Libby’s famous smile flickers when she sees another woman smile from the opposite escalator with a wide, toothy grimace.
“A face only a mother would love,” she mutters, striding over to the next mall store with extended sales. She smiles at the cashier. He grins back, his ears vanishing behind a wall of gleaming teeth.
Forgetting everything now, she hurries back into a suddenly manic throng, passing from leer to leer as other shoppers direct her to the fire-lit house built with toys. Waifs grab her hands and pull her to an enormous, red man with a wide, open mouth.
(Written for Loren Eaton’s 2013 Advent Ghost Storytelling Fest)
Holy mackerel, I never thought smiling would be so scary. Nicely done, Phil.
Ha! You’re very kind. I probably even believe all the praise you give me. I appreciate it.
That experience is unexplored in its scariness. Nice work!
After reading “Holiday Shopping With a Smile” I now realize what it is that bothers me about the malls at Christmas.
Great job, Phil.
Very nice. I read an article a while back about how American culture places a premium on both being happy and smiling. It also explained that the toothy grin so common in photographs is evolutionarily different from a smile that expresses happiness. It’s related to aggression and/or predation.
Good, creepy, and fun.
Thanks, guys. And don’t ever leave your kid with Santa or Krumpus or whoever is in your mall. You won’t get him back.
Yikes. That’s where you got me. That’s where it went from weird to horrible, and I believed you the rest of the way down the rabbit hole. Nicely done.