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Michelle
I knew I had to find a job right away if I was going to find a new place to stay. Gray’s kindness in letting me stay at Anton’s place for a few days would help, but once he left I’d be back on the street if I didn’t do something soon. I was desperate and no longer able to wait on an office job of some sort of open up. Despite my medical transcriptionist skills, I’d worked part-time for a trucking company back in North Dakota. I answered phones, written requisitions, talked in lost truckers from wherever the fuck they ended up. It wasn’t much, but it was something. But that ‘something’ wasn’t getting me anywhere in this bullshit down.
The only option I had was to cast my net as wide as I could get it.
Taking a shower, I dressed myself in the nicest clothes I had. A long skirt and a nice, flowing blouse that would help circulate the heat off my body. The mall was three miles down the road, which would be far enough for me to work up a sweat on the way. I piled my hair on my head and made myself look presentable. Slapped on some makeup. Tried to make sure my tits weren’t hanging out too much. Then I slipped into some comfortable shoes and grabbed my purse. I walked into downtown to the Xerox place on the corner and printed out as many copies of my resume as five dollars would get me. Then I stapled them to a cover letter, shoved them in my purse, and started for the mall.
The walk was long. Longer than I predicted under the hot morning sun. By the time I got to the mall, there was a sheen of sweat on my body that made me look like a swamp monster. I stepped into the bathroom at the food court to wipe myself off and touch up my makeup. I splashed water in my face, used up half of their paper towels to wipe myself down, then dried my fucking underarms at the drying station. I sprayed some perfume on my clothes so I wouldn’t smell like dust and sweat, reapplied my makeup, then started on my journey.
I was going shop-to-shop.
Even if they weren’t taking applications, I put one in their hands anyway. A couple of them interviewed me on the spot, though I could see the manager’s eyes dropping to my chest. Fuck. If it got me a job, I’d do didn’t care. So I played it up. Leaned on the counter and squeezed my tits together, then licked my lips like I wanted them. I’d take any job they threw at me. Stocking shelves. Piercing ears. A cashier paid drastically under minimum wage. Anything.
Like I said, I was desperate.
After I walked to every single store in the mall, I stopped at the sad excuse for a food court and sat down. I didn’t want to waste the money I did have on food if there was food at Anton’s, but I did take a couple of bucks out to get a drink before I walked back. And as I relaxed into the rickety chair, I looked around. Most of the places were shut down anyway. The only food places the damn food court had were a chicken place, Chinese Express, and a sub-station. Oh, and ice cream. But those were machines. Not an actual employable destination.
Stillsville wasn’t much different from where I grew up, and I wondered why the hell I was bothering. Maybe this place wasn’t worth my time. Maybe it would be better if I called my mother and asked her to send me enough money for a bus ticket home. I didn’t have to stay with her. I didn’t want to stay with her. But sleeping on the streets of a familiar town felt a little better than sleeping on the streets of a town I didn’t give a shit about.
A town that my ex lived in.
But the thought of returning back to the oil town made me want to throw up. The idea of going back to that damn trucking company and living in my crackerjack box apartment and boasting that I was ‘making it’ made me nauseous. I had felt trapped in my hometown, and Andy had provided a way out. I loved him, sure. But if I was truly honest with myself, that wasn’t the real reason I left with him. Love was not the real reason I agreed to go off with a man I’d only known a few months. All of my friends had gone off to college and never came back—not that I blamed them. They all got scholarships or took out loans. But me? I couldn’t do either. I stayed and worked my way through my two-year degree in some pointless venture to prove to myself that I was better than my mother. That I could survive without a father figure in my life. That I could make something of my world despite the fact that he had just fucked my mother and left.
Leaving me behind, like some unwanted trinket.
Going home brought back so many painful memories. But if I couldn’t find a job in Stillsville, I’d have no other choice.
I refilled my drink and walked back around to the stores. I caught some of the managers and talked to them, just to inform them that I’d put in an application. Most of them looked shocked before they started asking me questions, and I quickly found my stomach plummeting to my toes. I had no retail experience, so I wasn’t qualified for a bulk of the sales associate positions. Most of the entry-level jobs were filled by the high school girls who needed the experience at their age.
Which I knew was code for ‘that job isn’t for slacker twenty-four year olds.’
Some of the managers straight-up told me they weren’t hiring and had no plans to until the holidays. Some advised me to come back at Thanksgiving and Christmas when they made seasonal hires.
But I didn’t have until the holiday season. It was the middle of summer. I didn’t have time to wait until December for a damn job.
Refilling my drink, I started the long walk back to Anton’s house. My prospects for a job were dismal, at best. I stopped at a few random businesses still open along the three-mile stretch and put in my application, but most people just looked at me with a blank stare before tossing it off to the side. I felt defeated. Worthless. Useless.
Maybe my mother was right when she had called me all those things.
Maybe the only reason I left with Andy was because I was just like her. Useless and pathetic without a man at my side.
My eyes welled at the words as the sun beat down on my back.
I was a failure, and it was obvious to everyone. That was why no one wanted to consider my resume. That was why everyone kept throwing them in the trash can. Andy knew it, and he’d kicked me out. My father knew it before I was even born, and he left. And soon, Gray would come to know it and he would kick me out as well. Hell, he probably already knew it, since he had agreed to let me hang around for a few days. A handout to the neediest, most pathetic person in town, coming right up!
That was it.
I’d made up my mind.
In the morning, I’d call my mother and ask her for the money for that bus ticket.
I walked up onto Anton’s porch and stared in the window. I looked at the reflection of the woman staring back at me and almost didn’t recognize her. The lifeless eyes. The forlorn stare. The downturned lips. At one point in time, a vibrant young girl had looked back at me. Full of life, with prospects and pride as she spent her money on her own degree that she just knew would take her places. But as I stared at my carcass of a reflection, I saw why Gray felt sorry for me.
Saw why he felt I needed a handout.
Gray looked and talked like a successful adult. Held himself with pride and carried himself with confidence. But me? I was a twenty-something stereotype. No wonder he offered me a place to stay. He probably felt like he’d be kicking a wounded puppy or something if he put me out. I closed my eyes and drew in a deep breath as sweat trickled down my back.
What I wouldn’t give to have met him on equal footing.
Maybe then, I’d have a chance with him.
I couldn’t deny how attractive he was. But nothing was going to ever come of it. He was a tall, intelligent, well-spoken man in his thirties, probably. And I was a bullshit excuse for an adult in her twenties that kept floundering around with her life. Hitting dead ends, hoping to climb up some imaginary ladder that seemed so slick it must be coated in oil. But him, his bright blue eyes seem to look right into my soul, and the way his thick dark hair swooped back was so sexy. Those broad shoulders padded with lean muscle did me in.
And his arms. The way they throbbed with strength. The way the strong lines of his torso had disappeared beneath his jeans that morning.
A shiver ran through my body as I opened my eyes.
Yep. In another time—in another reality—I would’ve jumped his bones. I would have rolled my shoulders back in confidence and brought a meal to the table so delicious he couldn’t turn it down. Back when I felt more confident in myself. Back when I felt indestructible.
Back when life hadn’t pummeled me into the ground.
Drawing in a deep breath, I stepped away from the window and opened the front door of Anton’s house.
I needed a fucking shower to wash off the bullshit from my afternoon.
