I don't buy DymahCorp Stuff by Callum Phillpott

I Don't buy DymahCorp Stuff
​by Callum Phillpott

You know what’s weird? You almost never see a DymahCorp truck pull up anywhere. I know it doesn’t seem weird, right, but trust me, it is. Like, I’ve been stocking shelves for longer than I’d like to admit, and usually there’s not one big truck full of one brand that pulls up to the shop, it’s distribution centres — they gather stuff and send them to us. But for DymahCorp, you have to get all the toasters and junk directly from them (which isn’t the weird part, some brands just do that), and you’d almost never notice them arriving if you weren’t paying attention to all the boxes. They just sort of pop up outside. Sometimes you get a brief glimpse of a truck with that strange bald guy logo on the side (he is bald, right? It might be a buzz cut, I don’t know, it’s all shiny and bronze anyway), but they usually come and go before you even notice them.
    I say “usually” because, well, I did see a guy once.
    It was, like, morning, mid-morning, and usually the DymahCorp truck is scheduled to arrive a bit before that, but I noticed that it seemed to be running late and, I’ll admit, I was a bit curious, so I may have lingered by the warehouse doors just so I could see the truck, and I did. I also saw the person in it — this lanky bloke, pale as day, in a big grey jumpsuit. I’m not saying this to be rude, but he sorta looked like he just got out of prison or something, or maybe he’d been on the street for a bit — he had that sort of bug-eyed look, lots of stubble, very thin, and he was a bit too eager to be doing all this driving and moving boxes. I mean, sure, I’m not the best judge of what “too eager” looks like, but still, it was a bit weird. He also smelled like… I don’t know, just chemicals, I guess. Like when I dropped that big box of floor cleaner and shelves here reeked of it for weeks, that sort of smell.
    He barely waited for the truck to stop before hopping out and rushing to the back — like, full-on sprint, nearly — and he started taking out all these small boxes. I felt bad for him, seeing him doing all of this by himself, so I tapped his shoulder and was like, “Hey, I’m Gemma, do you want a hand with that?” and he just stared at me like I’d stabbed him or something. I thought he might be deaf, so I just… said it again, which, okay, not a good idea if he was actually deaf, but he wasn’t. He heard me.
    “I’m fine,” he said, very robotic, but also very, very Scottish (no, I’m not doing the voice), and then he just got on with it, heaving every time he picked up one of the lighter boxes full of frying pans or whatever. 
    It was very concerning, but usually people like him needed a bit of time before they say yes to help, so I just let him get on with it. Besides, someone needed to get the boxes inside the actual storage area, so I just got started on that while he was busy suffering.
    Now, this guy was working fast — like, really fast. I’m not even sure how he managed it with all that groaning, but he was still slow enough that I could talk to him, so I tried. First, I asked him if he wanted a sandwich from the back. Yes, I know, you’re not meant to do that, but it’s not like they’ll kill you for nicking a sandwich every now and then… or every day. Look, if they cared that much about it, they wouldn’t put it in a meal deal. Anyway, he just ignored me.
    Now, I don’t like it when people ignore me. If he told me to shut up, I would’ve, but he didn’t, so next I just tried to keep saying words until he reacted. 
“So, have you been working with these guys for long?” I asked.
    Again, he bloody ignored me.
    “You know,” I said, “I’ve been working here for years, right, and I’ve never seen anyone from DymahCorp — or I guess their factories or however it works for them. Are you from DymahCorp?”
    He stopped for a bit, and his head just snapped toward me, like proper snapped -- I think I might’ve heard a crack somewhere. “Apologies for the delay. Unforeseen circumstances forced us to change our— my route.” And then he just went back to work.
    Notice him try to correct himself there? I sure as hell did. “Is there meant to be more than one of you?” I asked.
    He stiffened a bit, but then went right back to ignoring me.
    “Hey,” I said, “If there’s meant to be another guy to lift all this, I can—”
    “Do not help,” he snapped, like he was a bouncer or something.
    “Why not? Is it, like, a work hours thing? I won’t tell, if that’s the issue.”
    “I don’t need your help.”
    “You’re grunting like my grandad when he’s walking up the stairs, mate, you need all you can bloody get!”
    “I’m fine.”
    I’ll be honest, I really wanted to slap him, but he was suffering enough. He clearly needed help, and I decided I’d go do it whether he wanted it or not. I waited for him to walk away before peeking through the back of the truck. There were some heavier boxes in there, so I picked up a pallet jack and hopped inside.
    I thought I was well sneaky, but he must’ve heard my foot touching the metal or something, because he just started screaming and running as soon as I got inside. If he were anyone else, I would’ve stopped, but I thought this guy was a right git, so I went on, looking for a box with our address on it, but before I could even see the labels, he grabbed me, like, really grabbed me, and he pushed me up against the wall! I tried to get him off me, but he was, like, wicked strong. I guess it was all those boxes, jacked him up real good, but he looked proper skinny under that suit.
    “This is my area,” he said, and his voice was shaking for once, like he was annoyed, or scared, or both, I don’t know, but it was also sort of firm, like a teacher. “Stay out of here. I’ll do my work, you do yours.”
    I just nodded. I wanted to have a go at him, but I just couldn’t. My heart was beating up a storm, and I could hardly focus enough to yell at him. 
    He let go of me, and I turned back to get the pallet jack, since I noticed he already had one in there (makes sense, I don’t know why I brought my own one in there like he wouldn’t have one — probably just still waking up, I guess), but just as I did…
    Okay, I need you to promise not to laugh at me, right? Because what I’m going to say will sound really stupid, but it’s not. Well, it is, but it also isn’t, maybe. To be honest, I hardly know if I saw it right. Again, it was early, I probably only had an hour of sleep — I might’ve just been seeing things, but I don’t know…
    Behind those boxes was this… I don’t know. I barely saw it, but it was teal, and I think it was glowing, and it looked a bit like a rock, I think. Maybe it was some special DymahCorp thing, but… what would it even be? A salt lamp? They do, like, microwaves and stuff, why would they make salt lamps? I could’ve sworn it was humming, too, but my ears were ringing from being slammed up against the wall, so I don’t know. Before my head could really get what I was looking at, the DymahCorp guy pushed me out and told me to clear the area for the heavier stuff. While I was doing that, I could hear him screaming inside the truck: lots of muffled swearing and punching the wall, and, again, I couldn’t tell if he was angry or scared. Probably both. He was very shrill. I apologised to him before he left, but… well, you can probably guess what he said back. What a git.
    You still think I’m an idiot because of the rock thing, don’t you? I get it, I also think it’s dumb, but the way he reacted to me being there… And there’s something else, too. 
    I would’ve spent the rest of my life thinking that was something normal (well, not normal, but you get what I mean), and I probably wouldn’t have said anything, not even to you, but then I got home to my flat and saw that someone had pushed a leaflet under my door. From DymahCorp. 
When I opened it, I saw this ad for a brand new microwave that apparently doesn’t make any noise. Above it were the words, “Because Silence is Golden”, and someone had underlined them with a red biro (like, physically, on the paper underlined, it wasn’t just printed that way).
    Maybe it was a neighbour being passive-aggressive — it’s a flat, it happens. But then I got to my living room, and I saw something when I opened the curtains: two right across the street. It was hard to tell, since I’m on one of the higher floors, but it felt like they were looking at me. One was thin and reedy, and the other looked like some sort of comic book brute. Both were very old. I wondered if they were waiting to cross the road or something, but the street was empty, and they walked off almost as soon as I saw them.
    It could just all be a coincidence. I like to think that. I do think that. What else can I think? Some weird conspiracy with rocks, men in black, and some weirdos selling toasters? Let’s be real, it’s all a coincidence… but, with all this happening the same day, it’s hard for me not to at least think about it being something more. It’s why I don’t buy DymahCorp stuff. That, and it’s well expensive. I mean, really, forty quid for a frying pan!? Sod off.

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