THUGLIT Issue One Read Online Free

pair with the wine. Thinking on the wine paired with the cheese, she tingled.
    But then she thought of the long bus ride home. The #65 bus she had taken from the metro light rail—how she would have to wait another ungodly amount of time on the bus going back. She thought again of the wine, the cheese, and everything was okay.
    “Excuse me?” Brandy said to the girl at the work station. Her name was Eric a according to her nametag.
    Sullenly, Eric a looked at Brandy.
    “Can you help me?” Brandy finally said, wondering if she broke a two-by-four over Eric a’s head, would it wake her up? “I have a question about that entertainment center over there.”
    Eric a glanced back at the copy of Cosmopolitan (underneath: Rolling Stone ). She closed the magazine, as if helping Brandy was a waste of her time. The disdain was written on her pretty, young face: how dare she be bothered.
    Brandy said, “How much is it? There’s no ticket on it.”
    “Two hundred and twenty- five dollars.”
    “Is it available?”
    “Yes, but we don’t have the bottom doors in,” motioning to the bottom cabinets. “They won’t be in until Saturday. You’ll have to come back if you want them.”
    “Is there any way to have the doors delivered?” Brandy asked.
    “No.”
    Surprised, Brandy said, “There’s no way to have them delivered? What about the floor model, is it for sale?”
    “No,” said Eric a, annoyed, trying to hide it.
    “Is there a manager available?”
    Eric a gave a look that said: I can’t believe you’re wasting my time with this. No longer trying to hide it, she said annoyed, “Why do you want to talk to a manager?”
    “Why do I have to explain myself to you?”
    Now Eric a had the look of a person holding their breath: that frozen, bated breath expression when something totally unexpected is said and they are trying to figure out what to say next, how to respond.
    More than anything, Brandy hated dealing with these kids. Spoiled, bratty kids who acted like they were owed the world. Eric a looked fresh out of high school—young, pretty; but Brandy knew, attitude trumped looks, any day. She had at least fifteen years on Eric a, and still, she looked just as good. The only difference were the little crow’s feet growing at the edges of Brandy’s eyes that perhaps betrayed her age.
    She waited for Eric a to say something. Finally, she said, “Because you’re not being very helpful. Maybe there’s something the manager can—”
    Eric a talked over her, “We can deliver the doors. Where do you live?”
    “The west valley.”
    “We can deliver them, but it’s going to cost you eighty-nine dollars.”
    “So they can be delivered? Why didn’t you tell me that in the first place? I still want to see the manager.”
    So, little Eric a made the call. Talking a few minutes on the phone, she said, “The manager will be here in ten minutes, if you still want to wait.”
    Go fuck yourself.
    That was the look on Brandy’s face.
    Jesus, she hated dealing with these kids. She wished she had that two-by-four. Right now, she wanted nothing more than to bash in Eric a’s pretty little face.
    The gold chain called to Brandy, from her neck. The same simple gold chain her mother had passed to her when she was a little girl.
    Momma Ashton—on her deathbed, dying of cancer—had passed the heirloom to her only daughter the way her mother, and her grandmother, and her great- grandmother had done generations past, all the way down the family line, to the very first Ashton s that had settled in the northeast (what possessed them to move and settle in Arizona, she would never understand).
    When the first Ashton s arrived penniless in America , they kept the gold chain no matter the indigence or hardship, as a symbol of providence, and reminder that fortunes were made through diligence and hard work.
    Brandy stormed off, so furious she wanted to cry.
    No one looking, she stroked the gold chain and felt better. Stroking the