The Vending Machine, Part 3

"You know," Emma said, "if you'd just stop fixating on what happened, you'd get over it."

"Easier said than done," said James. "You weren't the one who embarrassed himself in a roomful of the best and brightest." He closed his eyes with a grimace.

"The Bollocks Club?" asked Emma, with a wicked grin on her face.

"Billocks --!"

"Bollocks! Best and brightest, hah! Funny old men, doddering about a room jabbering about sasquatchiae and bigfeet --"

"Bigfoots, technically --"

"Oh, you know what I mean. Anyway, there isn't any evidence these creatures exist --"

"Cryptids, accurately, and there's plenty! Video evidence, pictures, sound recordings, not to mention the hundreds and hundreds of sightings and encounters."

Emma paused in her step. "Have you?" she asked.




"I have," said James solemnly. "Right here in these woods."

"Ooh, was it big and hairy, with a lumbering gait?"

"Well, yes --"

"Was it carrying a pile of leaflets and a Bible, too? Because that sounds like one of those Jehovah's witnesses."

"Emma! I'm serious! I'll take you to the spot and show you. We're almost there."

They walked on in silence for a while. The wind gusted, scattering leaves around their feet.

"What do these Bollocks -- Billocks -- people do, anyway? Sit around and compare notes?"

"In a manner of speaking. They've got video surveillance over most of these woods ever since the last sighting two years ago." said James.

"Is that legal? Does that mean I can't go naked running on this trail anymore? Unless I want a bunch of old codgers staring at my --"

"They wouldn't!" said James, appalled. "And they don't have any cameras pointed at the trail. So you could. Still."

"Could what?"

"Run. Naked."

"Nah," she said cheerfully, "Women don't do that. Hurts too much."

"Oh."

Eventually, they crested a hill.

"This was where I saw it," said James. "I was running --"

"Naked?"

"Running in the afternoon," he sighed. "I paused to catch my breath, heard a shuffling sound in the underbrush behind me, turned around and saw --"

"A vending machine?" finished Emma.

There was, in fact, a vending machine facing them as they turned around.

James frowned. "This wasn't here before."

"Definitely has," She bent down to inspect its base. "Look how it's sunk into the soil."

"This was not here two weeks ago," he repeated.

"It's weathered," Emma gestured. "You can barely make out the words. 'Wishes granted, destinies fulfilled?' This is an odd vending machine. There's only one button, too."

"I turned around," said James, ignoring her, "and saw my very first cryptid. Bigger than me, maybe eight foot high but bent over, fur matted and mossy, two arms and two legs. It saw me and scampered off. I can't even begin to express how I felt. I mean, I've always believed in cryptids, but to see one! In the flesh!"

"Baby's first cryptid! Gold star to you. Do you have any coins? I want to try this machine."

"So I went straight to the Billocks Club and blubbered out my story in the most hysterical manner -- I completely forgot you needed an appointment -- and these gentlemen were too polite to stop me from interrupting their tea. God, I could've died of shame," said James.

"I really don't have any coins." said Emma. She had turned out her pockets and was absently searching her shoes.

"Are you even listening to me?"

"James, you know how I've told you my greatest dream in life was to become a marine biologist in the Mediterranean?"

"Yes," sighed James.

"Well, scratch that! My greatest dream in life is to have a bloody fifty pence piece to stick in that vending machine," she said, not taking here eyes off the ground. "Maybe someone's dropped one around here."

"We've known each other for years, right?" asked James.

"Right."

"Since our first History class with Mrs. Lamp."

"Right."

"And we've been going on these weekly walks for what, two years?"

"Right."

"I think we need to reconsider our friendship."

"What?" asked Emma, momentarily distracted.

"I don't think you respect me enough."

"Nonsense. I respect you plenty. Top ten, in my list," said Emma, magnanimously.

"Not about cryptids," said James.

"No," she laughed, "But who does?"

"The Bollocks Club!"

"Bollocks?"

"Billocks!"

"They don't count." She smirked.

"I have a fifty pence coin," James announced. He held it out to her. "You can have it for the price of cryptid respect."

Emma inhaled sharply. "That's steep," she said, looking at the coin. She wet her lips.

"Take it or leave it."

"Oh, fine." She grabbed the coin and stuffed it into the machine, bouncing on the balls of her feet.

There was a series of clunks as the pressed the button, a whirring that intensified over the rhythm of something chugging deep within the vending machine's recesses. It vibrated, ever so gently. And then the noises all stopped, and there was a ding! as a bell rang. Something fell into the slot below.

James and Emma looked expectantly at the slot.

She reached in, her hand trembling, and pulled it out.

It was a fifty pence coin.

"Bollocks," she scowled. "What a waste of time."

James just laughed and pulled her away. "Have you heard the Billocks Club manifesto? It's such a stirring piece of writing..."

It would be a long day.