NOVEL WEB 001 – People Are Strange
Another day in this boring job.
Helping people exchange paper for food
A dream come true!
I flipped through a magazine about celebrities and their amazing super-interesting lives.
Someone got pregnant.
Someone got cheated.
Someone got pregnant and then cheated.
At least their lives are more interesting than mine
Sure they get pressured and their lives are exposed for our entertainment.
But at least they don't have to smile when they don't want to.
Or clean someone else's bathroom.
Maybe I'm just having a mid-midlife crisis right now and my life isn't that bad and it could be a lot worse...
No, that's impossible.
My life is at its lowest and it seems like that doesn't change no matter what univ–
*Ding ding*
Oh, there's someone in front of me wanting to keep the hellish torturous capitalist circle rolling.
At least it's interesting to see them and what they buy, and imagine what their lives are.
"Good morning, how are you?"
I moved my eyes from the magazine up to the customer
Even though I didn't care or wanted to.
It's a ghost.
Ok, just a ghost.
Wait, WHAT?!
"H-how can I help you?"
I tried to make first contact with the ghost.
First contact? It's a ghost, not an alien.
"...milk..."
The ghost looked at me like I was a piece of trash and mumbled something I couldn't hear.
Is it a curse?
Scary.
I started trembling a little bit.
Is it a vengeful spirit that I killed accidentally?
Maybe if I don't move he can't see me.
"WHERE'S THE MILK"
He screamed with a deep raspy ghostly voice and I jumped a little bit.
"J-just go straight into this way and you'll find the refrigerator"
Maybe I just pissed or shitted myself.
Maybe both.
"..thank you..."
He mumbled something again but I couldn't hear it.
Looking at him properly, he was wearing a gray hoodie with a logo that is already fading out and old jeans.
I thought ghosts didn't have legs and floated or something.
He had messy hair and pale skin.
I guess all ghosts have pale skin.
What kind of ghost drinks milk anyway?
Maybe his last wish was to drink milk.
Can ghosts drink? Eat?
As I ponder about ghost physiology, he came back with his groceries.
Soy milk, lactose-free yogurt, cheddar...
Is he...?
I looked back at his face.
He was staring at me making a face like I just fucked his house and stole his mother.
Scary.
Flinching, looking back, and sweating bullets, I kept scanning everything quickly as possible.
Maybe he'll go away when I'll give him his groceries.
"F-forty dollars and fifty cents. Is that all?"
*SLAM*
He slammed the counter and I flinched, almost letting out a squeaky toy yelp.
He left quickly, almost running, speed walking they call it.
Did I just get robbed by a lactose-intolerant ghost?
I looked at the counter and see, forty dollars and fifty cents.
Maybe he was a good ghost just living his death peacefully and didn't want to kill me.
Oh well, let's go to the back and change my pants real quickly.
---
*Huff huff*
That was the worst 10 minutes of my life.
I just tried to buy what was missing in my fridge but today's cashier was cute.
Not a nice old lady.
I should've cut my hair.
And brushed my teeth thrice.
I hope I didn't look weird.
Or talked weird.
Or walked weird.
And my clothes are probably weird but my grandma said I look good on them.
Even though I look like a horrible mixture of skater boy, emo, goth, and punk with a touch of "I hear Pumped Up Kicks all day every day".
I don't agree but grandma likes it so I have no choice...
*Sigh*
Walking back to my house and storing my groceries, I went directly to my holy sanctuary.
It's a room filled with rows and rows of manga, DVDs, Blu-rays, and CDs, from different genres and eras, some dubbed, subbed, or directly imported, all in a perfect state like they were just taken out of the box.
Shelves of perfectly carved figures of my waifu, Asuka, and my favorite characters across different anime.
In the middle is a low table with the perfect space for manga, tea, and snacks.
In one corner, three types of TV.
CRT, LCD, and Plasma.
In another corner, a gaming PC with three monitors, a red, white and yellow mechanical keyboard, a custom Xbox 360 controller with a high-quality painting of my waifu, Asuka, and a drawing tablet.
Saying "I'm home" to my body pillow with the picture of my waifu, Asuka, I entered the room and changed into more comfortable clothes.
What will we do today?
Maybe I'll put a random episode that I have already watched a hundred times so I can hear it in the background and occasionally glance at it.
I turned on the CRT.
"It's been 4 years since Tony Stark's reveal as Iron Man, let's go back in time and see how the world changed since–"
Hmm, I forgot to set it into AV mode again.
And yes, I got reincarnated in the MCU.