“Hey Jesse, I know it’s early but do you have the stuff?” The voice on the other end of the phone was harried—desperate, and he spoke in hushed tones as if he was afraid of being overheard.
“Actually, I do,” I told the man on the line, whispering too for some unknown reason. “But if you want the delivery early you’ll have to do a pickup. I’m babysitting right now.”
“Wait, you’re babysitting?”
“Yeah,” I said, not sure why it was a question since I just said that exact thing.
“At the bar?”
“Yes. It’s not like it’s open right now and his mom was in a bad way so I’m doing her a solid.”
“Is she pretty?” Why do people ask that? Like really, does it even matter? I mean, yeah she was cute in that, always in a hurry, not quite having your shit together but still incredibly endearing way, but screw him for asking.
“That’s none of your business,” I said coolly, grateful that I thought of a quick response to end that particular line of questioning. The laughter on the other end of the line was loud and long, booming through the receiver so that even Jesse lifted his head to see where the noise was coming from.
“I’ll be over in a minute,” was all he said before he ended the call, and I was left holding my phone, feeling embarrassed for reasons I couldn’t even explain. Whatever, that asshole. He was lucky I had product for him to begin with.
“Hey JJ,” I said as I grabbed the wet rag JJ had been using to clean up and wiping up all of the spots that he missed. “Have you ever seen a man as big as a bear?”
6
Harlow
I'd never had a more bizarre interview in my entire life.
The address I'd been given for the office was actually a bit of a ramshackle old warehouse building just a few miles away from Nasta's, where I had left JJ with Jesse. It took me all of five minutes to get there but another five or so to figure out the run down, sad grey building was in fact, where Glass City Guard called home. They didn't even have a sign out front, I had to make a judgment call by the three cars in the parking lot, one of them a filthy mud-caked Jeep Wrangler, and knock on the heavy wood door that faced the otherwise empty street.
The parking lot was cracked, with weeds and crabgrass pushing up through. The windows were dark with bars over the front, but a brand-new security camera greeted me at the door and the blinking red light on the front assured me it was working just fine.
When knocking on the door yielded no results I found a little gray box, almost the same color as the brick that had a small speaker on it with an equally gray button. The box was tucked into the left of the door and if it would have been a snake it would've bit me. I didn't want to be late, and no one answered my knock, so I pushed the button and waited for a buzz. I didn't hear a buzz, but three seconds later the speaker crackled to life and a polite feminine voice asked, "Glass City Guard, can I help you?"
I cleared my throat, which had suddenly gone dry as dust with nerves. "I'm Harlow Jones, I'm here for my interview this morning with Mr. Anderson."
"Yes, good morning, Harlow. Just wait for the click and then you can open the door. Please enter through the vestibule and come down the hall to the left. The receptionist area has an open door."
"Thank you," I replied, but my voice was drowned out by the ominous clicking of the door lock mechanism and I hurried to grab the door before it locked again. There was something about an auto-locking door that gave me anxiety. I never knew how long I had to grab the handle and pull before the lock clicked tight again so I always lunged for the door even when I didn't need to. JJ's daycare, back when I could afford it, had a door like that. As soon as you punched in the touch screen code the lock clicked like a shotgun pull. I had approximately four seconds to get that door open or I was punching in that code again. There were days I had to sign him in and out twice just to get to the door in time.
I probably looked foolish grabbing at the door handle like I did but old habits die hard.
The vestibule was very small, only large enough for probably two bodies, and there was another wooden door directly across from the one I had walked through. One window decorated the left side of the vestibule, but it was shut and a shade was pulled tight, obscuring whatever lay behind it. Don't be a wuss, Harlow, I told myself. Walk down that scary ass hallway and get a better life for you and JJ.
The directions were pretty simple actually. The hallway was clean, wide and well lit. There were several doors on either side of the hall but only one with an open doorway, so I headed toward it. I don't know what I expected as I walked into that room, my sensible black pumps making clicking noises on the worn linoleum. I'd worn a pair of plain black slacks and a three-quarter sleeve knit twinset in hunter green. I couldn't wear light colors. Not having a young child. Dark colors hid stains from sticky hands so my entire wardrobe consisted of different shades of dark. Even though it was the most professional job interview I had ever gone to, I couldn't bring myself to wear a skirt. Skirts and dresses were a little more girly than I had the patience for, and wearing one just for the purpose of an interview would just make me uncomfortable at a time when I needed to have my wits about me. So, slacks and a simple shirt were what I stuck with.
I was still the most overdressed person in the room.
The room was completely bare except for some folding chairs, a card table and several boxes up against the wall with various packing materials strewn about. A large grey rubber garbage tote was stationed in one corner with bits of cardboard and plastic sticking out from the top and various paper coffee cups littered the top of the card table. There was an open box of donuts on the table as well, where probably a dozen at first, there were three left.
"Hey, Harlow, go ahead and sit down I'll be with you in a minute." The male voice came from the right side of the room, where a rather tall man was perched precariously on a step ladder, a burnt-out light bulb in one hand while screwing in a new one with his right. He had sandy colored hair with a short, well-groomed beard and wore faded jeans with a navy-blue Manhattan's Pub and Cheer T-shirt that had a hole in the armpit. I could clearly tell there was a hole in the armpit because he had his arm stretched as high as he could to get the bulb in. They must have been fifteen-foot ceilings and he was barely making it. I had a hard time wrapping my head around this man being Gabe Anderson. Multi-million-dollar net worth Gabe Anderson. But he was the only man in the room.
There were two other occupants though, both women. One was a trim, auburn-haired woman who also wore jeans and a faded t-shirt. The other woman was a short, curvy blonde with a bouncy ponytail and a pair of bedazzled converse. She was the one who spoke to me first.
"Hi, Harlow," she said around a mouthful of donut before she swallowed. "I'm Angel and this is Jeanette. She works for Gabe," she waved her hand towards the step ladder as he finished twisting in the bulb and hopped down, skipping the steps altogether. "I, however, am being used for free labor." Then she laughed good-naturedly. She must be Gabe's girlfriend, I thought. She's different than I thought she would be, but I couldn't place how.
"I would offer you a cup of coffee," Jeanette said from the other side of the room where she was rifling through boxes. "But we don't even have a coffeemaker here yet. We just have what we brought this morning and that is cold already. Please have a donut if you'd like, though." It was a genuinely nice offer but I had to decline. My stomach was so twisted with nerves, that was all I needed to try to shove a sugary donut down my throat hole. Answering questions around a mouthful of crumbs? No thanks.
I sat down in one of the empty folding chairs and placed my red folder in my lap. Even though my resume was submitted electronically, I found that sometimes in an interview I had been asked for another copy. I also had a list of references included, although I'd had to do some editing to that list a few days ago. I didn't think I could submit a list of references where the most recent addition had a big black line drawn through it.
Gabe sat down acros
s from me and pulled a clipboard with some papers on it out from under the chair, making me glad I hadn't sat in that chair instead. He wiped his free hand on his dusty jeans and smiled. "Sorry for the informal conditions, and I normally shake hands during a greeting but as you can see I'm filthy." I could see. There was a fine layer of dust in his hair and dotting his shoulders. It looked like he had been poking his head in some fiberglass insulation. As I looked around the shambles of the room they had called the receptionist area, I had to think that might have been exactly what he'd been doing. "We did all of our scheduled interviews yesterday and were using today as an in-service day of sorts. We're cleaning. But we had to reschedule your interview so hopefully, we aren't putting forth a poor first impression.”
A poor impression on me? He may have been wearing ratty clothes but there was no question that Gabe Anderson could buy and sell my life as if it never existed. He was the owner of the business whether he looked it or not, and he was the person I needed to impress if I wanted to get out of the situation I was in. "Not at all," I said eagerly. "Thank you so much for bending your schedule to accommodate me. Yesterday was..." I broke off, unsure of how to finish my sentence. This was a job interview, how much I shared could make or break their opinion of me.
"Jesse said your son peed on him." Angel came around the front of the table and leaned her hip against it, looking at me with a hint of a smile on her lips. She had icing on her upper lip and I wondered if I should tell her about it.
Oh God, so that's how he had gotten them to reschedule my interview? Cheeks aflame I could only nod briefly and swallow. I don't think I'd ever been more uncomfortable in an interview than I was in that moment. The auburn-haired women from the other side of the room, Jeanette I think her name was, finally came and took a seat in one of the folding chairs next to Gabe.
"Don't be embarrassed, Harlow. You're a mom. These things happen, probably more than anyone knows. None of us have children, yet," Jeanette cast a sideways glance at Angel. "So we can only imagine it gets a little hairy. It's not like you ditched us and never called. We aren't so inflexible."
"In addition, this is a startup company. We are brand new and not even in business yet. It's not like you were taking away from our operating hours or anything. As you can see, we have some work yet to do." Gabe swept his hand through the air to indicate he was talking about the room in all its disastrous glory. The whole building looked abandoned. Work to do wasn't a phrase I would have used.
"I believe in building upon what already exists in this town," Gabe continued, judging what I was thinking from the expression on my face. "I feel it's better for the community to funnel my resources into properties that already exist instead of tearing down and rebuilding. This structure has history and good bones. And I have the income needed to give it the facelift it needs. Building up this building will set precedence for the neighborhood, and reform will naturally follow. That's the plan, anyway."
It actually made a lot of sense, and I found myself respecting Gabe Anderson just a little bit more after hearing his words.
"Okay, I'm sure you have lots to do, and a babysitter to get back to so I'll get right to the chase. I've been very picky about who I've interviewed for this position, and I have a specific set of qualifications I'm looking for. I'll let you know at the end of the interview what those qualifications are. In the meantime, let's talk a little bit about your background." Gabe paused and rifled through the papers on his clipboard. To the average bystander, he looked a little absent-minded, but I wasn't fooled. I knew exactly what was going to show up on any background check an employer might have done on me. Ten to one he’d already seen it and was looking to see if I would squirm. Well, I'd spent the last five years of my life being the kind of woman I could be proud of, so to hell with him thinking I might be uneasy about anything that might be on that paper.
Gabe crossed one tattered denim leg over the other and laid the clipboard down across his knee, and looked me straight in the eyes. "Tell me about Elliot Palmer."
Jesus, God, he was going straight for the jugular, wasn't he? Most people in job interviews ask about prior work history, what your strengths and weaknesses are. Sometimes they ask about your best and worst boss. This guy went straight for the darkest part of my life and threw it right onto the floor in front of us. He wanted to talk about my pain.
This was a security company. I knew going in that there would be extensive background checks. I guess I just wasn't prepared to talk about Elliot right out of the gate. "That's a broad topic, can you narrow it down for me? What specifically do you want to know about Elliot as it pertains to my qualifications for an IT position at Glass City Guard?" I was pushing it, I knew, but if he was going to be blunt enough to lead in with a heavy hit then I was going to block to avoid the blow.
"Fair enough," he said, and I swear I saw Jeanette and Angel's bodies both relax outside of my peripheral vision. "Why don't you tell me what's not in this paperwork then. Tell me your story and how it corresponds to Elliot Palmer."
Well, hell. I was either going to get the job or not, and to be honest, when people see I have a record of any kind, misdemeanor or no, they normally can't look past it. At least Gabe Anderson wanted to know.
"Elliot and I were high school sweethearts. We both grew up in Elkhart, Indiana, and had a lot in common. I'd lost my dad at a very early age and my mom a handful of years later. His parents were junkies and hardly around anyway. We were both good kids trying to get through with the crap hand we'd been dealt, you know?" I swallowed hard, this was the most words I'd strung together talking about Elliot since court, and not even JJ could get me to say anything other than, "Your father had to go away for a long time."
"I moved to Toledo a few years back because I received a grant for the UT tech department. It wasn't much, but in my situation, it was more than I could hope for, so I packed up and moved to Toledo. Since school was paid for I just needed to pay for my roof and living expenses, and with Elliot coming with me we could share that load. It seemed like the perfect plan."
Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. I had the attention of everyone in the room and they were all silent as they waited for me to continue. This was where shit got a little squirrely, and something told me that Gabe already knew most of the story—he just wanted to hear me say it. So I took a deep breath and dove back in.
"School was great. It really was, and Elliot...well he didn't adjust as well as I thought he would. He resented me being gone at work and school all the time, and he couldn't seem to hold a job for more than a couple of months at a time. It wasn't until I'd been in Toledo a year that he started hanging out with some bad people and started making his money selling drugs. I didn't like it. But I put up with it. I'm sure you want to know why, though, right?"
I ignored the other two women in the room and focused solely on Gabe. He wanted to know the story so I wanted him to feel and understand every word I had to say on the subject. "Elliot was my only person. He was all the family I had. I never knew my dad's family. Hell, I never even knew my dad. He died when I was just a toddler and I never even knew his last name. My mom was pissed at him because he essentially jetted when he found out she was pregnant and she never wanted to talk about him. They weren't even a couple when he died. They were like...I don't know...a booty call? My own dad considered my mom a sex buddy and me too big of a burden. What a tool. So I didn't miss him. Mom died of a heart attack when I was eighteen, right before I graduated high school. She passed suddenly and quickly. She felt no pain. I, however, was destroyed. There was nothing for me. No grandparents, no cousins, not even an aunt or an uncle to help me through. I was left completely alone—except for Elliot. I couldn't lose the only person to stay with me, to hold me steady. I was bound and determined to be a ride or die woman.”
"Even when he started using my car to make runs. Even after we got pulled over in the car and he begged me to shove in my glove box what he had on him so he didn't get busted. I stayed with him. I had a m
isdemeanor on file, but what did that matter? I was ride or die, right?"
I realized I had become so into my story that I had clutched the folder on my lap too tightly in my hands and completely wrinkled the corner. I tried to straighten it out but had to give up when it just wouldn't lay flat. Oh well, we were talking about my criminal history now, I'm pretty sure my wrinkled references weren't going to make or break the job for me.
"Then I got pregnant," I continued, my voice breaking on the very word. "And my point of view on the things that I was willing to ride and die for changed. Everything changed. I hung on, continuing to work as much as I could and still maintained my GPA. I did the best I could even though I couldn't work as many hours as I would have liked. Elliot was miraculously bringing in enough to help with bills and even though I didn't like it, I was carrying his baby. We were connected. I told him I didn't want that kind of life for our children, and he promised he would stop. That before our son was born he would give up that life—but that's not what happened at all."
"What did happen, Harlow?" Gabe asked the question simply, no judgment in his eyes or his tone.
"People always say it gets worse before it gets better. In my case there was no better. It just kept getting worse. Instead of pulling away from that lifestyle Elliot submerged himself completely. He went from dealing to using. He had stashes all over our trailer and I would find powder on the coffee table while he was passed out on the sofa. I couldn't take it anymore, so I started trying to plan to leave, but before I could put that into effect, considering I had no savings and I was six months pregnant, the bottom fell out of everything." I closed my eyes to get my bearings. I tried not to think about what happened, but it was always in the back of my mind, and it had shaped the woman that I was today so it was important, if not traumatizing.
Jesse (Glass City Hearts Book 3) Page 5