Block's Arc

Chapter 3 of 6

The paper ad ran Wednesday morning. Block bought a copy from the vending box outside the store and read the two-column notice under the fluorescent lights at the counter. FRIDAY NIGHT — MEMBERS PICK THREE FREE. It looked small on the page. Block set the paper down next to the legal pad and stared at what he had written for the district office pitch. Three paragraphs about loyal customers. One about the kid and his mother. Nothing a suit could measure. Block knew it wouldn't hold. Sentiment wasn't a number, and the district office ran on numbers. Block pulled the notebook from under the counter and opened it flat. Two years of nightly notes. Damaged tapes. Empty-handed customers. Requests he couldn't fill. Block flipped to a blank page and started counting. He tallied every name he recognized as a repeat renter. He counted how many times each had come in over the last six months. He counted the walk-outs and what titles they had asked for. By noon he had four pages of hard figures. A woman came in with two kids and rented a stack of animated films. Block scanned each barcode and wrote her name in the notebook under a new column: FRIDAY RSVP. He asked if she was coming Friday night. She said she'd seen the ad and yes, she'd bring her sister too. Block wrote a two next to her name. He did the same with the next customer. And the next. By three o'clock he had thirty-one confirmed heads on paper. He called the paper again and asked the ad desk what a full-page cost. Too much. He called the mall office across the lot and asked if they had an inflatable he could borrow for Friday, the tall waving one he'd seen outside the shoe store last summer. The manager laughed and said he could rent it for forty bucks. Block put forty bucks of his own money on the counter and wrote it in the notebook under EXPENSES. Thursday night Block stayed until two in the morning. He built a one-page sheet. Total active members. Rentals per week. Repeat rate. Confirmed Friday turnout, now up to sixty-eight names. He added a line at the bottom: STORE SERVES 412 HOUSEHOLDS THIS MONTH. NEAREST REPLACEMENT: 22 MILES. He printed six copies at the copy shop before it closed and slid them into a folder. Friday at ten a.m. the district rep pulled into the lot in a gray sedan. The tall inflatable waved from the curb. The tower sign glowed above the roof even in daylight. Block met the rep at the door with the folder in his hand. The rep opened it, read the top sheet, and stopped on the 412 line. He looked up. "This is what I needed," he said. "I can bring this back to the region. No promises. But I can bring it back." Block held the door open and let him inside.