Not The Breast Of Days

CONTENT WARNING: Injury Detail

(It’s 4 am, and a customer enters the store and approaches me. By the smell of his breath, he has clearly been drinking.)

Customer: “Do you know where I could find needle and thread?”

Me: “That would be in the crafts department. Would you like me to show you?”

Customer: “Yeah, thanks.”

(As we start to walk toward the craft department, which is in the back of the store, his phone rings. He picks up and has a short conversation to which I didn’t pay much attention. I only heard him say, “I guess I’ll have to sew it back on.”)

Customer: *hangs up* “It’s been a bad night.”

Me: “You too, huh?”

Customer: “Yeah. I got my nipple torn off.”

Me: “…”

Customer: “I got drunk, got in a fight, and my nipple got torn halfway off.”

(He pulls his shirt to the side to show me his nipple barely hanging on.)

Customer: “My friends said to go to the hospital, but I don’t have insurance, so I’m just gonna have to sew it back on myself.”