Max, Part 4 - Coming back from a service call, Max stopped at a gas-n-go. He'd filled up earlier, but had forgotten to buy a jug of

windshield wash.  Sure, the price was nearly twice of what you'd pay over at the big-box, but, who knew, from one week to the next what would be out of stock.  The line was long...nothing surprising there.  What did come as a surprise was: what was playing on several of the plasmas.  It was as if you couldn't get away from those things - the horrors, that you might miss an ad for something you don't want, a preview for a show you don't want to see, or a track from a band that you don't want to hear.

But what was currently being blared, wasn't the normal skanky rubbish. It was a few-second (but long enough) trailer of a full-length (40 minute) movie, about ... well, what people in 2021 would call the imaginations of conspiracy-junkies.   Oh no, fred, the gore (and that's a polite term) was front and center - and on the side, over by the milk.  And on the other side ... over by the three or four little food-court tables.  

Atleast this place had a few tables.  Most gas-n-go type places had the food court, but no place for travelers to sit a few minutes - cool their heels - and eat their sandwich and fries, before getting back on the interstate.  No tables meant one less thing for staff to deal with, one less set of potential liability issues.  Yes, back in '26 - or was it '27?  oh well, whatever - someone had sat down, in in the process of what he/she/it/they was wearing, the edge of the plastic chair had caught hold of a length of chain, somewhere attached to the individual's "clothing."  Needless to say, a bump and maybe two stitches - if that ... Yep, Dear Reader, you guessed it - a multi million dollar lawsuit.  And yeah, chain-link (think that was the person's name) won the case.

While waiting to be checked out, he glanced over at the locked display cabinet which stood behind the cashier.   It had been several months since Max had bought a pack of cigarettes; nor was he interested in shelling out $17 and change for a second, containing eighteen cigarettes.  The first had been a rite-of-passage thing; having turned 25, he was able to legally purchase tobacco products.   Max hadn't finished the first pack, just wasn't his thing.

He turned at the red light.  On the corner, which - when he was a kid - had been a little diner, then became a craft shop, then became a body art salon (by that time, the neighborhood was beginning to slouch) then became a hemp outlet.  The place was now another "dot matrix."  Max did a double take.  There was already one just outside of town - in the same strip where the grocery store was.  Evidently, there was a sufficient customer-base.  The parking lot was full enough, and coming the door, was an individual, who evidently couldn't wait long enough to get to his or her car, before flashing multiple selfies of his or her forehead.