Chapter 2
The next morning, Mike stood in the large atrium at his new place of employment. He lingered near the back of a group of his co-workers, listening with half an ear to their conversation. The area where they congregated was beautiful, with a quietly tinkling fountain, plants with thick green leaves in colorful pots, and big arched windows looking out onto a wide, deep green lawn that led to a small copse of trees. Every morning, the Marin’s Outdoors employees gathered here, networking while drinking a professionally acceptable morning drink.
Marin’s Outdoors main business was selling hunting and sporting gear, but they also hosted camping trips and other wilderness events. The morning social hour was a time for the people in different departments to bounce ideas off each other for joint projects that would benefit the company as a whole.
Mike held a mug of coffee, taking prolonged sips as a way to avoid actively participating in the conversation, which had shifted from work to discussing going out to an exotic dance club that evening. His tactic worked, up to a point. Eventually his co-workers turned their sights on him, pulling him directly into the conversation.
Rebeca, a petite Afro-Latina woman with a short, wavy haircut, and a diamond stud earring in each ear was the most excited. “Come on Zielinski you’ve got to join us. The Flirtatious Fox is one of the best exotic dance clubs in the Playground.”
“The Fox has lots of variety so you’ll definitely see someone you like,” chimed in a guy from finance.
“And it’s For the Troops night. Former military get in free and drinks are half-off.”
The last wasn’t exactly a selling point. They made good money at Marin’s and he didn’t need the discount. But maybe he should go. He hadn’t done any socializing since moving to St. Louis and he did want camaraderie. If it turned out that he couldn’t find what he was looking for with Strong’s superhero team, maybe he could find it here at work instead. Several of his co-workers were also former military so they had that in common. He looked down at the brown leather glove covering the hand that held his coffee mug. And he was willing to bet that at least some of them were hiding scars under their clothes, just as he was.
“All right. I’ll meet you guys there.”
Rebeca clapped him on the back. “Yeah! I knew you were good people.”
Thanks to practice, Mike didn’t flinch at the uninvited touch. He did however, subtly shift out of range to make sure he wasn’t touched again. “It sounds like it’ll be a good time,” he said politely.
Soon after he agreed to join them, the morning coffee break ended. Mike returned to the marketing floor, greeting the administrative assistant he shared with two other employees as he passed the man’s covered but organized desk on the way to his office. The office he’d been assigned was small but nice. Thick, gray carpet covered the entire floor. An L-shaped bamboo wood desk was the focal point of the room while bamboo shelves and wood fronted filing cabinets took up most of one wall. The office had three large windows with a decent view of downtown St. Louis. He hadn’t brought many personal items in yet, but the framed poster-sized nature shots that had come with the office gave it somewhat of a lived-in feel.
In his current position, he handled the influencers and other signed talent contracted to represent Marin’s on social media. It was decent work, but a far cry from the Army life he was used to. Adjusting to wearing slacks, a dress shirt, and a tie every day was a big change. Mike knew he was lucky to have found such a good position so soon after leaving the Army. He hadn’t wanted to return to his home state of Oklahoma, so when a friend mentioned they had a contact in St. Louis who hired veterans, he’d immediately applied. Then, deciding St. Louis would be a good place to live whether or not he was offered the job, he’d made the move to the city on the river as soon as his discharge was complete.
A little over a month had passed since his move, but he still didn’t feel settled in. He’d joined the Army as soon as he’d aged out of the foster care system at eighteen, and remained enlisted for ten years, so it stood to reason that he was lost without that familiar structure.
Determined not to waste office hours dwelling on his personal life, Mike turned on his computer to get started with work. His first task of the day was to review his stable of influencers’ social media feeds, check to be sure there wasn’t anything controversial attached to their names, and that Marin’s products were featured as scheduled. He was diligent, carefully going over a full day’s worth of Instagram posts, TikTok videos, and Twitter profiles for a half-dozen influencers, looking for red flags. Thankfully, nothing negative caught his attention. There were only pictures and videos of attractive people in front of idyllic campsites, artfully splashed with mud while straddling four-wheelers, or paddling canoes across serene lakes. Even his one problem case had been on his best behavior lately. It had been nearly two weeks since he’d had to ask the popular outdoorsman to remove a post that didn’t align with Marin’s brand.
Once that task was finished, Mike moved on to reviewing submissions for people who wanted to collaborate with Marin’s. There were a lot, the coming fall and cooler temperatures inspiring many social media personalities to think of outdoor activities and working with a company who could sponsor them. Mike worked quickly using aYes,No,Maybesystem. TheYesandNosubmissions received one of the two form emails he’d created to speed up the response process. TheMaybeshe flagged to review their platforms in more detail before making a decision.
For the rest of the morning, he tackled the remainder of his task list with the same smooth efficiency. He was so focused that he almost worked through lunch. He might have done so if his phone hadn’t rung with an inter-office call, taking his attention away from his computer.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Zielinski. It’s Rebeca. Wanted to give you the details for tonight.”
Mike grabbed a pen and memo pad. “Okay, shoot.”
“We’re meeting at seven in the Fox’s parking lot. It’s toward the front of the Playground on Mars Street.”
Mike jotted down the information Rebeca gave him before asking a question. “What’s the Playground?”
“Oh, goodness. You’re so new,” Rebeca said with a friendly laugh. “The Playground is the red-light district in East St. Louis. It’s on its own little island, where adults can go to get up to all sorts of fun and shenanigans. Pretty much everything is legal and it’s all play all the time. That’s how it got the nickname the Playground.”
“I see.”
Another laugh. “You’ll definitely see when you get there,” she teased.
She finished giving him directions, telling him which highway exit to take. Once they hung up, Mike went to the break room to get his lunch. He returned to his office, eating the contents of his protein box while he stood at one of the large windows. It was a clear day, and the early afternoon sun glinting off a massive, amber-glass sky scraper drew his eye to the tall building and the giant goldPperched atop it. The building housed Pruitt, Inc., a large corporation based in the Gateway City. Spread out on the grounds surrounding the golden tower on the hill were smaller buildings for the company’s manufacturing plants, distribution, and other facilities.
It was a huge campus. Taking up that much real estate in the middle of a major city must have been expensive and had more than likely displaced lots of businesses and homes. Pruitt products were everywhere in the country and the resulting jobs and corporate taxes had bumped the aging city on the river to a level of prosperity that hadn’t been seen in decades. Still, even as a new resident, Mike was aware that many St. Louisans weren’t completely happy with Pruitt’s invasive presence in their city. He’d seen the anti-Pruitt graffiti and heard people complaining about the company while he was out and about.
Finished with his lunch, Mike turned away from the window and thoughts of giant corporations. He had a lot of work to complete before he could go off to play tonight.
∞ ∞ ∞
Around six-thirty that evening, Mike finally walked out of Marin’s. He crossed the nearly empty parking lot to his dark gray Chevy Blazer. Inside, he took off his tie, tossing it on the passenger seat before he put the vehicle in drive and headed for East St. Louis. As he drove over the Eads Bridge into Illinois, the Gateway Arch shone silver and orange in the light of the setting sun. His tires whirring on the pavement, he looked over the guardrails at the wide expanse of water below him. It was a muddy brown, gently waving in the wake of the traffic on the river.
