Breaking News!

Sources are reporting that a customer who had previously insinuated that a retail worker had lied to her has now returned with additional questions. Why they would request further information from a person they have deemed to be untrustworthy is not yet known at this time.

It was about 6:13pm at a Kansas City, MO big-box retailer store when Nancy Keller approached a sales associate with questions regarding scented candles.

“She was looking for a cherry limeade scented candle,” says Mark Hubbard, sales associate. “I told her we don’t carry that flavor and even if we did, it would be part of the summer line. We’re all about the pumpkin spice and bonfire ones right now.”

The weirdness of referring to candles by “flavor” aside, it seemed a pretty straightforward answer. Nancy Keller, however, was not satisfied with it.

“I’ve gotten it here before, I know I have,” says Keller. “It’s here somewhere, he must be new and can’t be bothered to help.”

“I told her she was welcome to take a look at our selection,” says Hubbard, “but asked if maybe she was thinking of something she saw at a different store. I mean, as long as I’ve worked here we’ve never carried that oddly specific flavor of candle.”

Okay, seriously, can we look into whether this guy is eating the candles?

“I’d understand if he just said he didn’t know,” says Keller, “but I can’t abide people who lie just to get out of doing their jobs.”

Being accused of lying over trivial matters is nothing new to most customer service workers, but what happened next was unheard of. Okay, well, it’s pretty heard of, but still kind of crazy.

“I was going about my closing routine,” says Hubbard, “when the candle lady came back. I thought for a second maybe she found the cherry whatever candles and was going to rub it in my face.”

But rubbing scented candles in a sales associate’s face, albeit less weird than eating them, was not what Keller had in mind.

Witnesses of the incident say Keller again approached Hubbard, this time with a bouquet of dried flowers, and asked “Excuse me, can you tell me if these are real or artificial?”

“I was taken aback for a second,” says Hubbard. “Like, she had just called me a liar to my face. And now she trusts my input? It just didn’t make sense.”

Mark Hubbard answered her question and Keller went on her way, leaving Hubbard and several witnesses dumbfounded.

“I have to admire her ability to forgive and forget,” says Sally Mayfield, who saw the entire incident go down. “I don’t know if I’d be as quick to learn to trust someone again.”

“Maybe that lady just considered that the employee is doing his best,” says George Mayfield, another witness, “and you shouldn’t discount someone entirely based on one little slip-up.”

“Yeah, it’s kind of weird that she’d come back,” says customer Steve Ratner, “but I just can't get over the fact that dude over there is talking about what the candles taste like.”

RIGHT!?!?

Hubbard and the witnesses are left with one question: Is Nancy Keller naive or just willing to forgive? However, it is possible that she doesn’t believe people will remember when she insults them.

Upon leaving the store, we asked Keller why she returned to the department to ask another question.

“Oh, I was just wondering if those bouquets would trigger my allergies,” she says. “And the employee who helped me was much nicer than that other one I asked about the candles earlier.”

Yeah, okay, so that makes sense.