Petty Crimes & Head Cases by Lola Beatlebrox

Author:Lola Beatlebrox
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2019-10-08T16:22:14+00:00

Monday when Jamie came home from school I announced we were going to the recycling center because my car was full of plastic champagne flutes and glass bottles.

“Awesome!” Jamie said.

Kids love to go to the recycling center in our town. Not only is there a warehouse full of used toys, but the candy jar in the office is always full of fireballs and gummy bears. Jamie darted around the house, collecting recyclables. I sorted through the bins in the garage, making sure cans were in the metal bin, paper in the paper bin, and plastic in the plastic bin.

Our recycling center is the biggest meet-and-greet place in the city aside from The Watering Hole on Center Street. As we slid into a parking spot, I waved to Don Westcott who was backing out. I nodded to Martha Farquhar as she barged by with a box of cardboard, but Martha ignored me as usual.

My son began to unload our stuff right away.

“Jamie!” cried a familiar voice.

Tinker Bell, wearing a T-shirt with big letters saying STAFF, grabbed a full bin from Jamie’s hands. Tinker was no taller than Jamie and they seemed to be equals in the sophistication department. They ran to the plastics sorting tent, giggling all the way; then disappeared into the office, heading, I presumed, for the candy jar.

I caught sight of Shannon, who managed the center’s operations, and asked him if there were any Styrofoam peanuts I could use to ship a package.

“Sure,” he said, leading me to the back of the warehouse. Our recycling center is big on re-use—they keep stuff around that people could buy for very little money—plywood, two by fours, lighting fixtures, kitchen cabinets, toilets, sinks, and packing materials.

Shannon scooped some peanuts out of a bin and poured them into a plastic bag. “Need any moving boxes?”

Stacks of flattened U-Haul boxes towered over us; everyone appeared to be moving into our fair city, not out.

“Check out all those computer batteries,” said Shannon. “We’ve had a run on them lately.”

“I thought you didn’t take hazardous material,” I said.

“We don’t. Someone left these while we were closed.” The pile was a mile high.

“Do they work?”

“The lithium’s been removed.”

We walked out of the warehouse and I heard Tinker talking to Jamie in her funny voice. “Put your paper in the paper bin, Jamie.”

The paper bin was as big as the back of a semi-truck. As Jamie attempted to hurl the bag into the open window, Shannon gave it a boost but paper still fell out. He stooped and picked up a canceled check.

“Tracy, don’t be so trusting,” he said, tearing up the check. “Stuff like this shouldn’t go in a recycle bin. That’s why we have a shredder.”

“Do you worry much about mail theft here?”

“We have security now.” Shannon pointed to a camera perched up on the corner of the warehouse.

“That’s impressive.”

Shannon laughed. “It’s not hooked up or anything, but it looks official. Somebody dropped the camera off, so we decided to put it up as a deterrent.

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