"Closing Shift" by Pamela McHugh — Our September 2024 Silver Medal Winner

Pamela is our second place winner from the contest posted in our September 2024 issue!

What the judges had to say:

“This story deftly builds suspense from the first paragraph to the last, keeping the reader on the edge of their seat. ”

“...believable and emotional.”

“...really well articulated.”

Meet Pamela

Pam McHugh lives and works in Calgary, Alberta. She recently took up creative writing through a program at the Calgary Public Library.

Closing Shift

the unedited story by Pamela McHugh

Nina clicked off the store's electric sign and gazed out the snow-streaked window. Across the street, an employee locked the cinema door and stumbled into a growing snowdrift. The café and flower shop on either side of the theatre closed over an hour ago—their workers were probably sipping eggnog at home. A woman carrying an armful of packages wobbled into a taxi. The cab’s tires spewed chunks of white and then fishtailed out of sight.

Nina did not close early. The owner was counting on Christmas sales. He was counting on her.

“You just heard ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside’ by Dean Martin and isn’t that the truth? Wowzers! Government officials are asking people to get home and stay home. This storm is just getting started, folks.”

Nina unplugged the transistor radio as the disc jockey introduced Madonna’s Santa Baby. She hated that song, the embarrassing baby voice.

She pulled the final receipt from the register and leaned over her end-of-day report. She filled in the date: December 22, 1996. Nina jotted her sales numbers and stapled the receipts in a tidy stack.

Bus service ended early because of the storm. Nina had ten minutes to reach the stop one block west of the shop, nestled in the bridge’s underbelly.

Nina slid into her flimsy trench coat. Pulling on her gloves, she remembered the Christmas lights. She buttoned the coat and hustled to the front window. The owner’s wife insisted on ridiculous twinkle lights strung around the window’s perimeter. A fire hazard is what they were. Nina unplugged the cord. Then, she saw him.

A man sat on the bench outside the shop, his arm draped around a case of beer like it was his girlfriend. His parka’s fur-lined hood hung around his shoulders and snowflakes collected in his greying hair. His legs were set far apart, and he leaned forward.

Probably just waiting for his ride.

Nina grabbed her backpack and plucked the keys off the sales counter. As she slid past the sales rack and raised her eyes to the door, a scream passed her lips.

The man now sat on the beer box, beneath the store’s awning. Snow pelted down behind him. Cyclones of white smashed against the road and bounced back against wreath-laden streetlights.

The man lunged toward the door but stopped short of opening it. “I didn’t mean to scare you,” he yelled. “It’s me, Bill.”

She looked over his shoulder hoping to see a passerby, but there was no one. A cannon could fire down Milltown Avenue, and no one would see it—except Nina and the man who called himself Bill.

She scanned the bowling alley east of the store. The typically vibrant lights and blinking neon bowling pins were dark, dead-like. This fed Nina’s unease.

“I came into the store last month. You wore that plaid skirt and turtleneck...had your hair curled. You helped me pick the shirt for my job interview.”

His eyes widened as he waited for her response. Deep horizontal lines etched his forehead. He licked his chapped lips and flared his nostrils. He was broad under the parka, strong looking. He must’ve been fifty.

“I’m glad to have helped. But I do need to get going.”

“Oh, you’re locked up?”

His eyes scanned for the deadbolt which was still (uselessly!) morticed in the door. Nina’s fingers twitched with the impulse to jam the deadbolt into the doorframe. But then he’d know she was trapped, wouldn’t he?

“Yes, I’m sorry. We’ll be open again tomorrow.”

“Oh, I was hoping to look around again. Your boss man wouldn’t know if we had a drink or two.”

The man winked and motioned to the case of beer. Frost prickled up Nina’s spine.

“I’ve already set the alarm. I need to exit out the back.”

There was no back exit. There was no security system.

“In the alley?” he asked, craning his neck to look down the block. “I’ll meet you there, then. We’ll go to my place.”

He lifted the 24-bottle case like it was nothing and trudged eastward toward Joseph Wang’s Tailor Shop.

Nina locked the door and scurried behind the sales counter. She yanked the phone’s coil cord and threw the handset to her ear. She jabbed her father’s number into the device and listened. The line was dead.

The L-shaped store had two changing rooms in a little nook at the back. From the outside, it might look like an exit. Nina crawled into the furthest changing stall of her coveted Milltown boutique. Boy, she’d thought she was something when she got the sales associate job. Anyone could go to the mall and work at the Gap. But downtown? That was special.

What had her graveyard-shift-working-high-school-dropout father said when she scored the job?

“Neensy hunny, I wish you’d ask me first. There are real nutjobs downtown. I’m talkin’ crazy people. You’re only seventeen.”

Her father parked his dented pickup truck outside the store whenever Nina closed the shop. She seethed, ignored him, stomped by his truck. It was embarrassing. Yesterday she’d had enough.

“What’s wrong with you? I’m applying for college next year. College! Stop tracking me down. It’s sad. Get your own life.”

And now, she curled around her backpack on the changeroom floor. Her hands covered her ears like a petulant toddler melting down. The wind howled, but Bill hollered louder.

“What’s going on? Did you come out?”

A hand slapped the glass.

“What the hell, girl!”

Time passed. The door and windows shook as a once-in-a-decade storm walloped the city. Her wristwatch read 10:35 p.m. And then, a new sound. Hot metal sliced through the door lock.

A whoosh of icy air found Nina. Heavy, booted footsteps stomped across the store. Nina squeezed her eyes so tight she saw white blotches. Her scalp tingled.

The changing room door swung open. Nina’s burly father filled the doorframe; his overalls were wet and stained with road salt. He dropped the drill and picked her up.

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