Quietly, Anli stood behind the front desk reading the Georgia Guardian. The November sky was turning dark outside her store-front window as rush hour approached. Business had been slow since she had walked back from the library that afternoon. No one had come in the last three hours. Anli had busied herself putting out the new shipment of backpacking harnesses to take her mind off of her headache. She had made many friends hiking the Appalachian Trail who came in to her store to buy their hiking supplies.

Now she began to wonder if there would be anyone coming in tonight. the sidewalk was filling up with people going home, but no one was coming inside. She shifted her weight, leaned on the counter, and turned to the editorial section of the paper looking for material to discuss with her customers. She scanned the article heads and came across a poem submitted by Tempest Rage Rivers. With dramatic language, she described the opening of minds as new ideas were realized. Anli wished that her mind had been 'liberated' as this poem described. She had been caught in a culture to which she didn't belong with few doors to understand the one she loved.

The small bell hanging on the front door of her shop jingled as a customer walked in. A young woman, with hair as black as her own, bounced in. She flashed a smile in Anli's direction as she passed on her way to the back of the store. The bell rang again momentarily. Without a glance, the customer went directly to the kayaking equipment. Anli recognized her as having come in the day before. She went back to the paper in front of her unaware that a few others had come in as well.

"Watch out! Be careful with that thing!" The exclamation broke into her consciousness. Anli looked up to see the kayaker nearly hit another customer in the head with a paddle. Hastily, the black-haired lady exited the store for fear of a concussion as the kayaker tried to gain control of her unruly purchase. The other customers sent her annoyed glances and turned quickly back to their shopping.

While she rang up the paddle, Anli got the felling that this woman didn't belong in the city. She grinned to herself as she began totaling the next customer's items. She took heart knowing there was someone else who would rather be anywhere but here. Anli's mind began to wonder to the gates of the Forbidden City in Beijing as she mechanically made change.

CRACK!!! Again, Anli looked up to see the kayaker practically run over a woman on the sidewalk and nearly break the window with her paddle in the process. The woman maneuvered around the unwieldy paddle and into the store. She sauntered up to the desk, cutting in front of a customer, and asked for an application. Anli informed her that she wasn't taking applications at that time, not because it was true, but because the lady had been rude to a customer. This was not the kind of employee she desired.

Things settled down as the evening progressed. there were no more than three people in the store at a time, so Anli had time to dream about seeing China in person. She let her assistant go home early that night and counted down the till herself. As she turned of the radio on her way out, the last words of the announcer were, "...this is John Stevens. Love y'all. Be back tomorrow with..."

Tempest Rage Rivers
Young Woman
Kayaker
Applicant
John Stevens

(1)	(3)

Back to the Muse's Introduction.