Flea Market Find

Later in the morning, Chuck insisted on making breakfast for her before she loaded her kit back into her car to head out. She cuddled with him at the back door before she left, saying, "You call me real soon, hey? I like serving you." With a last kiss, she left.

Chapter 4

After she had gone, he went back to the bedroom to change clothes and head out to the garage at the Faro Trucks dealership, where the used queen-cab International box truck he'd purchased was ready to be picked up. The Morgan box had come with a pair of rear doors, but had needed a side door installed along with all the other modifications Chuck had in mind. After dropping the truck off at the Emerson's Emporium shop, trailed by one of the mechanics in his Mercedes who Chuck drove back to the dealership, he went on to the high school where the kids from the business club were waiting to confirm their involvement in the new enterprise.

"All right," he said as he entered the conference room where the future business leaders' club met, "let's go over it again. This is your last chance to pull out if you aren't willing to commit for the whole estate sale and flea market season." The four teens, three girls and one boy, looked at him expectantly.

"After school, you all come to the shop. We load up the truck. I expect this will take longer than the allotted time, because we have to stow the racks and the tables for the first time. Then we load the merchandise. You go home and pack your sleeping bags and one small duffel with enough clothes for two days. I have the polo shirts with the company logos waiting already.

"You report back to the shop no later than 4:00 AM. Because I've reserved a slot for the whole season, we can drive straight in instead of having to wait in line. That puts us on the field at the Grand Bazaar no later that 5:00 AM, and that gives us two hours to set up our display. Breakfast will be catch-as-catch-can. The doors open at 8:00 AM and close at 4:00 PM, and you will be on duty for that whole period, subject only to bathroom breaks and half an hour for lunch at the food trucks.

"At four o'clock, we start securing for the night. I'll cook dinner on the camp stove, and as the season progresses you'll all figure out how to do it. I have inflatable mattresses we'll sleep on in the truck on-site. The site provides roving security patrols, so we don't have to break down the display until Sunday afternoon. Doors open again at 8:00 AM to 4:00, and then we have to break down. The site owner wants everyone off the site by 6:30 PM. We head back to the shop, lock everything up, and we all go home.

"Any questions?"

The kids had none, and at 4:00 AM, sleepy despite the coffee from the big thermos Chuck had prepared for them, they set out for the Grand Bazaar. Their eyes got big as they joined the line of cars, trucks, and vans slowly moving into the parking lot.

"My God, there must be a thousand vendors here!" said Amy, a willowy Jewish brunette who looked like an Israeli sabra, with great people skills and a mind like a steel trap.

"Closer to three hundred, this early in the season," said Chuck as he eased the big truck through the turn off the highway. "The site can take up to five hundred at full capacity. In high summer, as many as fifteen thousand people a day pass through the gates, which explains why the parking lot is as big as the selling field. There are three entrances to the field, but during staging only the middle one is used. Preferred vendors, meaning sellers who pay for a month or more at a time for a specific slot, go straight down the road to the A gate and past the checkpoint, and go right to their spot, though Henry, the site owner who collects the money, will provide a ground guide if you ask for one -- I am going to use one the first few weekends until I know the landmarks. Being a Preferred vendor also means you can arrive at the Bazaar later in the setup period instead of having to get here in the middle of the night and jockey for a position in the staging area. That's why there was a police car by the entrance; sometimes tempers run high.

"Ordinary vendors who don't reserve a space take potluck and can end up anywhere on the field. As you see over to our right, the staff is lining them up in rows of twenty. The 'streets' between the 'avenues' coming from the gates, as I think of them, are based on ten slots on each side of the 'street.' It helps the staff with traffic control. If they know Street A has three preferred vendors on it, for instance, they will only send seventeen cars from the staging line to that street, and a ground guide will position them based on spots on the ground. They use the same white stuff the groundsmen at the high school use to lay out the football field and the soccer field to mark the corners. Each slot is supposed to be 20' x 20', although when I was doing the research to see if this business model was workable I heard a number of vendors grumbling that some are smaller, which if you have based your layout on 400 square feet less the space occupied by your minivan really screws up your plans. Big trucks like ours and anyone with a trailer have to pay for two slots, which is fine with me; if you have that big a rig, you have enough stock to fill the space."

They joined the Preferred line, were checked through, picked up a ground guide and were taken to what Amy could see was a prime spot at the corner of the second street. He positioned them, and left to guide another vendor.

Chuck opened the doors of the cargo box, handing out pipes with square bases about nine inches on a side, explaining, "These supports are screwed into the fittings at the front corners and the midpoints of the retracting roof. As I crank it out, you two with the shorter pipes fit them in at the front corners, then on the front. The taller ones go halfway down the sides. When the pipes are fitted and the roof is all the way out, lift up enough to drop the pipes into the bases and slide the retaining pin through. You may have to wiggle the bases to get the holes to line up. Let's get going."

He hooked the long crank up to the winch that moved the roof in and out and began to turn the handle. The roof slid out of its housing and extended towards the street. In less than two minutes, the pipes were in and they had a waterproof roof to work under that also kept off the sun.

"Next step is placing the rack bases and the tables," Chuck said, suiting action to words as he climbed up into the box and handed out the bases and six foot long folding tables. "Just like we practiced back at the shop. Set up the tables on the right as you look in from the street and cover them with tablecloths, and put the racks in rows on the left with three feet in between. Use the bags of deck spikes and the hammers to stake the bases down so a gust of wind won't topple them."

The teenagers followed instructions. Hammers rang as the deck spikes with a washer on them to protect the bases were hammered through the holes that normally held wheels for rolling the racks around. As the bases were secured, two of the future business leaders of America went into the box and came out with the vertical supports that fitted into the bases and the horizontals with inserts welded on that slid into the verticals, transforming the bits from pieces of chromed pipe into display racks. In about 15 minutes, the racks and tables were ready for loading.

They had rehearsed this as well. It was more difficult in the dark than in daylight (Chuck scribbled a note into his notebook about getting some good headlamps for the team so they could see what they were doing), but it did not take long for the clothing to be put out in accordance with the plastic size numbers that clipped onto each rack from their travel bags. After that, the pre-loaded shoe racks came out and were displayed around the edge reaching out from the truck, with a couple of chairs unfolded so the customers could try them on. Finally, the glass-covered boxes of precious metal jewelry and the racks for the costume jewelry were set out on the tables reaching out from the fenders to the street. Last, Chuck brought out the box of T-handle bags and two wooden TV tray tables. One held a shallow box of white wrapping tissue, and the other the cashbox. Dawn was just breaking as they finished.

"Not bad for our first time," he said, smiling at Amy and her three cohorts. "We'll probably get faster as we get more experienced setting up and breaking down. You all know the drill. Change into your Emerson's Emporium polo shirts and go get breakfast at one of the food trucks, and if you don't mind, bring me back a large coffee and a sausage, egg and cheese sandwich. The gates open at eight, so there's time to eat without wolfing it down and still be able to hit the portajohns if you need to."

The gates opened promptly at 8:00 AM. This early in the season, there wasn't the crowd of customers and curiosity-seekers intrigued by the Grand Bazaar's recurring appearances on flea market chic shows and the quest for undervalued antiques to be resold to big city dealers that later in the season resulted in people squirting out of the chute like water from a hose. Today's crowd was made up of the bargain-hunters and flea market addicts who have been known to brave rain and bitter cold to prowl the field in search of whatever it is they are looking for. They spread out onto the roads and began to walk down them, peering into the booths as they went in search of treasure.

Emerson's Emporium being a novelty to these habitués, it wasn't long before the ladies were crowding the aisles, examining the clothing, holding it against them, looking in the mirrors standing against the truck between the racks, with an occasional woman going up the steps into the truck to use one of the two curtained "dressing rooms" to try something on. The kids were kept busy writing up sales receipts, with Chuck taking the cash, bagging up the purchases, and ringing through credit card sales via the cellphone card scanner and the hotspot in the cab. Occasionally, he'd move from his station at the front corner to show a customer a piece of jewelry from one of the cases to his right. A woman in a tunic shirt and leggings approached him, her jacket and a lot of clothes draped over one arm.

"Excuse me, but do you have a changing room?"

"Up the stairs into the truck," he said, pointing. "We have two curtained spaces in there. Be sure to Velcro the curtains closed, there's no way to knock to see if someone is inside."

"Thank you." She walked toward the steps. Chuck looked after her as men do, checking her out.

"Age: probably early 40s. Height: five foot eight or so. Nice longish legs in those knee-high boots," he thought. "Good firm ass under the winter-weight leggings. Narrow waist. Hips not excessively wide. Probably some variety of Latina, with that café au lait complexion and the jet-black hair. Can't tell about the boobs with the clothes she was holding. Definitely worth a second look, though." Another customer approached with her finds, and he set about bagging them up and collecting her money.

About fifteen minutes later, he had his head under the table rearranging the pile of hangers from clothes that had sold, making a mental note that he needed to come up with some kind of rack to drop them onto so they wouldn't turn into a tangled, foot-catching mess. He heard a pile of clothes drop onto the table.

"Just a second," he said as he finished rearranging the hangers. He looked up square into the cleavage of a pair of tits in the D-cup range, and his eyes widened appreciately. He could see clear down to a pair of everted nipples, the kind he liked.

"Hey, my eyes are up here," the woman said, amused rather than annoyed.

"Sorry about that. But seated behind this table, they are at eye level."

"And what do you think of them?"

"Nicely rounded, firm, with excellent cleavage. Moderately spectacular on your trim frame. I daresay in a bikini you attract many admiring glances at the beach."

She blushed. "Thank you, kind sir. I'm ready to be checked out."

"I thought I'd already done that," he riposted with a raised eyebrow. She laughed and handed her selections to him, watching as he added the tags up and gave her the total. She shrugged back into her jacket and fished in her shoulder bag for her wallet, handing over a pile of twenties and receiving her change, in both instances running her fingertips along his hand as the cash was exchanged. Taking her bagged purchases, she said, "I'm Miranda. Are you going to be here regularly, or is today a one-shot for you?"

"I'm Chuck, and yes, I'm going to be a regular here at the Bazaar. I hope we'll be seeing you again, Miranda."

"With merchandise like this, at these prices, you can count on it." With a wink and a smile, Miranda sashayed down the street in search of her next bargain. He looked after her, enjoying the rolling buttocks, seesawing hips, and shapely legs.

"You seem to have made a conquest, Mr. Emerson," said Amy, coming to stand with him.

"Out here on the field, I think you and your fellow students can call me Chuck. We'll save the 'Misters' for when your faculty advisor is around." A couple of new customers drifted in and they shifted their attention to them.

So went the entire day. People not interested in women's clothing or jewelry would walk by the Emporium; women and a few men would come in, check out the stock, and leave, folks derisively known as "lookie-lous" to flea market vendors; and a couple of varieties of buyers would go through the stock. One would rapidly go down the racks, flipping through the clothes until something struck their fancy, at which point they pulled it off the rod and draped it over their arms, knowing instinctively what would fit and look good and what wouldn't. The other sort worked through the stock in their size more slowly, taking clothing out, looking at it, putting it back, or keeping it to try on and see what it looked like in the mirror. And after deciding yes or no on the items, taking the ones they had decided against back to where they'd gotten them, and asking one of the kids or sometimes Chuck to write up the rest.

At 3:00, the customers began drifting to the gates to go home. As the crowd thinned to a trickle, Chuck and the high schoolers pulled a roll of light canvas he had had made up and wrapped it around the display area, tying it to the poles on top and using more deck spikes and washers to stake it down. When they were done, the merchandise was secure, although as a precaution they carried the jewelry and the cash box back into the truck. The kids went off to get more sandwiches before the food trucks shut down, and on their return set about setting up the truck for the night, inflating the air mattresses and spreading out their sleeping bags. He left them to relax and entertain themselves with their cellphones and tablets while he slipped out the one corner by the cab they had not staked down and went to wander the field and talk to the other adults who had chosen to stay overnight in small tents or their trucks as he was doing.

The vendors, relaxed now, talked about their days and how well or poorly they had done, the old-timers reminiscing about the time before the Internet when making two or three thousand dollars a day was routine, and five thousand or more was not unheard-of; and complaining that the Internet and eBay had ruined the flea market biz. Chuck listened more than he talked. One thing he took note of was the grumbling about the state of the selling field at the Grand Bazaar. Some vendors bitched that their slots weren't level. A couple told stories about ending up to their ankles in water at a couple of the spaces in the western part of the field on rainy days because of the pitch from the road. One fumed about his stock of glass and crystal being damaged because the roads hadn't been graded or graveled in years. He wondered if this was typical, or just old-timer grousing. One such conversation caused his ears to prick up.

"I hear tell Henry has listed the Bazaar for sale again. What with online auctions, it's not as profitable as it used to be, and he's not as young as he used to be. The weather around here isn't helping, neither. It's not as bad as the summer of '94 was, when it rained all weekend every weekend except one, but it ain't good. Last year it rained on either Saturday or Sunday nine weekends out of twelve in the springtime, and three times on both days, and three weekends out of twelve in the summer. In the fall Henry had to cancel the show two weekends because of hurricane warnings. The weather screwed up a whole third of the season! How can we make money if that keeps up?"

Sunday was a repeat of Saturday, though the crowds were even lighter at the start and people did not really start arriving until after 11 AM. Sales were slow but steady, and when the time came to break down, Chuck's horseback estimate was Emerson's Emporium had turned a profit on the weekend.

"Nice job, everyone. Tomorrow we will unload the clothes and hang them on the pickup rack back at the shop. Then you're free until Friday afternoon. Be sure to clock out when we get back." It took more than an hour to break down and pack up, but the team was sure as they gained experience, they could better that time.

Chapter 5

As the weekends went on, Emerson's Emporium became a popular booth with women and girls with good taste. Each week, Chuck sent one of the kids out to walk the field, listen to the vendors and the customers, and write a brief report on what they were saying. A plan had begun to take shape in his mind.

The teens were quietly amused by the fact that every weekend, Miranda stopped by to see what was new or different. It was always Chuck that she came to, to make her purchases. The kids thought that it was cute, watching the old folks dancing around their mutual attraction without even being aware they were doing it.

One afternoon, Amy's cellphone rang. Chuck was calling.

"Amy, do you think you could handle setup with Kevin and Clint this Saturday?"

She was startled, but covered it well. "Sure. Kevin can handle the truck, and I can do the layout in my sleep. But why won't you be there?"

"Because I just got a call from my old boss, Jeanine. She has an estate sale at a genuine estate, and there is a great deal of clothing and jewelry. She's prepared to make a deal for all the clothing on Friday at the start of the sale, and on the remaining jewelry at its end. But it means I'll have to miss Saturday at the Bazaar, because the sale doesn't end until Saturday afternoon. You'll be in charge. Stop by the shop Thursday afternoon to pick up the keys.

"I'm planning on taking Maria with me. Her fashion sense is as sharp as yours, and you're all hard workers. Between the two of us we can bag all the clothes and load the trailer. After we get everything back, we're going to have a big sorting and prepping job ahead of us, I'll bet."

"I kind of envy Maria. I've always wanted to see how you get our stock."

"It all depends on the day of the sale, and who is doing the selling. Maybe next time I can take everyone. See you Thursday. 'Bye."

Early Friday saw Chuck and Maria set out in the big pickup with the dual axle trailer behind, bound for the sort of sale that Chuck told Maria didn't come along very often, perhaps once every couple of years. Chuck could see the petite Italian girl would be a deliciously slender beauty one day, but right now still had her teenage puppy fat. She looked at him and asked, "How could it happen that someone rich enough to afford an honest-to-God mansion like the ones you see on Masterpiece Theater get to the point where they have to sell everything?"