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She blinked, caught off guard by my sudden declaration. “Really?”
“Yes, really. Let’s get you down to HR.” I picked up the phone and punched the button for HR. “I’m sending Ava…”
“Stan,” she supplied.
“Stan?” I tried. It wasn’t what I expected, sounding more like a frat boy than a leggy redhead.
She smiled, obviously having dealt with that particular brand of confusion before. “Yes, Stan.”
“That sounds like a first name,” I said.
“I get that all the time.”
I checked with her again to see if she was joking, but her face held just the sort of long-suffering patience that one would expect from a person with an odd last name. I leaned on the intercom to continue my conversation with HR.
“I’m sending down Ava Stan. She’s going to work with me. She’ll need a badge and a computer and all that.” I looked up at Ava, barely listening to the acknowledgement from the HR department.
“HR is on the second floor,” I said. “Take the elevator down, take a left right out of the gate and it’s the third office on your right.”
“Left, right out of the gate, third office on my right,” she repeated.
“Second floor,” I said.
“Second floor,” she parroted, getting it all straight in her head. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” I replied. “Don’t let me down.”
“No, sir.”
I watched her walk casually from the room, not running and yet not dawdling. She had purpose to her step, something that I appreciated. She couldn’t know how many cookie-cutter blondes I had interviewed in the past few hours, but she blew them all away.
Pleased with myself that I had solved the desk situation, and now the secretary problem, I belatedly realized it was probably time to do some actual work. I had a number of meetings I was putting off, but Ava could reschedule those as soon as she started. The best use of my time would be getting myself up to speed on the company. I was all in, and I knew as much as anyone, but there was always more to learn. For an hour I perused the quarterly reports then decided to pack it up for the night. I would get a fresh start in the morning—with a capable employee by my side.
Chapter 4
Ava
The whole way down to HR, I was shaking. I was so nervous that I was going to blow it, even though I already had the deal in hand. I kept myself stiff and polite, smiling often but not really showing any teeth. I made chit chat with the HR representative as she walked me through the steps to set myself up in the payroll system. She gave me a badge and a lanyard, checked my two forms of ID, and scanned my fingerprints.
“This is just to make sure you don’t have a criminal history,” she explained.
“Don’t they do that at the police station?” I wondered.
“We just send the print to the police and they run the background check,” the woman replied. “It’s cheaper for us that way. Plus, it’s a lot faster.” She leaned forward conspiratorially. “It can take you up to a month to get a fingerprint appointment with the Boston PD.”
“A month?” I repeated, acting shocked.
“With this, we’ll get results by the end of the week.”
“Does that mean I have to wait to hear from you?” I asked.
“Oh no,” she said with a smile. “This is just a formality. You’re scheduled to start tomorrow.”
I held my breath. This was turning out even better than I’d hoped. Not only did I get the job, but there wasn’t any waiting and wondering. I could start earning tomorrow, bringing me that much closer to my own apartment.
The problem was, when I finally got through the onboarding process and was let out onto the street, I didn’t have anywhere to go. I wanted to celebrate. Taking myself out for a fancy dinner or some drinks would have been nice. But I couldn’t afford to waste perfectly good money on fancy things.
I walked to the parking garage and got back in my car. It was going to cost me fifteen dollars to get the car out. HR had explained that I could buy a monthly parking pass from the garage, but that was way out of my budget. I needed to find a way around paying for parking. Maybe I could park outside of the city and take public transportation to work every day. That would solve the problem for a little while at least, until I was able to afford a spot.
