Names have been changed to protect the innocent.

I used to work in the electronics section of a department store, which also included taking care of the photo area. One day I went in to work, got clocked in, and not ten seconds after I had stepped out on the floor, a customer came running up to me asking if Sarah was working today. I told her I don't know and was trying to add that I could find out, but "I don't know" was all the lady managed to process and it sent her into immediate apopleptic fits. "You don't know?!" she yelled at me. "How can you not know?! You work here, don't you?!"

I calmly tried to explain to her that I had literally only gotten there a minute or two ago and that as a consequence, the only electronics employee I was absolutely certain was there at the time was myself, but she wanted none of it. "I'll just go find someone who does know something!" she said, then stormed off in a huff.

There was nobody at the electronics counter when I finally got there, but if the unduly angry lady had simply followed me over there, I could have checked the schedule to see if Sarah was on there and then called for her over the PA system. I get the feeling that still wouldn't have been good enough for her. Oh well.

After checking the list of what needed to be done for the day, I went back to the photo area to make sure everything was going fine back there. I did some routine checkups on the machinery and noticed that on the counter there was a red camera sitting on top of an envelope that had a name on the outside and a battery and memory card inside. I'm sure a lot of folks reading this can already guess who the camera belonged to.

Anyway, I finished up there and headed back out to electronics, and about five minutes later Melanie, the head of the photo department who had also only come in a short time before, comes up to me and says she's got a customer that's looking for a camera that was left with us to work on, and have I seen it? I look over at the customer in question and we of course immediately recognize each other.

"Oh, I already talked to him!" she blustered. "He doesn't know anything!"

Instead of saying anything myself, I simply held up an index finger and then motioned for both of them to follow me. They do, though the customer does so under protest, muttering things like "I can't believe we're following him!" and "This is a complete waste of time!" just loud enough to be sure we could both hear her. I left the two of them on the customer side of the photo counter, which was behind a slight partition so neither could see exactly what I was doing. Melanie watched with bemusement and the customer simply glared as I picked the camera and parts up, deftly put them back together, and then handed the whole thing over the partition, a wide, perfect smile on my face.

The look on her face as she took her camera back is one that will warm the deepest, darkest parts of my heart for the rest of my life.