SCI-FI WINNERS
We take plastic
WINNER Julie Bissell, Sible Hedingham, Essex
FIRST PLACE
£100
When Doug saw the damage to the counter top on my truck, he went berserk. “What did you do to it?” He demanded. “I cleaned it!” I said. “Like I do every night! With the stuff you told me to use!” Doug ran his fingertip across the scratch. It was deeper than I’d thought, and the edges of the scratch looked like they’d melted.
“Exactly the stuff I told you to use?” he asked. “Not any cheap stuff out of the corner shop?”
“Exactly the stuff!” I said. “I can show you the can, if you think I’m lying.”
Though maybe I’d run out of the expensive sanitiser he’d told me I had to use and bought a can of the cheap stuff they sold down the market. He was never gonna check, and I was the one who had to pay for it. It probably works just as well. And if it doesn’t, it’s healthy, getting a dose of bacteria and stuff. Keeps your immune system working. Customers ought to thank me.
“I’ll have to get someone to fill that in,” Doug said. He sighed, all martyred. Like he wasn’t making a fortune off his food trucks while people like me did all the hard work - drove around in Cambridge traffic, dealt with customers who whined like spoilt kids and cleaned the muck off the equipment in the evening.
“Thank you,” I said, and he scowled. I picked up the carton of food marked up for my round, stuck it in the fridge and drove off before he got really grouchy.