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I turned to see Mrs. Stubblefield’s stepdaughter, Posey, standing near the main desk. Posey waved, her bagged lunch bobbing merrily. Something told me she wasn ’t just early for a picnic with her wicked stepmother. Posey was virtually unemployable since she’d set fire to the Pretty Paws Pet Grooming Salon while blow -drying Bitty Wade’s teacup poodle.
Apparently, doggie nail polish, heat elements, and long-haired breeds are a cataclysmic combination. This was the third job Posey had lost due to fire, including blazes started with overcooked microwave popcorn at the Video Hut and a boiled-dry coffee pot at the Coffee Spot. When Posey wasn’t working, she moved back into her dad ’s house, which also happened to be Mrs.
Stubblefield’s house. Clearly, my boss had decided she could share a water cooler with Posey but not a bathroom.
I was being replaced. Replaced by someone who needed flash cards to understand the Dewey decimal system. Replaced with someone I’d hated on principle since the sixth grade, when she penned the following in my honor: “Roses are red, violets are black. Why is your front as flat as your back?” Thanks to middle-school politics, I was labeled “Planed Jane” until my senior-year growth spurt. Regarding the use of “planed,” I believe one of Posey’s smarter friends showed her how to use a thesaurus.
Posey spotted me and froze mid-wave. I uttered several of the seven words you’re not supposed to say in polite company.
My soon-to-be-former boss let out an indignant huff. “Honestly, Jane. I can’t allow someone who uses that language to work around children.”
“You can’t fire me,” I told her. “I’ll appeal to the library board.”
“Who do you think signed your termination notice?” Mrs. Stubblefield preened while sliding the paper toward me.
I snatched it off her desk. “Your crony, Mrs. Newsome, signed the termination notice. That’s not quite the same thing.”
“She got approval from the other board members,” Mrs. Stubblefield said. “They were very sorry to see you go, but the truth is, we just can’t afford you.”
“But you can afford Posey?”
“Posey is starting as a part-time desk clerk. The salaries aren’t comparable.”
“She starts fires!” I hissed. “Books tend to be kind of flammable!”
Ignoring me, Mrs. Stubblefield reached into a drawer to remove an envelope, which I hoped included a handsome severance and detailed instructions on how to keep health insurance and feed one large, ugly dog without bringing home a paycheck.
The final indignity was Mrs. Stubblefield handing me a banker’s box already packed with my “personal effects.” I stumbled through the lobby on legs that threatened to buckle under me. I ignored the cheerful greetings from patrons, knowing I would burst into tears at the first face I recognized.
I got into my car, leaned my forehead against the white-hot steering wheel, and began to hyperventilate. After about an hour of that, I mopped my blotchy face on my sleeve and opened what I thought was my severance check. Instead, a bright yellow-and-white-striped slip of paper drifted into my passenger seat, shouting, “Twenty-five dollars! Plus free potato skins!” in huge red letters.
Instead of a severance check, I got a gift certificate to Shenanigans.
This prompted another hour or so of hysterical crying. I finally pulled myself together enough to pull out of the library parking lot and drive toward the mall. Shenanigans was one of the first big chain restaurants to come to Half-Moon Hollow after the county commission finally unclenched its “dry” status. After decades of driving over county lines to Maynard to get liquor by the drink, Half-Moon Hollow residents could finally enjoy cocktails close enough to walk home drunk instead of drive. Personally, I find that comforting.
McClure County was one of the last counties in the state where you could legally smoke in restaurants —thank you, local tobacco farmers—so the bar was cloaked in several layers of cigarette haze. I made myself comfortable on a bar stool, ordered some potato skins and a large electric lemonade. For those unfamiliar with the beverage, picture a glass of Country Time that looks like Windex and makes your face numb. After the gift certificate ran out, I handed my Visa to Gary the bartender and told him to start a tab. I switched to mudslides sometime around happy hour. An “I’m too tired to cook” crowd trickled in after dusk.
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Vampirism: (n) 1. The condition of being a vampire, marked by the need to ingest blood and extreme vulnerability to sunlight. 2. The act of preying upon others for financial or emotional gain. 3. A gigantic pain in the butt.
I’ve always been a glass-half-full kind of girl.
The irritated look from Gary, the barrel-chested bartender at Shenanigans, told me that, one, I’d said that out loud, and, two, he just didn’t care. But at that point, I was the only person sitting at the pseudo-sports bar on a Wednesday afternoon, and I didn’t have the cognitive control required to stop talking. So he had no choice but to listen.
I picked up the remnants of my fourth (fifth? sixth?) electric lemonade. It glowed blue against the neon lights of Shenanigans’
insistently cheerful decor, casting a green shadow on Gary’s yellow-and-white-striped polo shirt. “See this glass? This morning, I would have said this glass isn’t half empty. It’s half full. And I was used to that. My whole life has been half full. Half -full family, half-full personal life, half-full career. But I settled for it. I was used to it. Did I already say that I was used to it?”
Gary, a gone-to-seed high-school football player with a gut like a deflated balloon, gave me a stern look over the pilsner he was polishing. “Are you done with that?”
I drained the watered-down vodka and blue liqueur from my glass, wincing as the alcohol hit the potato skins in my belly.
Both threatened to make an encore appearance.
I steadied myself on the ring-stained maple bar and squinted through the icy remains of the glass. “And now, my career is gone. Gone, gone, gone. Completely empty. Like this glass.”
Gary replaced said glass with another drink, pretended to wave at someone in the main dining room, and left me to fend for myself. I pressed my forehead to the cool wood of the bar, cringing as I remembered the smug, cat-that-devoured-the-canary tone Mrs. Stubblefield used to say, “Jane, I need to speak to you privately.”
