GREEN BROOK, N.J. — CVS employee Martin Jackson received a harrowingly blank stare from a customer after naively asking how she was doing while she browsed options in the hair dye aisle, confirmed management.
“It was just a normal day greeting customers when I found a young woman crouched next to the hair dye. I realized she hadn’t moved an inch in over five minutes so I finally asked if I could help her with anything,” said Jackson while splashing cold water onto his face in the store’s break room. “I get it. Not many customers like making small talk, so I wasn’t expecting much from our interaction. But when we locked eyes, I could tell she was going through something. She looked like she hadn’t slept in days and her tired eyes didn’t look at me, they looked through me. It was as if she just witnessed a thousand deaths and their souls ripped from their bodies, but I was just trying to be helpful.”
An onlooking customer recounts her experience witnessing the interaction.
“I overheard an employee making small talk with another customer and the whole exchange was unsettling,” said CVS ExtraCare Rewards member Sharon Lewis. “I peered over the shelf to see a young woman doing a weird crab walk while holding two boxes of green hair dye. She was dead silent other than a few grunts and maybe a low hiss, and she had the most gut-wrenching look of emptiness in her eyes. The employee tried to engage, but the woman seemed to be in her own world, just lost. I was so thankful that the entire interaction was over, but as soon as he left, I looked over the shelf again to see the woman balled up on the ground quietly sobbing, surrounded by boxes of Arctic Fox hair dye.”
Board-certified psychologist Dr. Maxine Franklin is one of the most well-regarded voices in the field of stress management.
“It’s very common for someone going through intense mental distress to induce drastic cosmetic changes,” said Dr. Franklin. “I have seen many patients choose to shave their head, dye their hair, pierce their eyebrow, get a throat tattoo, and the list goes on, all to cope with the unbearable amount of stress. Then again, you don’t really need a degree in psychology to know that a box of twelve-dollar drug store hair dye is usually not the purchase of a fiscally or mentally stable person.”
At press time, witnesses reported seeing the woman at the nearby QuickMart entering her eighth hour of staring at frozen dinners.