it happened at Fed Ex Kinkos

On my way to an interview this afternoon, I stopped into Fed Ex Kinko's in Chelsea, to make copies of my resume. The shop resembled a sort of corporate war zone: scraps of paper littered the floor, confusion, subdued panic...I beelined for the first open machine. After a few attempts of inserting my debit card, I decided to seek guidance. The line behind me was made up of a variety of characters: a tall lanky Asian man with feathery hair and thick rimmed glasses, a woman in a long black down coat and a grad student type with curly auburn hair.

The short round attendant turned suddenly, "Who's up?" The Asian man lifted a small worn biblical stories book and inquired,

"How much for four copies? I must copy four pages from this book." He opened his left hand to expose a mixture of nickles and pennies.

"Ten cents per sheet, for regular copy paper."

"Ten cents?!"

"That's what I said."

"I don't think you are right. I could go to those uh delis, you know with the Pakistan and India men and it would be four cents."

*Silence*

"Well I could. Four cents!"

The cashier shrugs. A second cashier suddenly drops her face into her hands, "It's down again. The computer system is down again!"

The woman in the long black coat pulls a German-English phrase book from her pocket and begins to read from it. A third cashier shakes his head, "Do you have an account?"

"Account, yes!"

The first cashier walks past the one who is still clasping her face and raises a brow to me.

"I'd like ten copies of this. Resume grade paper, please."

He knods.

"You're patient," I offer.

"Yea, well it's that or kill myself."

He steps away. The disheveled cashier perks up, "How many are you getting?"

"Ten"

"It will be one-ninety-five."

I hand her my debit card.

"I, well, it will be a minute for the computers."

"NP. "

*10 minutes later*

"I have some change, well actually I only have....a dollar seventy-eight."

I gaged her reaction: disappointment.

The grad student type pulls out a quarter and drops it on the counter."

"Thank you."

The first cashier returns with the copies, "Since you're so patient. I have something for you- you watch Youtubes?"

"Sure"

He pulls out a scrap paper and carefully scripts, jojobanana1, "That's me. That's for you."