ANACHRONISM

The man, forty-one, lonely, had seen two men in elaborate costumes arguing with the bus driver about their axes—blunt, they said, demanding to be let on—and asked them what exactly they were up to. They hadn’t been the friendliest people, he thought, and had seemed to be making fun of his lanyard and his haircut, but he’d been intrigued by their utter fearlessness, the confidence they exuded despite their appearances. Was this, he wondered, confidence that came from some special knowledge, and was it something that could be passed on or instilled? He’d liked the idea, at least, of a dull but shiny sword—perhaps, too, some sort of headgear. He was less certain about the skirt-thing; his legs were more or less hairless. When he got to work—a large but often empty electronics store at the freeway end of the so-called marketplace, where, after thirteen years as a sales associate, he had finally been promoted to assistant sales manager—he looked up the rather strange name the two men had given him on one of the display laptops. Another employee, looking over his shoulder, said, Look! The boss found 1997, referring, apparently, to the website’s design. A small crowd formed, ignoring the store’s lone customer walking slowly past the same three shelves in the home theater department again and again, wondering where these people kept the television antennas and wondering also why he hadn’t just ordered one online. Standing in the aisle, the customer brought up the store’s website on his phone, typed in his zip code, and, briefly deterred by the thought it should be Antennae, searched for Antennas. One left in stock! the website said. Order now for instant pickup. The customer looked at the shelving unit full of universal remotes, HDMI cables, and unidentifiable things called switch boxes, none of them resembling the antenna shown—from three different angles, in the box and out of it—in the pictures. He could, off in the distance, just past a large bin of DVDs and the toothy smile of a slightly-larger-than-life-size cardboard John Madden, see a crowd of lanyarded and polo-shirted men with long dark hair gathered together. Would it be worth it to get their attention? He thought about calling the store to ask where he could find the antenna, but then he looked over to the empty row of cash registers and clicked the button on his phone’s screen to order the antenna online. The website had stored his information: address, email, even credit card number, though he couldn’t remember when he’d ever bought anything from them before. This item is on backorder, the website told him after he’d declined the extended warranty and selected Pick Up In Store Today. Enter your phone number for instant updates via text message, the screen told him. There was no option to cancel the order. Leaving, the customer set off the store’s alarm, and, because there were no security guards or cashiers near the front, one of the group he’d seen earlier, the assistant manager, came over. I’m not sure why it’s going off, the customer told the manager. Sometimes there are tags in your clothes, the manager said. Security tags from clothing stores they forget to take out when you check out. Maybe, the customer said, lifting up the hem of his shirt. If you could just step over to our loss prevention office for a moment, we’ll get you on your way, the assistant manager told him. The customer had to show his driver’s license for some reason. The whole process only took about twenty minutes.

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