AKA Everything

I was standing in line at the post office, six or seven back. We were in that common traffic jam slow-down mode, with one guy sending a huge tube to some far off country, in need of insurance and insurance on top of the insurance. And some other poor soul counting out change at a glacial pace. My boy was in the car, so I was a little restless, but I could wait. Last night, around midnight, there was a long skid screech followed by a giant thump. I ran out, along with some of my neighbors, to find a truck nose-dived into a tree. Empty. Someone saw the guy running away. Cops were on the scene in under two minutes. Which way did he go? And they were off. One woman came back and cut in line to tell the clerk helping the tube guy that she smelled something burning in the lobby. The clerk looked up, unperturbed, and said, “I’ll check on that shortly.” I bumped up a few more spots in line. The tube guy had one more thing he needed to ask. A friend’s child, in the middle of playing a video game at dinner the other night, answered a question with a off-handed, “AKA everything.” He assumed he’d answered the question. Three, four minutes passed. The clerk looked up absent-mindedly, and said, to no one in particular, “I better check on that fire.” Mine weren’t the only pair of eyebrows raised. Finally, I got called up to the desk. One envelope, first class, no receipt, thank you. And I was out the door. Tube guy was still chatting away with the clerk, who still hadn’t torn himself away from his tasks. And, indeed, the lobby smelled vaguely of burnt paper. I wasn’t going to look into it. I put my head down and walked quickly to my car.