I glance down. I’m still in the navy pantsuit I wore to work this morning. I meant to change before heading to Ellie’s party, but things ran late. I have a change of clothes in the trunk of my car. The car I was in just a minute ago, when…
None of this makes one single bit of sense.
“Your caseworker will be with you shortly. If you’d take a seat.” The receptionist waves toward the rows of empty chairs.
“If this is a waiting room, what am I waiting for?” And why do I feel like I won’t like the answer?
“You’re here to meet with your caseworker. Your caseworker will be with you shortly,” he repeats, slowly, his words overly enunciated.
Only now do I register howroboticthe receptionist’s perkiness sounds. Does perkiness always sound so mechanical? It’s possible—I’ve never been a fan of perky people, but I don’t usually find them unsettling.
I’ve never felt this unsettled in my life.
“What case? What are you talking about?” I ask, desperation bleeding into my voice.
A door opens a few feet away from me. Was it there a second ago?
Of course it was. Doors don’t just appear out of nowhere.
People don’t just appear in 1970s-style offices out of nowhere.
Yet I seem to have done just that.
A woman steps through the doorway. She looks to be in her forties, a stern expression on her face, holding a manila folder. Smart brown pantsuit, also 1970s-ish, with bell-bottom pants. Nude brown lipstick painted across her lips.
My kind of woman.
She opens her folder and peers down at it. “Josephina Vasquez?”
“It’s Joey,” I correct on autopilot. Years of habit. “Who are you?”
“I’m your caseworker. Follow me.”
She doesn’t wait for a response before she turns on her heel and retreats through the doorway.
I glance at the receptionist, who nods. “Go ahead. Eternity waits for no one.”
Again, what averyodd thing to say. I can’t hold back my frown as I turn and follow the caseworker, realizing that whatever is going on, I trust herwaymore than I trust this dude.
I follow her down a long hallway. She walks with purpose, not onceglancing back at me. I look down at her shoes. Heels that would clack on any hard floor, but her steps are muffled by the olive-green shag carpet under our feet.
This is the ugliest carpet I have ever seen in my life.
She steps into an office that looks a lot like the waiting room: Teakwood. Mustard. Drab. The carpet in here is the same shag texture as the one in the hall, only it’s a burnt-orange color.
I would like to amend my previous thought.
Thisis the ugliest carpet I have ever seen in my life.
That this stern, self-possessed woman in front of me—again, my kind of woman—works out of this ugly office simply does not make any sense. The image of this woman in this space, day in and day out, is so incongruous that it would be laughable if I had the capacity for humor right now.
She takes a seat behind a large executive desk. On top of it sits nothing but a single mug with a brown lipstick stain. No computer. No picture frames, no tchotchkes. Just the mug.
Such a huge desk, almost completely empty.
“Please, take a seat.” She gestures to the camel leather chair across from her and places the manila folder next to the mug. Only one chair on this side of the desk. Also strange. I’ve never given any thought to the fact that office desks almost always have two chairs in front of them until this moment. The kind of norm you don’t really notice until it’s gone.
I take a seat, and she promptly opens the folder.
