“Don't worry about it.” answered Jim. “Forget about it.”
As Jim stepped out of the truck and over to a telephone pole with the newly-acquired GPS device, Cody followed while appearing to supervise. Cody watched as Jim activated the device to locate where he was standing. Once the detailed latitude and longitude coordinates were provided, Jim logged them into a notebook and walked back to the truck.
But Cody stopped Jim midway and asked, “What are you going to do with that?”
“The coordinates? I put them in a spreadsheet and then update the map with it.”
“Aren't you going create an address tag for the pole?”
“Nope, the coordinates are way, too long for an address tag. It's only being used for reference.”
The answer wasn't good enough for Cody. “Whoa! Wait until Ryan hears about this! From what I understand, you are to be conducting a detailed GPS survey of each telephone pole and them labeling them. Why aren't you following instructions?”
Jim sighed, “I was never told to label the poles. And how big of a label would we need to fit all those coordinates?”
Cody shook his head in disbelief and then reached for his cell phone. “Hang on; let me give Ryan a call!”
Cody's tattletale report to Ryan resulted in an immediate trip back to the Mapleview Cable office. If you were in Jim's shoes, being tattled on by a young cadet who is supposed to be in training and then ordered to come back to the office, how might your attitude be? Rest assured, nothing was said during that ride back to Mapleview Cable. Cody was the first to exit the vehicle and was sure to be many feet ahead of his supposed mentor, en route towards Ryan's office.
Moments after Cody entered the office and sat down across from Ryan's desk, Jim entered.
Ryan announced Jim's entrance. “Jim!”
Jim froze at the door, thoroughly fed up with his recent treatment at the job.
Ryan continued, “I was afraid it would eventually get to this.” The he paused for a few seconds before continuing to speak. “Come on in and have a seat.”
Jim did as ordered.
With everyone seated, Ryan initiated the meeting by asking Jim, “So what's going on out there? It sounds like we have a problem?”
Immediately, Cody spoke up. “I actually noticed a few things about Jim this morning. From what I gather, he's been slacking off and allowing excessive leakage to come out of the utility boxes. Then I noticed he's a violator of OSHA regulations by not placing a safety cone outside of his truck. Even worse, he's using safety equipment that is overdue yearly certification.”
Ryan looked over to Jim, “Jim, how could you? I'm disappointed in you!” Then he looked back at Cody, “What's he doing with the telephone pole labeling project?”
“I guess he's getting the GPS readings at each pole, jotting the coordinates down in some notebook and entering them in the infrastructure map. But he's not labeling the poles.”
Ryan turned his attention back to Jim, “Jimmy! This is not good! What's going on?”
Jim had been silent in recent times for too long and it was time he spoke up in defense for himself. “Can I talk, finally?”
“Yes, you may.” reassured Ryan.
“First of all, you never said anything about labeling those telephone poles. Aside from that, those coordinates are very lengthy. I don't know what sort of label you would need to accommodate those long lists of numbers. As for the safety gloves that are overdue certification, you were already aware that the inspector was behind schedule.”
Ryan raised his finger in interruption. “Yes, I already knew about the gloves. But suppose you can explain to me why you are violating OSHA regulations and not setting a safety cone out behind your truck?”
Jim now raised his voice. “Come-on, Ryan! We weren't dragging equipment out of the truck! I only pulled over to show Cody the inside of the utility box!”
“Still, Jim, if OSHA inspectors happened to be driving by, we would have been slapped with a fine. How old are you, now, Jim?”
Jim had been with Mapleview Cable for 18 years; started at 22. He was now 40, definitely a seasoned veteran in the business with seniority and worthy of some degree of respect, especially in the face of young men who were in their early to mid 20s who hadn't more than a year's experience in the company. He proudly announced with a challenging look on his face. “I'm 40!”
“Well, Jim, why don't you start acting your age?—someone who is 40.”
“Excuse me?” answered Jim
“What?”
“You said something about my age!”
Ryan calmly sat back in his seat. “Jim, here's the thing: I've got you making up excuses for violating OSHA regulations; I discover you are slacking off in your job by allowing utility boxes to leak signal; and you are slacking off in your job by doing a project I assigned you, incorrectly. I would expect this sort of thing from someone like 20 years younger than you. I mean I feel like I have Cody babysitting you. How else would you want me think?”
Now I won't detail the remainder of that discussion as to how Jim tried in vain to explain why the excessive signal leakage from that box at the intersection of Mapleview Road and 6th avenue was acceptable. Nor will I detail his fruitless argument of how impossible it would have been to label the poles with lengthy GPS coordinates. Jim raised his voice throughout most of the discussion while Ryan spoke calmly in a patronizing manner, imposing his belief of being so many more years wiser than Jim. At some point it was decided that acquiring thousands of metal tags with lengthy GPS coordinates would require a purchase requisition; something that might be delayed with the soon-to-be company takeover.
And then Ryan made his executive decisions which ultimately ended the meeting. “So for now, Jim, just continue doing the project as you've been doing. By the time we get tags, Cody will be the official lineman technician and you can devote all your energies to nailing the tags up on the poles.” And then he sighed, “Jim, I'd hate to do this to you, but when you come in tomorrow, there will be two final written warnings on my desk for you to sign.”
“What?” Jim exclaimed. “You can't give me final written warnings. I've never received verbal warnings for anything!”
“Well, let's see; I had you in here one morning because you were sending cards in to the warranty center with vague diagnostic information. I caught you fooling around in a utility box a couple weeks ago that ultimately caused a serious outage. I believe you've received plenty of verbal warnings from me. Don't feel bad. Company policy says that after a year you will be eligible to have those written warnings erased from your employee file. But the new company might have a different policy when it comes to written warnings. Provided there's actually a chance for you to stay with us at the new company, your employee file might start fresh. But let me warn you; documenting your recent insubordinate behavior does not look good for you if they decide to clean house.”
Despite how irate and thoroughly fed up Jim was with recent times, he now found himself pleading with his arrogant, young boss to be merciful. “Ryan, you can't do this to me; you just can't. Come-on, give me a break. Please don't write me up—not with the possibility of layoffs coming.”
“Sorry Jim, I wish the situation were different. I can't allow your careless and insubordinate actions to be met without consequence. That's life. Be a big boy and take your punishment.”
Jim turned numb at that moment and suddenly didn't care about anything. He stood up from his chair, threw his hands up and stormed out of the office. Never mind his obligation of training Cody for the remainder of the day. Jim simply needed to get away; far away from the office where he could be alone.
Chapter 64
The forest was the place where Jim needed to be; in particular, the very place where Ekaterina resided. This stolen moment made possible by storming out of the office and driving off from Mapleview Cable provided the perfect opportunity to look for Ekaterina. Jim parked on the side of Mapleview Road, climbed over the guardrail
and into the forest. The narrow path created by him and Ekaterina was still there. It served as a comforting reminder that what Jim experienced in all those weeks actually did occur in reality.
Jim was destined to lose his job. Ryan and Cody inevitably had him on a schedule to constantly mess and fail. Today they succeeded in finding a way to write him up so that Jim would be gone when the new company cleaned house.
But then Doctor Millheimer's haunting words returned in Jim's imagination.
“How about false beliefs or strange delusions? Delusions are most often characterized with fantastic ideas such as the belief that people conspire against you, and are out to hurt you?”
Jim paid no mind to this possibility and continued hiking to the location of Ekaterina's cottage. Jim wasn't stupid! He lived long enough to know what Ryan had in store for him. Jim was slated to lose his job later that year.
This was the sort of thing that probably happened to witches as they realized what they had turned into. For many weeks, Jim was gradually called and inducted into magick. Ekaterina trained him. Now the world was changing around him. Most people in Jim's position would fall apart. But he was now a witch and much stronger than the rest of them.
“Sometimes you might think that you have some great power over everyone else.”
No! Jim knew he had a power over everyone else. Jim's sanity and very life depended on understanding this! Now a short distance from the location of Ekaterina's cottage, Jim was disappointed to discover it remained invisible.
“Ekaterina! I know you are here! You can come out, now.”
Then he realized the carelessness on his part. If Ekaterina was hiding for safety, Jim wasn't doing a good job in protecting her. She was probably in some magickal, invisible, parallel universe where she carefully observed Jim and everything he did. This was probably a test. Yes, of course! Why hadn't Jim thought of this before? Ekaterina probably waited patiently for him on the other side—that invisible, magickal realm where she invited Jim to go on Saturday afternoon. Would Jim pass the test? Could he enter this alternate dimension and find his new, loving witch-family?
“There is another delusion that seems to be a growing trend in society. Some people are under the impression that they are influenced by paranormal forces.”
Jim ignored his imagination's resistance. He needed to believe! This was the crucial key in generating enough magickal power to cross over and find Ekaterina. He knew how to reach that invisible, magickal realm. He was to return to the special place where Ekaterina led him on Saturday—the place where the wind seemingly blew out of nowhere. From there Jim would find the magick portal and finally cross over.
Jim walked for some twenty minutes to Ekaterina's special place in the forest, all the while ignoring any suggestion from the imagined voice of Doctor Millheimer.
“How about hallucinations? Hallucinations are different from delusions in that rather than simply believing in some fantastic notion, the sufferer actually sees or hears things that are not present in reality. Do you experience this?”
If Ekaterina had only been a hallucination, then Jim wouldn't have known about the special spot in the forest. Ekaterina was real. His experiences with her were equally real. While continuing to maintain his belief in her, Jim climbed the final hill which ultimately led him to the place where he and Ekaterina stood on Saturday.
But where was the wind? It blew out of nowhere on Saturday; but now the air remained still with only the gentle trickle of water some distance below at the bottom of the ravine. “Ekaterina? Where are you?”
Maybe if Jim closed his eyes and concentrated on the wind it would finally appear. Then it would open the necessary magick portal and provide the means to join Ekaterina. Jim concentrated with all his might and imagined a strong wind blowing out of nowhere. But when he opened his eyes, there was nothing.
“Come-on, Ekaterina! You have to help me! I can't do this alone!”
But there was no answer and no help from Ekaterina. She was gone, probably forever. Jim had the opportunity to leave this world and live happily ever after with Ekaterina on Saturday afternoon. But he passed the chance up and walked away.
Or maybe it was something else. The voice of Ekaterina spoke in Jim's imagination. “Just think about your girlfriend. What is she doing to you? You know what she is and what she's trying to do to you.”
* * *
Amber feverishly completed another mystical portrait in the candlelit attic of her home. It was that of Jim in the very place of nature where he was now at. Jim was heartbroken, confused and holding back that split second just before going insane. Tears rolled from his face as he lay in a disheveled mess at the very spot where the young Ekaterina had been last embraced. But unbeknown to Jim, the ghost of an old witch stood before him with a small cup positioned underneath his face and collecting his tears.
Finally; a heartbroken man's tears that had been cried for her! She could use them as needed.
The End
To be continued in the third book of Amber, house of witches.
Author Biography
Tom Raimbault is recognized as one of those authors who have difficulty distinguishing fantasy from reality. But as he feels, this is the crucial ingredient in writing dark fantasies and horror. Much of his writing sessions have occurred during the witching hour while the rest of the world sleeps. Tom arises from bed at two o'clock in the morning to ensure that he is partly in that unseen world behind the veil. From there he writes, for you, his most treasured place of fiction, Mapleview; and hopes that each book is a visual trip to his world of fantasy.
Halloween is an especially important holiday for Tom, and is celebrated each year on his blog with new short stories that portray the eerie world behind the veil, and those mysterious things that reach and call out to us.
Tom has developed a noteworthy style of storytelling that he calls “freaked out horror”. With it he attempts to paint up the classic black and white Twilight Zone feel to relay the strange, the macabre and the bizarre. This style of writing expands into his bizarre tales of science fiction, alien abduction horror, and extra terrestrial romance fantasies.
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