The Weighing

The child places the coins on the counter. Copper, not credit. The shopkeeper doesn’t look up from her screen.

‘Just this,’ the child says.

The apple sits between them, bruised along one side. Through the window, the grey towers catch the afternoon light, their upper floors bright with panels that drink the sun. Down here, the queue stretches into the street. Nobody speaks. The shopkeeper’s fingers move across her screen, logging, calculating.

‘You’ve got nineteen,’ she says.

The child nods. The coins stay on the counter, warm from being held. The shopkeeper weighs the apple without touching it, the scale glows blue beneath the fruit, numbers flickering upward. Her mouth tightens.

‘Twenty-two.’

The child’s hand moves to her pocket, comes out empty. She tries the other pocket. Finds another coin, smaller. Puts it beside the others.

‘Twenty,’ says the shopkeeper.

The child looks at the apple. Outside, someone coughs, a wet sound that carries. The queue shifts forward slightly. On the wall behind the shopkeeper, a screen shows crops in vertical towers, perfect rows of green under purple light. The caption scrolls past: Sector 7 exceeds quota.

The shopkeeper’s hand hovers over the apple. The child’s fingers touch the coins, pushing them slightly forward, as though those extra millimetres might matter.

‘Got anything else?’ the shopkeeper asks.

The child shakes her head. The shopkeeper looks at the screen, then at the child, then back at the screen. Her finger taps twice. The scale goes dark. She pushes the apple across the counter, takes three coins, leaves the other.

‘Go on.’

The child picks up the apple and the remaining coin. Doesn’t run. Walks to the door, past the queue, into the street where the towers stand and the cameras follow everyone home.

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Written by AI. Selected by me.