“Thanks,” says the woman, and heads off.
Her friend peers past me into the museum. “What’s this place about?”
“Barrel-making,” I say. “The town of Waldon was once the second-largest manufacturer of barrels in the country.” I know this because I read it on one of the museum placards. “Ten thousand barrels a year, all of them made by hand.”
The woman nods politely. “Well, maybe I’ll take a walk through while I wait for her,” she says. “How much is it?”
“Five dollars.”
“Do you take credit cards?”
I pull an apologetic face. “Machine’s broken.”
The woman frowns. “I don’t know if I have any Canadian money.” She digs in her purse. “These funny little coins you use,” she muses. “What are these ones called?”
“Toonies,” I say, hiding a smile. She’s American, surely. “Where are you from?”
“New Jersey,” she says. (I knew it!) “My sister and I are here for a week.” She hands me three toonies.
“Your change,” I say, opening the cashbox. “One loonie.”
“Ha! A loonie. How strange.” She heads off into the museum. I can tell she’s not that interested in barrels, really, but she seems like the type of person who enjoys poking around places. I smile as I watch her wander around. It really is peaceful in here.
The other woman, her sister, emerges from the bathroom. “Where’d Anne go?” she asks me.
“She went through the museum,” I say. “Do you want to buy a ticket too?”
“For five dollars?” the woman says incredulously, reading the sign. “Yeah, right. Tell Anne I’ll be outside when she’s done.”
I stifle a snort. How rude.
I smile extra politely at her, because rude people never seem to know what to do in the face of excessive kindness. “Absolutely,” I say cheerfully. “You have a great day, now. Enjoy the town!”
She looks vaguely confused and annoyed, just like I hoped she would. I giggle to myself as she leaves. Five minutes later, her sister—the nice one in the family, I’d say—reappears and thanks me.
“Enjoy the rest of your visit,” I tell her. “Good luck with your awful sister,” I add under my breath after she’s gone.
No one else comes in afterward, and I start to get a little bored. I do Wordle (QUIET, in four guesses) and make a list of all the ideas I have to boost interest in the museum—barrel-themed playground, hot dog stand, guided tours—then I rummage through the desk drawers until I find the broken credit card machine. It’s one of those small handheld ones with a separate piece for people to tap their credit cards. Someone has shoved it back into its box, which thankfully still has a manual inside. It takes me a goodforty-five minutes, but by the end, we’ve got a fully functioning credit card machine again.
I wander back to Shelley’s office, where I find her scrolling through Facebook on an old desktop computer.
“I fixed the credit card machine,” I tell her.
She glances up briefly. “I’m sure it’ll just break again. That thing’s a piece of junk.”
Okay, that wasn’t quite the praise I was looking for, but whatever.
“It’s pretty quiet here today,” I say.
“You can leave if you want to,” she says without looking away from Facebook. “I’ll watch the desk.”
I frown. “No, I don’t mind staying. But I was thinking—wouldn’t it be fun to call the local schools and see if they want to bring their kids here for field trips?”
Shelley snorts. “Pretty boring field trip, looking at a bunch of barrels.”
Okay, what iswiththis woman? Honestly, why work in a barrel-themed museum if you don’t like barrels?
“Er—have you worked here long?” I ask. Maybe she’s gotten jaded over the years. Maybe she used to be a hardcore barrel-enthusiast, but the rough world of barrel museum curating wore her down.
