What Lies Within Black Friday

Shadowed lines wrapped around the buildings. Voices filled the air. The sound of feet shuffling against the harsh pavement and the sound of fabric pushed up against another body echoed throughout the cold night. Pale hands grabbed the glass doors that remained locked. More voices of protest shook the lines that continued to coil around the buildings, and a moment later, they were finally set free. Insanity returned to what we call the Black Friday.

For the past three years, I fell prisoner to serving the insanity that came flooding through those glass doors. Lines of people would fill up the entire space of the store. Bodies would be crushed against each other, and hands would lash out at any item nearby. The air was suffocated with voices, cries, screams, laughter; the elements of insanity of the shoppers gone wild. Wherever there was a space, an army of feet would go marching, and whenever you could breathe, you would be sucked into the middle of more lines that continued to pour through those doors. Welcome to Black Friday.

When the insanity finally ended hours and hours later, destruction would stay behind. The floor would be covered with garbage, litter, and a million, dirty footprints. The glass doors would be stained with hundreds of fingerprints of those that clawed the door, begging to come in. Shelves lied barren, and the stockroom was nearly empty. And the nightmare wasn't over because more of those lines would return the next day, and if what they saw wasn't available, the insanity would turn ugly with murder shining in their eyes. The remains of Black Friday would linger far enough into the next week, leaving those like me shaking, begging for it to end soon.

Somewhere in the midst of this madness, a phone rang in the back of my head. For three years, I struggled to answer it, trying to hear what the message could be. For three years, I wondered why that phone rang endlessly, and now I know why. I finally answered the call.