Temporarily Employed

by Vicki Batman

  I uncovered the annual buried under a French II workbook. Returning to my comfy chair, I passed my hand across the black-and-yellow cover, pausing to smooth over the embossed letters which spelled Sommerville High. A few years had passed since graduation—fortunately.

  I ran my fingers down the index page and voila! located Sarah Anne Wellborn, my most cherished girlfriend. As the warmth of friendship overtook me, I poked her name looped in raspberry ink and smiled. Miss her.

  I checked one notch up and located Allan Charles Wellborn, Senior. A frownie face had been drawn next to his name in black ink. Beside that was a column of page numbers indicating where he could be located. I flipped to the traditional senior portrait on page fifty and my lips split into a wide grin.

  Good ol’ dependable, always Mr. Perfect, never, ever did-anything-wrong Allan Wellborn. His black-framed glasses looked similar to Buddy Holly’s. And like other kids, multiple zits polka-dotted his face. His brown hair had been parted down the middle, bangs laid over his forehead. He looked totally geeky.

  Recorded under his name was a list of his club activities—Treasurer in the Future Accountants Club. First trombone in the Sommerville Marching Tiger Band where he served—this was not a stretch—as Treasurer. Math Competition listed as his favorite hobby.

  I wasn’t surprised. No wonder everyone had thought him nerdy; yet, we all knew the universal idiom: Geeks Rule.

  Paging to the Accounting Club photo, I giggled. A pocket protector, a bane to every mother and repellant to every potential girlfriend, had been stuck in the breast pocket of a button-down, white shirt. A mechanical pencil, a fat yellow highlighter, and what resembled a pocket level were tucked inside, too. I rolled my eyes to the ceiling. “If only.”

  Most people would love to exploit the excellent blackmail material I’d uncovered. I reached back to Officer-slash-Detective Wellborn and contrasted him with this picture. My suspicions were confirmed, definitely the same guy. Only he’d improved for the better. Officer Wellborn’s face had looked kind, and his hair appeared better styled. He didn’t wear glasses any more, except for the sunglasses which looked mysteriously sexy. And instead of a vinyl protector in his shirt pocket, he packed a gun on his hip.

  Then, a replay of this afternoon’s events hit. The citation and my stolen car parts surfaced. My brain obsessed over how he’d treated me. Fury fired from the pit of my belly. It devoured me, threatening to erupt like Mount Vesuvius. I wanted to smack him. Smack him. Smack him. Smack him.

  I jumped up and stalked to my roommate’s boudoir where I slapped the yearbook page on the scanner. With a press of a few buttons, I produced an eight-by-ten copy. Returning to the kitchen, I dug in the junk drawer for packaging tape. I stuck the photo on the kitchen wall right above the trash can.

  Back at the drawer, I unearthed three small stress balls—one red, two blue—the squeezy kind used for anger management given away by a vendor at a health fair. Each of my friends had picked up one and given them to me because I was going through a stressful period. I banged the drawer shut and stomped to a place in front of my creation. Just as I eyeballed the distance, I heard my roommate open the apartment door and saw me planted there.

  Jenny’s brown-eyed gaze flicked from the wall and back to me. “What’s goin’ on?” she asked in her Louisiana drawl. “And where’s the rest of your clothes?”

  “This guy…” I ground out the word, “wrote me a ticket.”

  Her gaze went back to the photo. “He looks kinda young to be writin’ tickets.”

  “Aren’t you funny?” Determining I stood too close, I took two steps back. “I knew him a long time ago.”

  She pressed her hand over her mouth. “You know the cop who wrote you a ticket?”

  “Sorta.”

  With a drawn-out sigh, she dropped her handbag on the couch. “Explain sorta.”

  My arm rose and reached behind, my front leg lifted in a baseball windup. The first squishy ball landed on his left temple. “He’s Sarah Anne Wellborn’s brother, and he wrote me a citation today.”

  “And throwin’ things...”

  I took a step to my right and eyeballed again. “Stress balls.”

  “’cuse me. Throwin’ stress balls will make you feel what…happy?”

  The second ball hit his mouth smack dab in the middle. I blinked. “All the time he knew who I was. Why didn’t he say something? He didn’t have to write me a ticket. He was being a smart ass. The creep. The asshole. The...” The third ball smashed the bridge of his glasses. The paper split. “The geek!”

  Jenny glanced at the squishy balls which now lay on the floor. “Better?”

  “Nope.” I picked them up, returned to my spot, and let the red one rip.

  “How much longer you gonna be? I’m starvin’.” She plopped in the club chair I’d vacated and watched as the third ball flew by. “Tell me something about him.”

  I stared, wondering where in the heck to begin. The Wellborn and Cooks families lived in the same neighborhood in Sommerville, a picturesque suburb made up of highways and byways, a wide variety of restaurants, and most importantly for me, excellent shopping. Historic municipal buildings and old warehouses restored into lofts were located downtown. Compared to other places, Sommerville enjoyed an excellent reputation.

  Many college graduates wanted to transfer to high-energy cities with all their economic and cultural opportunities. Sommerville was large enough that I’d wanted to return after college upon obtaining the job I’d desired. Clearly, A. Wellborn had come home as well.

  I set my hands on my hips. I knew the Wellborn family had discussed my visits ad nauseam over the dinner table. The same thing had taken place at my house with my parents employing the Cooks’ Spanish Inquisition. These examinations were interspersed with table manners and Mom’s little talks, more Cooks’ trademark tortures.

  I picked up the instruments of anger management. “When Sarah Anne, his sister, and I were younger and had play-dates, I saw him then.”

  Jenny tapped her lips with her fingers to suppress her yawn. “I’m well acquainted with Sarah Anne.”

  “In my teen years, he gave me long glances—very disturbing. Mostly, I avoided him like the plague. After all, something nasty could have rubbed off and contaminated me for life.”

  “Okay,” she said. “We’ve determined he was a geek. What else?”

  I shifted the spongy balls from one hand to the other. “Our mothers are good friends and wholly devoted members of The Mothers Always Know Network, the one which would inevitably bust you for the most minor infraction, like trading clothing. Or eating candy instead of lunch. Or… Well, you get the idea.”

  Years passed before I’d determined they weren’t lying about the connection—they really had known everything.

  To my everlasting embarrassment, the network operated much too well on numerous occasions. Yelling my whole name was a sure sign of trouble and not music to anyone’s ears. Even now, I could hear the dreaded words, “Harriette Lee Cooks! Come down here this instant!”

  I knew better than to dawdle.

  Front and center, Mom had curled her fingers into my shoulders. “Hold it right there, missy.”

  Cringing in holy terror, I’d prayed for a distraction. Her right index finger had nearly poked my nose. Inch-by-inch, my feet shuffled in the opposite direction.

  “At the grocery store today,” she began with her probing technique, “Shirley Wellborn found out Sarah Anne and you are hosting a boy-girl party on Saturday night. I thought you had planned a sleepover. What exactly is going on? Give me details. Now.”

  I’d cave. I’d always wondered how Mom had known exactly what we’d done.

  “Mothers always know,” she’d replied with a smug smile.

  I bet Mr. Perfect Allan Wellborn had tattled.

  When Jenny swung her feet, her designer sandals went flying. “So what, Hattie? He wrote you a ticket. Deal with it.”

  Jenny’s comment rubbed me raw. She should be
more supportive. I put the evil eye on her. “As you well know, I am currently unemployed and am down to counting pennies and nickels and dimes. Now, I have a ticket to pay and no extra cash to do so.”

  “You know your parents would help.”

  Which was something I wanted to avoid.

  “Tell me more.”

  My nose scrunched. “After graduation from Southern U, Sarah Anne married, moved to Colorado Springs, and last year, birthed a baby girl. When she comes to town—which has not been in a while, now that I think about it—I’ve never seen A. Wellborn. We never talk about him.”

  The admission sounded self-absorbed. My mouth curved downwards, quite unlike me. I must be getting all whiny from the job-hunting thingy.

  Jenny pointed to the poster. “So… Allan Wellborn is a cop.”

  “I thought he was an accountant like his dad. His mother had told my mother who told me he’d studied accounting and finance in college.”

  She tilted her head. “Why isn’t he practicing as a CPA now?”

  “Good question, Sherlock. I don’t know.” I shrugged and squeezed the blue balls. Life with Mom and Dad had been perfect back then. We lived in a two-story brick home, the yard landscaped with oak trees and a pool in the back. Dad was employed as a mechanical engineer at an architecture firm. Mom sewed, cooked, and cleaned like a maniac. She volunteered at our schools and community service organizations.

  My sisters and I had shared bedrooms and one bathroom. Because of the limited mirror space and the high demand, elbows were in the face and jabs elsewhere. Sisters were annoying until a miraculous breakthrough occurred after college when we’d developed a tight bond no one could sever.

  After picking up the annual, Jenny paged over to the sophomore class. “Look what I found…Cooks, Harriette Lee.” She flipped the book in my direction so I could see too.

  For me, an unusually good day for photo taking. Long straight hair, parted in the middle, fell to my bra clasp. Rectangular tortoiseshell glasses stuck out from my face. A large pimple distorted my chin, and sure-to-repel dandruff had decided to not make an appearance.

  My parents had pinned on me an old-fashioned name, Harriette, which wasn’t French, nor trendy like the girls named Heather or Taylor or Katie. Mine came from my grandmother. In fifth grade, I’d discovered the nickname “Hattie,” which sounded more acceptable, even sassy, but not dorky.

  I liked sassy.

  “This is so funny.” Jenny waltzed around the room with the book and sang, “You two geeks…were meant…to be together.”

  I snatched the book from her hands to flip nonchalantly through the rest of the pages, and an odd thing caught my eye. All the sophomore girls had long straight hair parted down the middle. So did the juniors. And seniors. We looked like clones. Or clowns.

  With a slap, I closed the volume and set it on the counter. I sipped more water. “You know, it’s a small world.”

  “So they say.” Jenny tossed me my cell phone. “Why don’t you ask your mom what he’s been doing?”

  I caught the phone and bounced the device in my palm. I could find out from Mom where A. Wellborn had been since high school. Over bananas, cantaloupes, or whatever produce was on special in our neighborhood grocery store, The Mothers Always Know Network continued to trade information about their kids.

  On second thought, this could be a really crazy idea with Mom assuming my asking concealed something, and—surprise, surprise—she would interrogate me to death. After my reluctant confession, she would pontificate on “What a Nice Boy Allan Wellborn Is,” her favorite little talk I’d heard way too many times in the past.

  And she would ask me about today’s bloody interview and I wasn’t ready to discuss it. I rubbed a circle on my throbbing temple and set the phone on the dining table. Yeah, I should revisit this plan some more.

  After graduation from Sommerville High, I’d attended State Tech and received a Bachelor of Science in Human Sciences, majoring in Fashion Merchandising. I loved clothing. Being a self-proclaimed pro-shopper, I wanted to dress the world in beautiful clothes at bargain prices.

  Mom had said, “Look where it got you.”

  Her tone had intimated my education was worthless. She would have been overwhelmingly ecstatic if I had majored in accounting like my sister and A. Wellborn. To this day, I felt the need to justify my degree by explaining I’d taken lots of business courses. I’d nearly failed accounting, the most boring class ever. Even with a calculator, adding long columns of numbers became tedious.

  Still was. And on top of that, rarely did I get the same answer twice.

  Emphatically, I’d disagreed with her opinion. Being unemployed right now didn’t count. I’d studied other courses—Art Appreciation, Food & Nutrition, History of Costume, Archery, and Geology. But no basket weaving.

  What is Mom thinking? If A. Wellborn’s Accounting Club photo was an example of what accounting professionals were perceived, weren’t they geeky? Geeky could never be an option. What’s more, I didn’t wear shirts with pockets on the chest—a huge fashion no-no—for the pocket protector. Large pockets made a girl’s bosom resemble an inflated life preserver, the only exception being a specialty shirt worn for fishing or on an African safari.

  Sommerville’s premiere department store, Tuckers, had recruited me for the job I’d truly desired. Steadily, I’d fishtailed my way up the food chain to become the menswear assistant buyer. The bonus of being the only woman in the men’s division meant I received an enormous portion of flattering male attention, too.

  I’d loved my job. I’d held the everlasting wish to continue my retail career with Tuckers. I’d visited our sister stores in nearby smaller towns to arrange merchandise and consult with the staff. At the Men’s Wear Show, I’d purchased new inventory. Did relevant paperwork. Pride and accomplishment consumed me when an order went from paper to merchandise to display.

  However, when I’d fallen victim to department reorganization during a slight economic downturn, my bubble had burst. Translated—I was let go.

  Today, I’d taken the initiative and implemented Plan A—interviewing with Tuckers’ closest competitor on the off-chance something was available. I’d borne sky-high hopes for the meeting, only to find they weren’t hiring either. My heart broke with disappointment. I didn’t want a trip to Europe or a million dollars. I wanted a plain ol’ job, doing what I’d done before.

  Now, I had to shift to Plan B.

  Earlier, over lunch at Muy Bueno with Maggie, a Funsister friend who’d worked with me when we were teenagers at Amazing Adventureland, the local theme park, posed, “Why not try temporary jobs?”

  I’d never considered working as a temp. I’d quirked my eyebrows upwards. “Temporary?”

  “Sure.” She’d beefed the idea with enthusiasm. “That way, if you don’t like the job, you don’t have to go back. And you can continue to look for buying jobs until the right opportunity opens up.”

  Maggie was right. Temporary jobs would pay the rent and provide cash for food—and chocolate—until I’d found the position I truly desired. An extra selling point was learning new skills and networking. Luckily, another friend, Trixie, owned the employment agency Jobs Inc. and placed people in permanent and temporary positions. I could be one of those. And after today’s disheartening interview, I should call her to launch implementation of Maggie’s Plan B.

  Hugging the annual to my chest, I surveyed my assets. I was doing all right, in fact, as well as any peers. I’d purchased a gently used couch in blue-and-khaki check from a consignment store, the club chair with matching ottoman, and a leather-topped coffee table were garage sale finds. All paid for and not on credit.

  A Chinese-styled armoire had been retrofitted with shelves and housed a flat screen television. An old farm-styled table with chairs painted white had been placed in the dining area. In my bedroom was my grandmother’s iron bed covered in a beautiful blue and white toile ensemble my mom had crafted. I’d draped a coordinating, striped fabr
ic over the bedside tables. Another antique armoire held clothing.

  I heaved a sigh. “Wish all my dreams would come true.” A job I loved. A man I adored.

  “Don’t we all, darlin’.”

  Jenny’s small smile, just a tip of the corners of her mouth, showed how much she sympathized.

  I said, “Just like the fairy tales.”

  “That may not be the best example.”

  “I know.” I extended the squishy balls toward her. “Wanna try?”

  “Nah, but leave up poster boy—just in case.” She stood and slung an arm over my shoulder. “Let’s eat.”

  I dropped the book on the couch, and we made our way to the kitchen counter. I stroked First Fish, my beta, whose bowl sat on the bar counter top. Jenny had named him. When I’d first brought him home in his clear plastic bag, he was silver-colored with magenta fins. I guess they starved him at the pet store ’cause he ate good fish food and turned electric blue.

  My finger dipped in the water to stroke my aquatic friend while I contemplated dinner. As if on cue, my tummy growled. I wandered over to the kitchen cupboards to check for nourishment. Found nothing. No huge surprise since I had little cash.

  Jenny peeked inside the fridge. Found nothing.

  Well, not exactly nothing-nothing. A rotten head of lettuce and a jug, which undoubtedly contained old milk, were inside. She passed me the container. “You do it.”

  “No way.” I pushed back. “You do it.”

  “I did it last time.”

  She had. Squeezing my eyes shut to avoid what I knew was forthcoming, I unscrewed the green plastic top. Bravely, I sniffed, instantly gagged at the repulsive scent, and rushed the container to the sink for emptying. My free hand flapped the air with vigor to clear the unforgettable odor. Helpful Jenny turned on the Vent-a-hood.

  Considering the lack of promising contents inside the fridge or cabinets, I lifted my shoulders in an uninspired shrug. Because of the heat, I didn’t really want to prepare anything anyway.