Customers Are Watching The Watchers

(Being a charity shop, our store is pretty casual about where we sort and price stock. Quite often we’ll put the prices on at the front counter, where we also serve customers. On this occasion, my coworker is pricing some books, standing on the “customer” side of the counter so it’s easier for her to go back and forth between the counter and the bookshelves. For the record, my coworker is a slightly grumpy woman in her 60s, and I’m a woman in my mid-twenties. A customer comes up and waits, as she thinks my coworker is a customer being served.)

Coworker: “Oh, sorry. You can go; I work here.” *walks away to shelve some books*

(The customer comes up and I ring up her purchases.)

Customer: *in a hushed whisper* “Does she work here?”

Me: “Excuse me?”

Customer: *points to my coworker* “Her. Does she really work here?”

(I look to where my coworker is putting books away, obviously working.)

Me: “Um… yes?”

Customer: “Oh, I thought she was lying so she could watch you.”

Me: “No, she definitely works here.”

(She kept shooting suspicious glances at my coworker until she left. I still have no idea what she was worried about; if someone wants to come in the shop and do work for us, they can “watch me” all they like!)