Lal Jee Kirayana Store

If you walk down the lanes in Nangal Raya and find WZ-636, that’s where Lal Jee Kirayana Store is. I’ve been sitting behind this counter for more years than I care to count. The shop is small, and every inch of the walls is covered with shelves holding lentils, soaps, and bags of flour. It gets a bit crowded in the mornings when everyone wants their milk and bread at the same time. I usually have to tell the kids to wait their turn while I weigh out the sugar. The fan on the ceiling makes a clicking noise that I’ve stopped noticing, but visitors always mention it. We keep everything local people need for their kitchens. Sometimes the delivery truck blocks the narrow road and the neighbors complain, so we have to hurry up and unload the sacks of rice. I know who likes which brand of tea and who is going to ask for credit until the end of the month. It’s not like those big supermarkets where nobody knows your name. Here, we talk about the weather or how the prices of onions are going up again. My hands are usually dusty from handling the grain sacks. It’s a quiet kind of life, just keeping the pantry stocked for the neighborhood. We don’t have fancy lights, just a few tube lights that flicker sometimes.