"Maybe people won't notice that I'm missing. After all... how often does a customer need to come to be considered a regular?"

Marc said nothing.

"Come on. Take a guess."

"I don't know. Once a week?"

"I didn't come in for a full three weeks last year. I broke my leg and stayed in my house with a cast for nearly a month. And you know what? Nobody knew I wasn't coming in. Nobody cared."

Marc stared into Stephen's eyes as the light continued to flicker. The only reason Marc knew this house was on Fess Ave was because Stephen had a memorable 

Bloomingfoods

owner number: 1111. The machine wouldn't say what your address was when you typed their owner number in. But Marc had to dive deeper into the database one time when Stephen wanted a refund on something and the machine was acting wonky. That's when he saw the address. He couldn't remember the number now... but the street name. Fess. It had always stuck out to him.

"So how long do you think it'll take them to realize that I'm missing?" Stephen said. A sad grin on his face. It wasn't sadistic. Just sad. Like he hadn't had a friend in over a decade.

"I don't know, Stephen. This is messed up."

"Well now you have to listen to me. No more 'oh there's customers behind me' Now there's nobody waiting! We'll get to talk all the time!"