Moving it to one hundred percent, he checked to see if anything had changed.
Nothing.
Back to zero, no change.
Back to one hundred, still no change.
Leaving it at one hundred, Felix shrugged his shoulders. Maybe he could figure it out tomorrow. For now, he’d leave it a hundred to see if anything changed.
Mentally popping the confirm button, he looked up to the body in the crate.
Instantly, teeth began to straighten themselves, growing anew. Where teeth were missing, new teeth broke through the gum line. In ten seconds, she had a healthy set of lovely teeth.
Then her lips started to warp and fan out as they regrew themselves next, until finally she had a pair of full lips hiding those resplendent teeth.
Felix sighed and looked around the garage. He had an hour or so to wait till midnight.
Going inside the house didn’t appeal to him. It was empty. Dark.
Devoid of life.
Here in the garage, with what was essentially a corpse, at least he wasn’t alone.
When midnight finally rolled around, Felix felt like his skin caught fire for an instant.
It wasn’t painful, but it certainly wasn’t comfortable. Normally when his power reset, it only felt like he’d caught a mild sunburn. This time felt like he’d been in a furnace.
Felix popped open the window and then hesitated. He might as well get it out of the way now. He’d been thinking while waiting for midnight. If he couldn’t fix some of the truly awful things, what was the point?
He selected the box for blindness: left eye, and looked to the corner. Six hundred points.
Despair welled up in him.
Eyeballs aren’t simple things like teeth or lips. They’re intricate organs and—
The confirm button was lit up.
Chapter 2 - Spend Money to Make Money -
Felix adjusted his necktie as he shifted in the seat of his rundown coupe. Glancing up in the rearview mirror, he found it almost looked right.
Almost. There was still a hint of a pleat in the middle.
The horn coming to life behind him made him jump in his seat. Felix gunned the gas and then jumped forward. Only to slam on the brake when he realized the light was still red.
Ha ha, ass hat.
Doing his best to not make eye contact with anyone, Felix slunk into his seat. He remained in “stealth” mode all the way until he pulled into the parking lot of work.
Felix looked up to the rotating hamburger above the squat red brick building. The windows were decorated with saccharine-sweet mascots and kids who looked like they’d been fed a steady stream of cola.
Pressing his lips together in mute disappointment, Felix clipped his name badge into place.
“Felix - Manager” read the top line. Underneath that was his “time served,” as employees called it.
“Eight years serving you,” he muttered aloud.
Eight years of serving up burgers, fries, and every other assortment of fast food under the sun. Eight years of watching young people roll in and roll back out when they realized fast food wasn’t easy and didn’t pay well.
It certainly wasn’t rocket science, but it had its own challenges. Namely the customers, really.
Whoever had coined the phrase, ‘the customer is always right,’ had clearly never worked in retail or customer service.
And if they had, well, then they’d need to be hauled out into the street and beaten to death with plastic spoons.
His phone began to chime gently, signaling his need to go clock in for his shift.
Felix huffed and then exited his car. Silencing the alarm, it took him all but a minute to drop his card past the electronic reader.
The day went by in a blur. Not to mention he had a hard time concentrating. His mind kept wandering back to the woman in her makeshift coffin in his garage.
He’d shut the lid and latched it back closed. Then he’d left her there, as he wasn’t quite sure what he wanted to do. Most of the night he’d spent tossing and turning, thinking about the fact that he now had a total of nine hundred points to spend.
It’d taken a bit of tinkering with options to figure that out, but he’d done it.
And he still had all those points to spend at the end. After cycling through all the options available, he’d ended up not being sure what to do.
In the end, he’d reverted the changes he’d made to her, since he didn’t plan on breaking the coma from her yet, and then gone to bed.
“Felix. Cover the window for me, I’m going to take a break,” demanded the imperious voice of Janessa.
Before he could even object to the lovely young woman’s demand, she pulled out her phone and wandered off.
The last one she’d thrown at a customer and he’d had to play go-between to appease the customer and get Janessa in the back room.
She was the most recent pet project that had been pushed his way by the regional manager. One that really wasn’t working out in any way, shape, or form.
So much so that had it been anyone else, Felix would have let her go already.
Felix didn’t doubt for a minute that Joe had ulterior motives, and wasn’t quite prepared to go up against him right now. Not over a woman who would end up quitting in the end. It wasn’t the right time or place to call the regional manager out on it.
Can’t trust anyone named Joe.
As the store manager, he had to deal with whatever the regional made him do as long as it was within company policy. Though he was slowly preparing all the right paperwork to walk the woman out despite that.
Beautiful, built for the eyes, and whatever else she may be, but an annoying, lazy, monster that could only be a shrew to whoever she was dating.
In his shame, he couldn’t deny he’d been infatuated with her for a short period. Days, maybe. That was how long it had taken before she’d revealed her dumpster fire of a personality.
“Hello? I’m ready to place my order,” said a voice in the headset at the window. She’d simply set it down and walked off without another word.
Vibrating his pocket, his phone demanded his attention at the same time.
Pulling out his phone, he glanced at the caller ID.
Restricted, unknown caller.
The regional manager liked to call him at all hours on different phones to test him.
Another worker slipped into his line of sight at that moment, and Felix thanked whatever luck he’d been granted at that moment.
“Steve, get the window, please? I’d really appreciate it,” Felix said to the young man with a smile. He flipped open his phone at the same time, which he hoped would end any argument before it could happen.
“Sure thing, boss,” said the young man.
Felix assumed part of that was the fact that Janessa would have to talk to him when she came back.
Holding the phone up to his ear, Felix said, “This is Felix.”
“Afternoon, Felix,” came the cool response.
He recognized that voice. He couldn’t quite place it.
“I happen to have two more items that fit your request for merchandise.”
Marcus!
“Ah! Marcus. Yes, yes. That’s great news,” Felix said, and he meant it. Where one super might give him a significant point boost, what would several more do?
He was pretty sure it all hinged on that slider at the bottom. The “Draw” slider. Nothing else had changed otherwise.
Looking around, he realized this wasn’t the best spot to have this conversation. Walking into the back office where he normally did performance reviews or paperwork Felix shut the door.
“Marcus? Ah. Nah. Today I’m Caldwell,” said the previous Marcus, now Caldwell.
“Alright. Caldwell. What’s the fee?”
“Five. This’ll be a delivery to boot. We were going to dispose of these two Dudleys, but I figured… why not make green on the side?” Caldwell chuckled at that.