Tonight I waited patiently behind a college-aged guy with an arm covered in tatoos and his two buddies at the RedBox at Walmart. His chewing tobacco spit bottle was sitting on top of the machine, and his friends were loitering off to the side, lanky and restless.
He was swiping his card as I walked up. We all waited awkwardly for the machine to spit out his game. By the time it did, the guy has started talking to his friends and doesn't notice.
I notice.
I decide not to be bossy and wait for him to notice, too. He doesn't.
Eventually the machine sucks the game back in and displays an error message. The guy notices that. "What the...?" He reads the error message and reports it to the boys. They shift impatiently and make sounds of general unrest. The guy debates trying again. Maybe the machine is broken. I finally speak up.
"You waited too long to take it. It'll work if you try again."
"It came out?"
"Yah."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Well, I thought you would see it..."
"You shoulda been like, "He, Tatto-guy, stop talkin' and get your game."
We all laugh as I somewhat feebly defend myself by saying I didn't know it would get sucked back in if he waited too long.
"I guess I'll do it AGAIN," he said pointedly, looking at me in mock accusation. Finally, the hard-to-get game makes its second appearance of the evening.
As he leaves, Tatto-guy turns to me and says, "You have a good Saturday night."
And we part ways.
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