Life of a Shopkeeper

     Without waiting another moment, he convinced himself to keep walking toward his destination. No matter what the case, he still had a job to do. He took one last glance at the beaming sunrise and kept on heading toward the direction of Neopia Central.

     With every step, the buildings became larger as if they were coming toward him. The reflections of the pink clouds were visible from their lustrous glossy glass windows. After a small sum of minutes of walking cheerfully, he now faced his own shop.

     The tiny Chia unzipped his bag and searched for his store's keys. After a few short minutes of constantly pulling his things out and tossing them back in, he could not find his keys. He decided to dump everything in the bag on the ground to help him search. Instead of finding what he was looking for, he came across things that he didn't even know he had, and didn't know existed. The contents varied from spare Neopoints to chocolates of many colors and shapes, some stranger than others.

     Once he had carefully spread out his things onto the hard ground, he began to get frustrated. His keys were still nowhere in sight. Quickly, he glanced to his left and right. Then, he lifted up the dusty welcome mat below him and saw a spare key. He carelessly threw the doormat aside.

     He placed the bag he was holding on the ground beside him and grabbed the tiny silver key. As he held it, it shined like the bright sunlight on a rushing waterfall. Carefully, he slipped it into a tiny silver keyhole between the two glass doors and turned it until he heard a soft clicking sound, which told him that it unlocked. Then he pulled the doors open and stumbled inside.

     Inside were many tables of different sizes and shapes, a counter with a grey register, and a door that seemingly led to the back of the building. The Chia dropped his bag onto the checkout counter and went through the door behind it.

     The first thing the small Chia had noticed was that there were many brown boxes stacked from the floor the ceiling. He was almost completely surrounded with the boxes. A frown appeared on his face as he realized that he might not have such a great day after all.

     One by one, the small-sized Chia pulled, pushed, carried, and dragged boxes into the main room. There were many more boxes than he would usually find each and every morning. Without a further thought, he began to unpack a few of the smaller boxes first. Once they were unpacked, he carried the foods to certain areas of the room depending on the type of food they were. He placed all of the drinks onto a skinny shelf by the front doors and placed all of the fresh hot burgers on a long table.

 * * * * *

     The Chia sighed in relief after he placed the last box of fresh foods from the first load onto the table and unpacked it. He dropped a stack of cheeseburgers onto a table and placed heavy glasses of milkshakes on a long wooden shelf. Exhausted, he walked over to a small square window in front of the store. The sun was shining very high above the bazaar. The Chia had been working alone in the shop all morning! He could hear the ground rumble before his two flat feet. Bottles and cans began to shake on the tables faster with each passing second.

     They were coming.

     The tired Chia quickly made his way behind the counter and stared at the tables covered in vibrant colors. He smelled the warm odor of freshness and sheer accomplishment in the air surrounding him. He turned to the doorway and watched uninterestedly as pets and some petpets of all sizes and colors headed toward his edifice at record speeds. He frowned instantly.

     They were here.

     The moment the door had burst open, all chaos was released. Wrappers from various items had gone flying onto the nearby heads of a group of green Nimmos. An orange Zafara had just grabbed the last purple negg when a blue Skeith had just pounced on top of him for it. The screams filled the air so earsplitting that it seemed it could be heard from miles away. One white Lenny had tripped over a spoon and fallen face first into a Grarrl's chocolate ice cream. On the opposite side of the room, where the most madness was currently occurring, a fairly large crowd of Elephantes were after a bag of peanuts and were ready to fight for it.

     Many cans of Neocola exploded as they were kicked and thrown around the room in the mist of the battle. Jars of baby food were smashed in half as pets tried to rush through the crowd to the checkout line. Bowls of soup were toppled over and food was being hurled across the room, some landing on the customers. Fruits either ended up squashed or in pieces. Even foods that were costly were being sold as fast as feathers drifting in a roaring sandstorm. To the shoppers, especially the aggressive and hungry ones, it was war.

     Massive bags filled with Neopoints whizzed at the Chia as he tried to stuff them into the register and every open space in-between. Dishes behind him shattered as they hit the ground. A large shelf of plastic spoons and forks tumbled off the wall and scatted in front of the Chia's feet. Small petpets began to gnaw on the food that was dropped onto the floor. Neopets slid in every direction because a table of orange juice and other sugary beverages had collapsed. To the Chia, a minute felt like an hour, except for the fact that so many things were happening much too fast to pay attention to. It seemed as the mayhem would never cease, but just as soon as it began, it had ended.

     They were gone.

     The place was deserted in just mere seconds. Bare shelves lay on the floor of the room, some in pieces. The large tables were smashed in half and a thick blanket of Neocola stains covered the once clean floor. It was hard for him to even believe that they were ever clean in the first place! The distraught Chia looked around his shop. It was trashed beyond one's imagination, but it shouldn't have been much of a surprise to him. Quickly, he brushed the dirt off of his white and blue apron and reached for his broom. He sighed in relief again that the hungry crowd was gone, but he had a strange, uneasy felling that the worse was yet to come.

     The shopkeeper of the Neopian Fresh Foods looked at his calendar, only to find himself frozen in horror.

     It was Half Price Day.

The End