Meander Alert

A search is underway at an Orlando area retail store for a manager who disappeared shortly after announcing he was heading to the sales floor. So far all attempts to locate and bring the manager back to the office have been fruitless.

The staff of the big-box retailer Kessler’s All-In-One recount the events that led to sales manager Patrick Dowd’s disappearance hours ago.

“We were all sitting at the table in the upstairs office,” says customer service manager Dean Moeller, “and one of the salespeople kept calling over the radio for something or other. At the time we were just kind of tuning it out as you do.”

“We had a customer demanding to buy the display of a vacuum cleaner,” says sales worker Marisa Frimpter, “and we’re not allowed to sell floor models of big-ticket items like that without a manager signing off.”

“It was actually really annoying,” says Moeller. “Dowd was asking our opinions on where to go on his next vacation, but this girl on the sales floor would not give it a rest!”

“This woman was legit screaming in my face to see a manager,” says Frimpter. “I don’t think it’s too much to ask that whoever was even managing that day come down.”

“Eventually we just got tired of hearing the damn thing squawk,” says Moeller, hopefully about the radio, “and after we reminded Dowd that he was the sales duty manager he agreed to go see what all the fuss was about.”

That was the last time anyone saw Mr. Dowd.

“I was just standing here with this lady for like ten minutes,” says Frimpter, “and nobody showed up.”

“This is absolutely ridiculous,” says customer Beth Vaughan, who is still waiting to buy the vacuum cleaner. “Real nice to see this is how they treat their valued customers!”

The generous use of the word “valued” aside, even the worst absentee managers wouldn’t keep a customer waiting for this long, and as the minutes ticked into even more minutes it had become clear that something had gone wrong.

“We tried checking the security footage,” says loss prevention officer JP Guzman, “but the cameras around the store are honestly a little out of date. Except for the cameras at self-checkout. Now if that guy was skip-scanning we’d have a crystal-clear view of it! But all I could say for certain about Mr. Dowd is that he went down the south-side stairwell at approximately 5:04pm, entered the sales floor around Home and Garden, but then we lose visual as he turns a corner towards Automotive.”

“Literally the opposite direction he needed to be going,” says Frimpter with an eye roll.

After about 30 minutes and several unsuccessful attempts to call Mr. Dowd over the radio, JP Guzman and several store staffers fanned out around the store to try to find where he may have gone. There have been several reported Dowd sightings but no visual confirmation.

“I thought I saw him walk down the Kitchen Gadget aisle, get to the end, and then turn around and walk back the way he came,” says merchandiser Paul Sipe, “but I’m not entirely sure that was him. Could’ve just been some guy looking for the oven mitts. Kitchen Textiles, my guy!”

“Someone in a shirt and tie came back behind the counter and then out the door that leads to the loading dock,” says bakery worker Jess Trapenton. “I think it was him, but it’s not like customers don’t do shit like that from time to time.”

“Oh, I think he did walk by here a while ago,” says customer Beth Vaughan. “Wait, is that the manager I’ve been standing here waiting for!?”

“Holy crap, how the hell big is this store!?” says customer service manager Dean Moeller, scrolling his instagram feed (mostly posts about boating) still in the upstairs office, while these accounts are recounted to him.

While these leads were all noted by JP Guzman, there is still no official word on where Dowd may have ended up.

“All we can say for certain,” says Guzman, “is that Mr. Dowd has not, as of yet, stolen anything from self-checkout.”

As the search for Mr. Dowd goes into its second and a half hour, the staff are steeling themselves for the news that their beloved manager might not be coming back.

“Wouldn’t surprise me one bit if he just walked out,” says merchandiser Paul Sipe. “That vacuum lady might’ve just been one whiny customer too many.”

“I mean, that’s fine by me if he did just F-O,” says sales worker Mary Reichert. “I’ve worked here for four years and I’ve literally never met the guy. And he’s like my boss or something? Whatever, see you around. Or not I guess.”

“Legend has it he got held hostage by organized shoplifters but then got Stockholm Syndrome and now he’s part of their crew,” says Molly Sturgis of the Returns department, “but Josh says he heard he sharted himself and went home to save himself the embarrassment.”

While rumors and legends (seriously though, legends!?) are one thing, the fact remains that there is a person missing and the priority at this store is to find Mr. Dowd and bring him back safely.

“I’m sure it’s fine,” says Dean Moeller. “It’s almost time to close up for the night anyway, let the openers deal with it.”

“I can’t help but feel responsible,” says sales worker Marisa Frimpter who initially called Dowd to the sales floor. “You can’t just throw these managers out of the upstairs office onto the sales floor and expect them to just know where to go. I should’ve known better, I should’ve went up and walked him down. What am I even going to tell his family if they asked me what happened? How am I going to look my coworkers in the–”

“SO AM I GOING TO BE ABLE TO BUY THIS VACUUM OR NOT!?” interrupts Beth Vaughan.

While JP Guzman promises to keep his investigation going well into the hour of 10pm (but not past because that’s when his shift ends), he’s not optimistic about finding Mr. Dowd.

“There’s not much hope, in my experience, for a manager that’s been missing on the sales floor for this long,” he says. “We may find him disheveled in a corner somewhere covered in dust like we did Ms. Dworkin four years ago, or they might just pop back into the office a week later like nothing happened just like Mr. Johansen did at the Topeka store that time. But rest assured, I will stop at nothing until we find out what happened to Mr. Dowd! But I have the next couple days off and then we have that big sale this weekend, so I probably won’t start until Monday, or maybe Tuesday because Monday’s usually a wash. You know, I’ve got PTO the week after that, so maybe I’ll wait till I come back from that....”

Well, wherever he is, we just hope that for his own sake and the sake of all the employees who care about him, that Patrick Dowd is safe. Oh, and also his family he apparently has that someone mentioned earlier I think. We should talk to them, actually….

Update:

After we wrapped up our investigation at the Orlando All-In-One, we received this report from an employee at a Target store whose parking lot connects with All-In-One’s.

From Target employee Marshall Branch:

I was cleaning up around the Home department getting ready to close up for the night when this one manager come up to me and ask if I had called for him. Now I had never seen this man before, but I figured he was just new but I told him I never called for a manager. He said something like he was looking for a vacuum cleaner or something, so I told him where they were and sent him on his way. At the end of the night, he thanked us for all our hard work and for handling “the vacuum lady” but should let him know next time if we no longer need him because he was looking for this lady for a long time. It was weird. Everybody said they didn’t call about no vacuum, and nobody else knew who he was. But he said we could go so we all just left. Weird though, right?