I’m the Delivery Driver for Unspeakable Horrors - Ask Me Anything

NOTE: This was originally posted in r/AMA but mods took it down. They said it broke the rules.

I got a new job yesterday. Which is good because rent is due in two weeks, and I’ve nearly blown through my savings. A tanned and plump hand slipped the assignment through the crack in my bedroom window. One whose arm reached impossible lengths and whose owner had their body tucked around the corner out of my sight. To avoid being rude to a house guest, invited or not, I took the manilla envelope and waited until the hand had completely retracted from my window to open it.

Inside the envelope are two sheets of paper. Printed at the top is a bold typeface that reads ‘Delivery position. Monday through Friday, 7pm to 4am. $35/hr, gas compensated. First day: tomorrow.’ Below that: ‘Congratulations on joining the team!’ And below even that are my uniform specifications: Plain black t-shirt with a pocket on the chest, full-length jeans, and close-toed shoes. It then lists the address. The second sheet of paper was a W-2 with a typed sticky note attached instructing me to fill it out and hand it in tomorrow first thing.

***

It’s a warm and cheerful evening when I arrive at my new job. Of course, when I glance at the clock on my dashboard, I’m fifteen minutes early, because like my grandfather always told me: ‘if you’re not early, you’re late, and if you're late, you’re fired’. Usually his advice was prefaced by “you’re unsettling, and people won’t like that.” and culminated in, “so do ‘x, y, and z’ and they won’t mind you too much.” Whenever he visited the children's home I grew up in, he passed on gems like that and I’ve found each one just as useful as the last.

Just as my GPS said it would be, the shop sits tucked in the rear of a pitch black alley. The unlit neon sign above the door is a simple curled tentacle, and along the suckers are a series of swirling letters that my brain interprets as ‘Unspeakable Horrors’. When I blink, I swear the tentacle on the sign shifts in place, as though restless. I shake my head to dispel the illusion, swallow my nerves, and push the door open. The bell on the inside handle announces my arrival, but no one greets me at the register. Dishes clatter and food sizzles in the kitchen, but the long metal gate is shut, so the chef remains a mystery. “Excuse me.” I call, and there’s a beat of silence in the cacophony before it resumes its regular tune. I try again, projecting my voice louder this time. “Excuse me, I’m here about the delivery driver's position?”

When there’s still no reply, I turn around and take in the shop. Best to be patient. Someone will come out eventually, right? There are a handful of red booths, and a few blonde wood tables whose sizes range from seating two to six patrons each. At the far left of the shop, resting atop a small round table where a single person would struggle to eat their meal without feeling cramped, is a 90s classic: a cherry red Sangyn brand landline telephone. The kind with the buttons instead of the previous model’s rotary style face. It and the table beneath it are the only items on the left side of the store, aside from the swinging traffic doors that lead to the kitchen. The menu above the register gives me the same issues as the sign out front. The letters swim, and I can’t tell if this is a deli, a sandwich shop, or a pizza parlor. All I glean is the delivery fee: +$2.50 for every ten miles outside of the regular delivery zone. 

The phone’s sudden shrill ringing sends jolts of nostalgia through me. With hardly a glance around, yet brimming with hesitation, I stride towards the phone and answer it with a confused, “Hello?” Not my phone, not my problem, so why did I answer it?

There’s no voice on the other end, no breathing either. No tone, or buzz, just a sucking silence that makes my ear ache from where I’ve pressed it against the receiver. My mind goes blank. My eyes stop seeing. The cells that make up my body seem to stretch as though moving ahead without me. Time ceases, granting me a small sampling of infinity. 

Welcome, the dark and terrible emptiness says without saying. When the kitchen bell rings, a delivery is ready. Do not look inside the bag. Deliver to the address printed on the receipt. Ignore all handwritten notes you may see. Return promptly. Remain in the lobby. Do not enter the kitchen. Questions?

Just one.

“What do we deliver?” I ask, my tongue numb.

Nothing but static comes over the line.

My senses come back to me as I hang up the phone without meaning to, but the message is clear; I’m hired. If I had a dad, I bet he’d be proud. Heart full of sunshine, I do a little happy dance across the lobby. Behind the cash wrap, I find an ancient-looking broom and a banged up silver dust pan. Instead of leaning, I get to cleaning.

I’m still grinning from ear to ear when the kitchen bell rings for the first time. I gently place the broom against the wall, and dump the dustpan on the way to the bathroom to wash my hands. “Be right back!” I say as I grab the handles of an unassuming brown paper bag that reeks of copper. The weight of it surprises me and I grunt as I heave and move towards the door. As I hoist it, the contents wiggle, almost like half frozen jello. There’s also a strange heat radiating from it that warms my fingers where they’re wrapped around the little twisted paper handles. What kind of food is this? I think, but I don’t peek and, you know what, I definitely won’t yuck someone’s yum, so I turn my thoughts to my guessing what part of town I’ll end up in.

In my car, I turn on the passenger seat warmer so the package doesn’t get cold during the drive. Then I squawk along with the radio and gently drum on my steering wheel until I pull into the parking lot of an apartment complex. As I remove my seatbelt, I glance down at the receipt and see the zero dollar tip in the bottom corner. *Ah, bummer,* I think, my lips pulling to one side in displeasure. Then I remember the hourly wage and my mood is cheerful once more. *If no one ever tips me, I’ll be a-okay with that.* I grin to myself. The sun has long since set, but the breeze is still warm and the moon is bright enough to guide my way. The delivery note on the receipt says to bring it to the leasing office, which is easy enough to find. It’s the big brick building at the forefront of the complex with the big wooden sign that reads ‘LEASING OFFICE’.

The massive double doors open to a spacious lobby decorated in various shades of coffee and beige. The clacking of mechanical keyboards draws my attention to the right side of the room. Centered perfectly is a massive white desk, framed by two towering iron lamps. Sitting at that desk are three women who look almost exactly the same. From their hair color and style, to their makeup, to their clothes, they’re identical, with only a single difference between them. Never once do their heads lift, nor do their eyes drift from their screens.

On the left is an older woman. Elderly, certainly, but not at all frail. On the right, a woman in her fifties. She sits tall as she types. In the center, a young woman. Somewhere between sixteen and twenty-five depending on how frequently I blink. There’s a strange sort of pressure behind my eyes as I step forward with the delivery, and for a second my vision blurs. The three women merge into one, and again, just for a second, the world changes. I step foot into a cave a hundred miles above a craggy shoreline. Sea salt and brine fill my nostrils and behind the merged woman is a massive loom where a brightly colored tapestry lay half-finished. Then my vision clears and the three women have their own bodies, and the package in my hand weighs so much that my arm trembles to keep it upright. Sweat pours down my temples. I have to focus on my breathing to avoid throwing up.

The young woman in the middle, still without ever raising her gaze to meet my own, reaches out a single hand to take the delivery. Eagerly, I pass it over the computer monitor. She takes the heft of the package with ease and hands it to the woman on her right. The woman on her right then reaches underneath her desk and extracts a large yellow umbrella. The umbrella moves from the woman on the right to the woman in the middle, who then passes it to me. “Oh,” I say, and glance over my shoulder to gauge the weather, “I don’t think I’ll need that. The forecast said no rain all week.”

The elderly woman speaks, startling me as honestly I’d forgotten about her entirely. “Take it.” She intones, pecking at her keyboard one finger at a time. Maybe I’m still overwhelmed by the image of the cave, or maybe it’s the aura of authority that radiates from her, but I don’t argue any further. I take the umbrella and stagger out of the leasing office. The double door's slam suit behind me; the sound of the wood crashing together makes me flinch. I clutch the umbrella in my hand and take a second to gather myself. Upon my first steady inhale, the sky opens. Rain pours from clouds that snuck up on me, and the temperature drops so suddenly all the heat from my body seems to be sucked away with a single gust of wind. The only bit of heat comes from the fingers that held the delivery, so I press them to my throat and savor the warmth. With my other hand, I pop the button on the umbrella and let it spring open. With the big yellow shield above my head, I race to my car.

Back at the shop, the rain continues. In fact, it’s coming down even harder than before. For a brief minute, I consider sitting in the parking lot outside the alley until the rain passes, but the list of rules I was given thirty minutes ago remind me that I’m not to dilly-dally on delivery, so I brave the rain once more. Honestly, the umbrella is perfect, but when I close it to bring it inside the shop, the kitchen erupts into deafening chaos. Thunderous clangs of metal hitting metal, the impact of which is so strong it dents the grate that hides the kitchen from view.

A warbling wail that makes my stomach turn with dread. I drop the umbrella to clap my hands over my ears. The second I let go, the umbrella goes flying outside the building as though kicked, and the door slams shut behind it. Silence descends upon me, and cautiously my hands fall from their protective position. I watch the yellow umbrella spin down the alley until it disappears from sight. “Sorry.” I say as I turn towards the kitchen. Something tugs my gaze upwards, and I spot a small sign above the menu. It’s a white circle about the size of my face, with a yellow umbrella printed on it, and a big red circle with a line through it, indicating that the item is banned from the premises. “Oh, sorry.” I say again, “I didn’t see that. No umbrellas, got it.”

Out of guilt for pissing off my new employer on my first day, I find cleaning sprays and gloves, and get to work scrubbing the backsplash below the kitchen window. The noises in the kitchen taper off, and eventually the only sound in the shop is the scritch-scritch-scritch of my scouring pad against the tiles, and the rain hammering against the pavement outside. That’s how I pass the rest of my shift, and by the time four a.m rolls around, I’ve done a single delivery all day. As I gather my belongings, the phone rings. The receiver is in my hands before I can blink, “Hello.” I state.

Good work today, the dark and terrible emptiness says without saying. Leave your paperwork on the counter. Payday is every Tuesday. Your check will be in the register. See you tomorrow. Then I’m out the door, having successfully completed my first day of work. As tired as I am, I can’t help but have a spring in my step. This job, while confusing and stressful at times, feels like a good fit for me. I pull my keys out of my pocket as I exit the alley and turn into the parking lot, where a rubber-duck-yellow umbrella rests on the hood of my car.