting you," Kevin said. "Thank you for all you have done to get us out of there. I think that's the last time I come to Walmart on a Saturday."

"Agreed," one of the guys in the back said.

Chapter Two

Kevin went home that day and laid on the couch in his living room. His couch was this kind of blue velvet, but I’m not really certain that’s what it is. I don’t know, Kevin likes it. His house was of a decent size, not too big, not to small. The walls inside were a pale baby blue color, and that was the only color of paint on the walls, except for the ceiling. The ceiling was white, but most people paint their ceiling white. It’s kind of like a tradition that was started ages ago. That would be something cool to research: why do people paint their ceilings white or off white. Kevin’s ceiling was more white than off white.

Kevin’s house is pretty square. When you walk in the front door, you are in the living room. There’s a hallway straight ahead. If you go left, there’s a door that will take you to the garage. If you go straight, you will end up in the kitchen, and to the left of the kitchen is the dining room with a regular ceiling fan above the four person table. If, when you come to the hallway again from the front and you go right instead, you come to the three bed rooms. Now, Kevin is not one of those people that likes even to come in threes, but the three bed rooms is one reason he didn’t originally want to buy this house, but he overcame his differences and bought it. Off of the kitchen is an outdoor patio with a hammock on it which he uses to sleep on during the warm summer nights. So technically, according to Kevin, the patio makes a fourth bedroom, even though it’s really not. Kevin’s house does include a basement, but he only uses it during times of emergencies, like a tornado is rummaging through the city, or even if some burglar dude is in his he goes down there. It is a very creeping looking basement; Kevin says no one would want to go down there. They would know just by opening up the door. It smells like mold and mildew, and there’s no floor; it’s just dirt. There’s this hidden area behind a door down there. When you open it, it’s just a room filled with dirt. It’s like the contractors didn’t want to finish the basement, so they filled most of it with dirt. Kevin has actually removed 75 percent of the dirt. At one point, you couldn’t even walk down the stairs because the dirt was so high up.

Now, you’re probably wondering why I’m telling you all of this. Like why is she spending so long describing these places? Well, it will all make sense in the end. So, do you have any questions thus far? I hope not because I don’t feel like answering any. You don’t need to know anyway. It’s not like you’re gonna be using this novel for an English paper. Actually, that would be pretty funny considering it is only chapter two and not too much has happened. Although, I hope you’ve been taking notes, at least on the characters. If you haven’t, you should start now. Let’s take this time to review who we have met thus far. Let’s see: there’s Kevin of course and Greg and the obnoxious customers of Walmart. Here’s a fun fact Kevin is not the main character. DUN, DUN, DUN!!!