All eyes were on a tall, thin boy behind the register. I had my earplugs in—a rookie mistake for a columnist, I know—and quickly took them off. In front of his cash register, at the beginning of the tape, lay the remains of what had recently been a bottle of white wine. Huge shards of glass floated like shipwrecked sailors in a pale sea that grew bigger and bigger. Apparently the boy refused to clean up and people kicked him for it. A man told him not to have such a big mouth, whereupon the boy put on an even bigger mouth.
I looked around. If I had been a security guard in a supermarket, this was the moment I’d been waiting for all my life. But there was no security guard. There was no manager at all. The boy and the man yelled back and forth. “You have to shut up your cancer,” said the boy. Then he got ready to get out from behind his cash register and fly at the man. If he was going that way, he might as well clean up that bottle of wine. But another checkout boy stopped him. Two girls were laughing sheepishly behind the service desk.
“You’re a 14-year-old boy,” said the man in line, “and you should shut up.” As I was considering whether, when and how I should intervene, I did not hear what the boy replied. Apparently it was wrong. “Hey!” shouted a young guy who was at the very front of my line. He was wearing a T-shirt and looked like someone who does crossfit. “Now shut up.” He jabbed a finger at the cashier. ‘I work at the Public Prosecution Service and this is a threat.’ The man did not say exactly what he was doing at the Public Prosecution Service. Maybe he fixed printers. At least his words had the desired effect. The boy covered his eyes with his hands and shook his head. He squeaked some more and reluctantly continued to pay for groceries. When it was the turn of an elderly lady, she gave him a completely unnecessary kick. “Thank you, madam,” she said in a taunting manner, “for providing me with a job that will allow me to be paid.” Then she looked at me, with a look of understanding. We had those, but not the right ones. Now I had it right with that boy. And of course that could never have been the intention.