I didn’t want to go look. I want to be honest about that. My first instinct was to stay in the cereal aisle. To mind my own business. To pick up the Cheerios again and keep shopping and pretend I hadn’t heard anything.
That’s what I’ve always done.
Zoe was already walking.
She went around the end cap. Past a display of Easter candy. Into the juice aisle.
I followed her.
A young employee stood beside a stock cart.
He was maybe nineteen. Short. Stocky. Round face. Glasses with thick black frames. Light brown hair cut short and neat. A green Lakeview Foods polo shirt tucked into khaki pants. A name tag pinned carefully over his heart.
HENRY.
He had Down syndrome.
He was surrounded by broken bottles.
Juice. Ocean Spray. Cranberry and grape. The big sixty-four-ounce glass ones. At least eight of them. Shattered across the linoleum. Red and purple juice spreading out in a wide sticky pool. Shards of glass everywhere. Glittering under the fluorescent lights.
