AllFreeNovel
Share Us
We don’t talk about that one hundred percent return these days.
Let’s just say Perky is swimming in cash, and coffee is her fixation. She’s so obsessed with it that she changed her name from Persephone to Perky to identify with the coffee. Not legally – that would require forethought and follow-through, neither of which are her strong suit.
“I hand pull and massage perfection that people put in their mouths,” she argues.
“Now you make being a barista sound dirty.”
“Never underestimate the eroticism of coffee.”
Never underestimate Perky’s capacity for self-delusional bullshit.
“Congrats on the job!” she chirps. She might be super weird about coffee, but she’s also my oldest, most loyal friend. “What is it?”
“Professional fluffer.”
The long pause is really, really weird for Perk. She’s more the type to overtalk than go quiet. Finally, she says, “Could you repeat that, Mal? I swear you said ‘professional fluffer.’”
“I did! It’s an old term for someone who stages houses. I’m guessing the people I’m working with are really uptight. Probably very conservative. I wore a dress, and I have to make sure I don’t swear.”
“Mallory, are you kidding?” Sharp and increasingly loud at the end, her answer ends with giggles.
“What? No. Not kidding. The guy said the set is–”
“Set? You’re going to a movie set?” She’s reaching high decibels here.
“More like television, I think. I’m not sure.”
“Oh, my God, Mallory. This job sounds like it’s p–”
My phone dies.
One other thing about Perky: She’s always right. I do need to charge my battery.
I love her enthusiasm about my new job, though. I’m sure the next word out of her mouth was going to be “perfect.”
But I frown at my dead phone.
Hmm. I called Perky to tell her where I’m going. To be my safety net. Every woman knows that you don’t go somewhere alone to meet a stranger you communicated with on the internet. That’s how people end up chained to basement walls or tucking a fifty-six-year-old man into bed while changing his diaper and feeding him breast milk he bought on eBay from a bottle he trashpicked at the local children’s consignment shop.
Don’t look at me like that. This exact story was covered in a podcast series and the outcome was just as bad as you think.
But I’ll bet even he had a date to his high school reunion.
My phone battery’s dead, so I can’t map the rest of the trip, but I remember the address. 29 Maplecure Street. Pfft. As if maple ever cured anything. Maple bacon, maybe.
Maple bacon donuts? Definitely.
Great. Now I want a road trip to Portland to the Holy Donut and to have a date with a box of bacon-crumble-covered maple potato boyfriends. You can’t have sex with food (American Pie excepted), but it makes for a fine companion when real men aren’t in abundant supply.
Speaking of men, as I pull up to 29 Maplecure Street, I see a cluster of them, three in a circle, all smoking. Beards abound. At first glance, I assume they’re a moving crew.
But they aren’t wearing matching t-shirts with company logos.
Hmm.
As I put the car in park, I take a deep breath and steel myself. Meeting new associates is always nerve wracking. My grey knit dress from Athleta should be just right, the intersection of polished and cool with enough functional stretch for bending and lifting. Real estate agents dress up to look successful; the interior designers I occasionally meet dress up, I think because it’s their nature to choose beautiful things.
And they accessorize. I’ve got big silver hoop earrings and an armful of black beaded bracelets.
