I was running low on underwear, so in the afternoon I drove down to the mall and started bargain-hunting. I walked past the Victoria's Secret and spotted a sale, so I went inside the store past the posters of hungry women to the underwear rack and found a frilly black one I thought would feel good on my skin. A young salesgirl came timidly up to me, waiting and smiling perfunctorily. "I'd like to buy one of these. No, make that two." The girl pecked at the computer. "I'm sorry ma'am, we're out of stock for those." "Oh. Then I'll just buy this one then." "Actually, I can't sell you that one. It's a display item." A little annoyed, I looked around for another pair, the girl waiting on me patiently. My irritation was immediately relieved when I spotted a pair of purple underwear that I was sure would look fantastic. I asked if she had any of these in stock. More pecking. "Um, we're out of that item as well." Frustrated, I picked a gaudy-looking hot-orange full-bottom pair of underwear with blue dots that I was sure nobody would ever buy, and asked if they had any of these. "Sorry." I told her I'd like to see the manager, and waited patiently by the counter while the girl retreated quickly through the door at the rear. A young man came back in a friendly blue suit. The girl didn't return. "Why are you out of stock of everything? I'm practically throwing my money at you people and there's nothing to buy." The man grinned. "I see you haven't heard. We don't actually sell clothing anymore. We've been keeping this store open in the meantime while the management changes get sorted out." My jaw dropped. I asked him why they would ever do something like that. "It turns out that young men will pay just to see the catalogs we have full of attractive women in lingerie. We've been making most of our money off the catalogs lately and we realized it would be more profitable to just produce the catalog and give up this process of selling underwear altogether. That's business for you." I couldn't believe it. A clothing store that only sold catalogs of clothing they didn't make. Millions of young men drooling over volumptuous supermodels wearing sexy negligees no regular women would get to wear. I hoped to myself that this wouldn't become a trend. Then I turned to the boy and asked him if they had any catalogs to buy at least. With a smirk, he said, "Actually, we don't sell any catalogs here either. You have to go to our website." It was at that point that I sprayed him in the eyes with my can of mace, then beat him to death
and stole his underwear. As a happy coincidence the kid turned out to be a pervert and was wearing
a frilly black number like the one I first picked up in the store.
Just what I wanted. The drive home was strangely satisfying,
and as I passed a billboard with the airbrushed models smiling down at me, I smiled back.
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