The woman reached £4.32, then suddenly stopped and looked up. “Oh. I think I lost count, dear.”

She always did this.

As the woman started counting over, Nisha gave the man and woman behind an apologetic look then glanced up at the CCTV camera. She hoped Hassan was seeing this.

The woman reached £9.45, then she counted a pound coin that wasn’t there. She always did that, too.

Nisha said nothing.

After another minute, the woman asked, “Are you watching, dear? I’m not going to have to stand here while you count all this lot again, am I, dear?”

“No,” said Nisha.

“Good,” the woman said curtly. “£12.29 exactly.”

Nisha nodded then scooped the coins toward her. She quickly began to put them into the right compartments in the till.

“Give me a receipt, dear.”

Nisha tore of the slip and held it out.

The woman hesitated. “Actually, I think I might have miscounted, after all. I think I gave you too much.”

Oh god, Nisha thought. She hadn’t done this before.

“The money’s already in the till, madam.”

“I don’t care, dear. If I’ve paid you too much, then you owe me some change. You can’t just keep it.”

“I don’t know if you did give me too much.”

“No, but I do, dear. And if you’d bothered to count the money to begin with, you’d know that too.”

“I don’t know what I can do.”

“You can give me your change, dear, or get the manager in here now. I’m not being ripped off by you.”

Nisha nodded. She reached under the counter and pressed the button. A chime much like a doorbell’s sounded in the back room. Nisha listened for Hassan’s arrival.

There were five people in the queue now. Nisha tried to not look at the woman on the other side of the counter, but the woman didn’t take her eyes off Nisha.

“I’m waiting, dear,” she said.

Nisha pressed the button again.

“All right, all right; I heard the first time!” Hassan shouted as he smacked through the door.

And to think Nisha had been looking forward to him coming to take the flack of her.

“What is it?”

Nisha explained what had happened, or the woman’s version of it, anyway.

“What do you mean you’re not sure if she gave you the correct amount?” Hassan cried. “Didn’t you count?”

“That’s what I said, dear,” said the woman.

“There were a lot of coins,” Nisha said. “She counted them herself whilst I watched.”

“Who’s she? The dog’s dinner?” Hassan said.

“Madam. The customer.”

“Since when do we let customers count their own money?” Hassan turned to the woman. “With all due respect, madam.”

The woman nodded.

“Would you let customers use the till themselves if you couldn’t be bothered?” Hassan continued.

“No.”

“Well, then.”

The woman was trying hard not to smile.

Hassan turned to her, palms pressed together. “How much do you think you gave us, madam?”

“I think I gave you one pound too many, dear.”

Hassan gave Nisha a condescending look. “Give the customer her pound back, Nisha.”

The woman had a look of great satisfaction on her face. Nisha didn’t give her a pound coin. She picked out two fifty-pence pieces, and held them out to the woman.

“Actually, can I have those in ten-pence pieces, dear? I need to make a phone call.”

“I trust I can leave you alone now,” Hassan said quietly. He glared at her as she pushed through the door into the back of the shop.

Nisha swapped two fifty-pence pieces for ten ten-pence pieces. The woman didn’t look at all grateful.

“I won’t come back here if this is how you treat all your customers, dear,” she said.

See you next Saturday, Nisha thought.

As the woman left the shop, Nisha was grateful she only worked one day a week. One day a week was more than enough. She knew she would be validated, of course. Hassan would look over the takings and notice they were at least two quid down on what they should’ve been.

Though of course Nisha knew she’d get the blame.

A large white woman stepped up to the till. “Hi,” she said, her accent making the word sound like a plane dive-bombing. She was an American.

But at least she was smiling like she meant it.

“Hello.” Nisha smiled back.

A man jumped the queue with a copy of the Guardian. “Hi, can I just leave the money here?”

He didn’t wait for a response before slapping the money down on the counter.

“Sorry for the delay,” Nisha called as he left the shop. She ran a hand through her hair.

You were supposed to count from one to ten, she remembered, but Nisha didn’t have time.

The American woman was still beaming. She had put several large Dairy Milk bars on the counter. Nisha began to scan them.

“Ask her if there’s any galleries.”

Nisha realised the man in the baseball cap was an American too. They were together. Both of them were wide without being terribly fat. He was rummaging through postcards in a rack beside the counter.

“Oh, yes,” the woman went. “We were wondering if there were like any art galleries or exhibitions around here.”

Nisha shook her head. “No. Sorry, I don’t know.”

The woman bobbed the entire top third of her body. “Oh, don’t worry. It doesn’t matter.”

People like this made a change.

Nisha finished scanning the chocolate. “That’s £7.96.”

The woman separated the clasp of her purse with chunky fingers. “Oh. Do you take Euro?”

“Sorry, no.” Nisha shook her head.

“Oh, not to worry, dear. Bobby, give the girl pounds.”

The man abandoned the postcards and reached into his back pocket. He found a tatty old twenty-pound note and held it out between two fingers.

“Hope that’s not too much,” he said, looking over the top of his glasses. He had smiley eyes.

Nisha smiled. “That’s fine.” She opened the till and took out a tenner, two one-pound coins and two two-pence pieces. She tipped them into his palm.

NOTES:
Ever wondered why shop assistants seem so miserable and disinterested? It's because the only times when they're not bored out of their skulls is when they're being abused like this. This bit of the story was based in spirit on an encounter I had working in a shop when someone accused me (incorrectly) of over-charging them and proceeded to call me a "fucking cunt" for the next ten minutes, threatening to have me done in, and all in front of a manager summoned at their bequest, who ended up siding with them. The message of the story: the customer is rarely if ever right. Same goes for management. Always be nice to shop assistants; no matter how bad your day was, there's was invariably worse.