I am 22, and have been working for my employer for over a year. At the beginning of the calendar year, I had a car accident and my car wasn’t salvageable on my budget, so I let it go.

I want a promotion, and I feel like 22 is a good time to start moving up someplace, so I start training with the manager in late summer. I am only learning the most basic things: how to use the handheld device to count stock, what frozen items to pull and when, etc.

It isn’t long in the “training” process when my manager hires a young man we nickname “Young Neil.” His name isn’t actually Neil, but we already have somebody working in our small convenience store with his same name. Young Neil was 19 — barely old enough to sell cigarettes and definitely not old enough to sell alcohol. After a few weeks, I learn he was actually hired to be the new shift lead, since he has a car.

If that isn’t bad enough, I make it clear when he and I meet the first time that I am in a committed relationship with another woman. My impression of him is that he’s a harmless flirt. Am I ever wrong!

He begins hitting on me, mercilessly. He constantly asks when I am going to take him home to meet my girlfriend, when we are going to all have a threesome together, etc. At first I write it off; I’m not attractive enough for him to be serious.

And then he starts asking me every single day. Every time we work together, this boy is harassing me.

I take it to my manager. He says, “Boys will be boys!”

I call corporate HR. They never answer the phone. So, I leave message after message. I get one call back and she basically tells me to suck it up.

The best day I ever have working there is my very, very last. I was hired the night before at a local fast food joint, so I go in to work at the convenience store fifteen minutes late for my shift, in street clothes. I owe my in-laws gas money, so I grab a twenty-cent item and ask for $20 back off my card.

The manager is at the register and asks me if I know I’m late, and if I will be returning shortly in uniform.

“F*** that. I quit!” I march out, head high. I have not gone back, nearly five years later.

(My husband used to work in a shop getting $10 an hour, and quit because of few hours and low pay. The next day, he found a better shop, getting $13 per hour for the same job. My sister-in-law just got married, and her husband is struggling to get a job, so he goes where my husband was working and gets paid even less. We don’t want to make them feel bad, so we say nothing about the new job. One day I go with my sister-in-law to pick up her kid from school, and on the way back this exchange happens:)

Sister-In-Law: “So, where is my brother working now?”

Me: “In a shop at [40 minutes away from his previous job, and 30 minutes away from home].”

Sister-In-Law: “But why so far?!”

Me: “Well, he says he likes it better there, and he gets paid more.”

Sister-In-Law: *as if she is about to teach me simple math* “Is it worth it? I mean, how much more is he getting?”

(I hate her attitude but I don’t want to make it look like I am showing off in her face.)

Me: “Just a couple dollars more.”

Sister-In-Law: *talking as if I am an idiot* “Well, that’s stupid! All the extra money he thinks he makes gets wasted on gas! He is not getting more money; he just drives all the way there for nothing…” *and goes on for around five minutes on how stupid we are*

Me: *trying to sound a bit annoyed just to make her stop* “I don’t care. I mean, he is happy there, so I’ll just let him be there. You can talk to him whenever he comes back.”

(Silence goes for a couple minutes, and then I notice she just drove past her home.)

Me: “Where are we going?”

Sister-In-Law: “I am going to get gas.”

(There are more than four gas stations between the school and her house.)

Me: “Why didn’t you stop before? You forgot?”

Sister-In-Law: “No. It is just that here is cheaper than in the others.”

(She stopped five minutes away from her home to save four or five cents. She was driving a van around the city; my husband drives a little Toyota on the interstate.)

I have been with the same company for 14 months now. When I was first hired, I got a paper schedule, as we were still building the location and didn’t have the online system set for the new hires. They told all of us in orientation, and repeatedly afterwards, that schedules were made three weeks out. From the time our store opens in late May until present day, I have checked my schedule on Saturday or Sunday, because our work week starts Saturday…

…until today, when my boss calls me at ten, wanting to know where I am and if I’m seriously injured. I’m confused as to what he means, until he tells me his schedule shows me on at nine. Mine said 11:30. I leave for work immediately and am only an hour and a half late.

When I finally see him, at close to noon, he tells me that schedules aren’t finalized until Wednesday, only two and a half weeks before the new schedule. That’s not a big deal, except this is the first I’m hearing about it, and now I’ve lost an hour and a half of pay — which adds up quickly in just-above-minimum-wage retail — because my boss didn’t think to let me know in over a year that the schedule I’m getting isn’t necessarily right.

(I work in a library that allows patrons to use a computer for two hours a day. You either need a library card with us, or you can purchase a guest card for $2.00. Most patrons don’t balk at paying $2.00 for two hours.)

Patron: “How can I get on the computer?”

Me: “You can either buy a guest card for $2.00, or you can use your library card to log on to the computer.”

Patron: “D***! I have to pay?”

(I assume that he doesn’t have $2.00 on him.)

Me: “Well, if you don’t have a library card, yes, but you can sign up for a library card free today.”

Patron: “What do I need?”

Me: “I’ll needs to see two proofs of address stating that you live in our county.”

Patron: “Well, I ain’t got that!”

Me: “Then it looks like you’ll have to pay $2.00 to get on the computer today.”

Patron: “I was in the military; do I get a discount?”

Me: “For $2.00? No, sir. We do not offer military discounts. I’m sorry.”

Patron: “Y’all are trying to take all my hard-earned cash.”

(The patron then pulls out a wad of hundred-dollar bills. He unfolds at least ten, and gives me a twenty.)

Patron: “I want all my change back, too!”

Me: “Sure thing, sir.”

Me: “Good morning.”

Customer: “Do you sell hot chocolate?”

Me: “Yes, ma’am, we do.”

Customer: “How much is a small?”

Me: “It’s [price].”

Customer: “Okay, I’ll take a small white mocha.”

Me: “…”