Equality

So I am, once again, working at the bookstore. These two middle-aged African-American women are standing near the customer service desk looking a little lost. I stop and ask them if they need help with anything. They turn and look at me and ask if the tables in front of them are all the sale books we have. I answer yes. The one gets an attitude with me and says "I see. Y'all don't have any African-American books. Interesting. Well then, we'll just look around."

I tried to explain that the books that end up on the sale tables are the ones that there was a large amount of backstock from the publisher. So by not having any leftovers to send to us, they must be selling really well.

This didn't seem to help. The attitude was still there.

I walked away to take care of something, leaving them to wander around. There wasn't much else I could do at that point.

When I returned back to the customer service desk, another woman began to approach me. She was a middle-aged white woman. I asked her the same question, did she need help finding anything.

She looked at me and asked if these tables were all my sale books. Having a moment of deja vu, I paused for a minute. I answered "yes".

She smiled, "oh, cause you don't have any books for chubby white women."

I smiled at her and had to walk away.