Taken

by Mia Ford

  “You’re breaking up with me?” Suzie asked, tears in her eyes.

  “Yes. I cannot pretend you are something you are not,” he said sadly and then walked away.

  Suzie sat on the deck swing and rocked, feeling more alone than ever. Helen had come to check on her and informed Suzie that Jared had left and they would make sure she had a ride back home. A long time passed and the place was silent. Jeff joined her on the deck when the cabin went dark.

  “I thought you would come to me,” he spoke quietly, putting his hand on her shoulder.

  “I didn’t know what you wanted,” Suzie replied.

  “I want to paint you,” Jeff said and he scooped her up and brought her to the studio. “Now be with me.”

  Billionaire Brother’s

  NATASHA

  The nameplate on her desk read Delores Morris. I wondered what kind of parents would name their kid Delores Morris. It sounded like a character from a children’s book that was a bull frog or maybe a mule. Or maybe it was more like a brand of cookies from the Depression Era. Delores Morris Ginger Snaps.

  Either way, Miss Delores Morris had called me to come to the Human Resource office over fifteen minutes ago and I was still sitting here waiting. I knew what was coming. You didn’t get called to the Human Resource office just before noon on a Friday to be told you’re getting a promotion.

  Looking around the office, I decided that Delores Morris was making me wait on purpose. I looked at my watch and saw the little hand was on the twelve and the big hand was on the one. It was officially after noon. I had been sitting here in the morning until it turned afternoon.

  Eyeballing the candy dish full of Tootsie-Rolls on Delores Morris’s desk I shifted in my seat and looked behind me out of the office door. Holding my breath, I didn’t hear anything. So, I reached up and grabbed a handful, shoving the little morsels in my blazer pocket along with my house keys and a pen. Figuring I might walk lopsided if I didn’t even things out, I grabbed another handful and stuffed my other pocket. There were now only four lonely little Tootsie-Rolls in the bowl.

  Anyone with such a name as Delores Morris had to have another bag of candy around in her desk. Probably more.

  What would she do if she saw me sitting here with the bag in my lap, unwrapping one after the other while she delivered the news.

  “Are those mine, Miss Morgan?” she’d ask.

  “What, these? No. I had them in my pocket. They’re mine.” She’d see her almost empty candy dish, yank open the drawer only to find it bare of more Tootsie-Rolls.

  “Yup. Picked them up this morning.” I’d say as I ate another one, really smacking away as I chewed. I smiled to myself. That would be funny. If only I were brave enough to actually do it.

  “I’m sorry for keeping you waiting, Natasha.” Said a hurried Delores without shutting the door behind her. She was a full-figured woman who wore her hair shaved close to the head in a style very few women could get away with. But she had a perfectly round head so it did look good on her. Her nails were squared and acrylic and made a pleasant clacking noise as she shuffled some papers on her desk and made room for herself.

  “Natasha, we’ve had to make a difficult decision…”

  Natasha? I had never met this woman and yet she was calling me by my first name. Perhaps she wouldn’t mind if I called her Dory.

  “We think, that is your supervisor Jolene and myself, we have decided that your services are no longer needed here at Mangan Financial.” She said. I wondered if they still gave out pink slips like they used to. Looking on Dolores’s desk I didn’t see anything pink. “You had been warned about filing your evening reports and when Jolene tried to help you were insubordinate.”

  “Jolene herself doesn’t know how to file the evening reports. If she did I wouldn’t be doing them wrong. She’s the one who trained me, for Pete’s sake.” I said, rolling my eyes.

  Dolores continued rambling on about handbook regulations, proper procedures and COBRA benefits. I wondered what would happen if I were to suddenly start to twitch and grumble obscenities at her. My Turret’s Syndrome that had been pleasantly lying dormant for several years had reared its ugly head under the stress and strain of being fired.

  How great would that be? To just start shouting F-this, F-that, and a whole slew of terms even sailors would blush just hearing. I had to choke back the giggles that wanted to race up my throat. I needed to stay in control.

  “Now, Natasha, I’ll just need you to sign this paperwork and…”

  “Sign what?” I broke out of my trance.

  “This is just a standard form stating you understand why you are being terminated and …”

  “I’m not signing anything.”

  Dolores looked at me as if those symptoms of Turret’s had actually occurred.

  “I’m afraid you have to sign this.” She said. There was no more playing Miss Nice Morris. Delores glared at me and plucked a pen from her smiley face coffee mug full of pens. Setting it on the document to be signed she slid it in front of me.

  “No. I don’t. I don’t work for you anymore. I’m not signing anything.” I sat back in the chair, folding my arms across my chest and glared right back at her. I saw the panic in her face. Poor Dolores was one of those people who followed everything to the letter. Rules were not meant to be broken. There was a proper procedure for everything. And when one rule wasn’t followed it led to trouble and Dolores was not about to get into trouble over the likes of me. At least that is what she thought.

  Finally, after several seconds of not saying anything her eyes fell to her candy dish. I saw her take a breath as if she was about to speak but thought it was probably no use. Her eyes flashed at mine as I smirked at her.

  Yes, it was childish. I was a grown woman in my mid-twenties and could have handled this with grace and class. But after two years at Mangan Financial watching one woman more incompetent than the next get away with mucking up the works, I had had enough. Besides, I was fired. It wasn’t like there was something I could say or do that would make them change their mind.

  If showing up on time every day, putting in eight solid hours and doing the job I was assigned wasn’t good enough, then there was no hope for me. That was the part that really burned.

  I had seen women in my office show up drunk after lunch. There were a couple of girls who never arrived on time, ever. They were late every day. Not just five or ten minutes but we’re talking they would come in to work half an hour late and think nothing of it. There would be no calling to the boss’s office for them.

  My supervisor, Jolene would shut her office door and sleep at her desk.

  The office manager would shop for Birkenstocks four or five times a week when she had nothing to do. As if wearing Birkenstocks wasn’t offensive enough.

  And the swapping of partners that went on in the place was enough to make the Bunny Ranch in Nevada look like a convent.

  It was a well-known fact that Mark Reynolds in sales was dipping his pen in about four wells of company ink and what was worse was that they all knew about each other.

  But yet I get fired for not filing my evening report correctly. What a world I live in.

  When I finally emerged from Delores Morris’s office with half a paycheck and my pockets full of Tootsie-Rolls I was greeted by Ron O’Malley. Ron was a retired police officer turned security guard who I not only had lunch with in the lunchroom on more than one occasion but I even had a beer with when everyone at Mangan Financial bailed on him on his birthday.

  “Hey, Ron. Sorry they’re making such a big thing out of me.” I said smiling at him as he stood from the chair he had been sitting in that was near the door. He didn’t smile. They had gotten to him. It was like a scene from Invasion of the Body Snatchers. He didn’t show a shred of emotion. I felt like I was all alone on a raft.

  He escorted me to my desk and handed me a banker’s box in order to collect my personals.

  “Good thing I stole all those reams of paper an
d boxes of pens last week.” I said to O’Malley with a smile and a wink. He just folded his arms and gave me a dirty look.

  Mangan Financial’s Human Resource Department had waited until everyone was gone to lunch to get me out of there without incident. I thought that was kind of humorous since I was only about five foot four and wearing heels and a skirt. It wasn’t like this was Walmart and there was a sale on flat screen televisions or something. I was a professional. An Administrative Assistant to be exact.

  So, while I packed my coffee cup and my pictures and my little personal effects in the box with O’Malley breathing down my neck I couldn’t help my hands shaking a little. I was so mad, yet, as I said I knew it was coming.

  There was a sting in my eyes. Quickly I bit my tongue until I thought I’d sever the tip in order to keep any tears behind my eyes until I was a safe distance from this place.

  I grabbed a file that was filled with all kinds of notes and positive emails from clients I dealt with and contact information for other offices and dropped it in the box.

  “That stays.” O’Malley said.

  “It’s mine. It’s my file with my notes in it.”

  “It stays. Put it down. Don’t make this difficult.”

  “Right. I’m making it difficult. My getting fired is making this difficult for you. Are you kidding me?”

  “All right. That’s it. Let’s go.”

  “Natasha. Remember? When I waved good morning to you every day for almost two years? My name is Natasha, Ron. They won’t fire you for being nice. Well, I don’t think they would.” I scratched my head but left the file in the box. It wasn’t that I really needed it. It was the principle of the matter.

  Tossing my purse on top of it I saw Ron thought better than to grab that in an attempt to get what essentially was unreadable doodles. A few people were still in this area of the building as Ron escorted me to the elevator. I couldn’t blame them for rubber-necking. I had done it, too. What bothered me was that most of them didn’t know me and they weren’t going to know the truth. The rumor mill was going to crank out something outlandish and obscene and there would be no one here to defend me. No one would say no, Natasha Morgan did not cry when they escorted her out or no, Natasha was not fired for getting drunk at Leo’s birthday party and calling her boss a skank while trying to make out with Keith in accounts receivable and then Ben in accounts payable.

  No. Those rumors and a dozen more just as bad if not worse were going to circulate all around until someone else did something so stupid I fell from the front pages. I give it about a week in this place.

  It was sinking in now. Like that iceberg that just snuck up on the mighty Titanic. I was feeling the reality of my situation sink in and now what was I going to do. I had half a paycheck in my hand, about negative ten dollars in savings and one credit card for only $800 that was maxed out.

  Couldn’t I have kept my mouth shut? What would have happened if I had called in sick today? Would they have fired me over the phone or would I have earned myself another week so they could fire me on a Friday again? How was I going to pay my rent next month? Where was the nearest unemployment office? Was it really the people in this place or was it me? No. It was them. It had to be because if it were me then that would mean I was doomed to get fired at every job from now until I was dead.

  The elevator door slid open and I strolled in saying a quick prayer of thanks that no one else was in there. But as I turned around I was surprised to see O’Malley stepping onto the elevator, too. What do they think I am going to do, get off on another floor and proclaim squatters rights?

  Delores Morris watched from the safety of the hallway past the lobby to make sure I didn’t run back to my desk screaming sanctuary. I gave her the finger to which she turned and walked away as the elevator doors slid shut.

  Don O’Malley didn’t say a word to me. When the doors finally slid open I stepped out of the elevator carrying my box of belongings and expected him to just press the twelfth button and go on back upstairs but he didn’t.

  Instead, he walked behind me through the lobby and to the glass revolving door that lead out onto the busy city street.

  Everyone was looking at me carrying my banker box with security behind me. I wanted to scream. I just wanted to scream that I didn’t deserve this. I wanted people to know I got canned because the people in my office didn’t like me. It wasn’t because I didn’t do my job. It was because they just didn’t like me.

  I finally pushed my way around in the revolving door and felt the cool, fresh air on my skin. I would have stood there for just a second to get my nerves settled but O’Malley came out behind me, his arms still folded across his chest.

  “Move along now.” He said, looking out at the bustling street acting like a real dick.

  “Yeah, okay, tough guy.” I snapped and began my slow walk.

  People were coming and going on their lunch break. Some of them looked at me with my box of trinkets and I could tell they knew what had just happened. Fired.

  And as luck would have it as I walked toward the bus stop to catch the twenty-two bus back to my apartment I ran into the gals from the office. They all stopped for a second and looked at me. They all were there including Trudy who signed off on all paychecks.

  “Natasha, what happened?” Tricia would ask.

  “I can’t believe they’d let you go. You always did your work.” Amy would add.

  “I know we hardly spoke but you were really nice.” Would be that weird Laura girl’s contribution.

  “It’s just a sign of better things.” “You’re too good for that place.” And so on, and so on.

  But that wasn’t what happened. They looked at me and I looked at them and they quickly hurried past me without saying a word. Not a single word.

  Now, I know this might sound crazy but at that moment, when those half a dozen women just walked past me like they didn’t know me, that was when I couldn’t keep the tears back.

  I swear the entire city held its breath. Birds didn’t sing, cars didn’t honk their horns, trains didn’t rumble on the tracks, people stopped talking and all I could hear was my own heart beat as everything silently passed by me.

  Telling myself over and over again what a good employee I really was made my head ache. As sound slowly started to creep into my ears again and drown out my own heartbeat I relived the whole ugly incident in my head. I had a college education and solid work experience and great references from great friends who posed as employers more than once for me. I’d never trust a boss, no matter how good you were at your job, to ever give you a fair reference.

  And because my awesome friends would do this for me that meant I’d have to tell them that I got fired…again.

  Not wanting to walk down the street blubbering into my banker box I saw a neon sign and made a bee-line for it. And it was a good thing I had done that because overhead some dark clouds had just rolled in to match my mood. A storm was coming. Pathetic fallacy. Perfect. I may just have to wait it out getting lit in Liona’s tavern.

  Stepping inside this bar was like stepping into perpetual nighttime. The windows were heavily tinted and on a gray day like this it looked like it was after ten o’clock at night. The maroon colored walls were barely lit with sconces giving off a sultry glow. The carpet was a well-worn red and black pattern and the bar was a dark wooden block with mirrors and a few dozen bottles lined along it.

  All I wanted was an ice-cold beer. I was hot from carrying this box and humiliation tended to get a person’s body temperature up. Plus, I was in heels. A cold one sounded perfect.

  The place wasn’t crowded at this time of day. There was a couple seated off to my right sitting dangerously close but with sour looks on their faces. My bet was they were living out the words to Third Rate Romance.

  There were some men who looked like they had been putting in some time at the nearby construction site. They all wore dirty blue jeans, heavy boots with thick soles and dark tans that in this light made
their skin look like the surface of a rawhide bone.

  A very handsome drink of water was sitting by himself in the booth directly in front of me. He wore a nice suit and his blond hair was cut military style as if he was on shore leave. He was very good looking but paying absolutely no attention to me.

  Besides, romance was the last thing on my mind. What kind of dude would want anything to do with an out of work secretary? Still, Mr. Business was easy on the eyes.

  I walked up to the bar, set down my box of tricks on one seat and hopped up onto the one next to it. The bartender came down from the end of the bar where he was doing a crossword puzzle.

  “What can I get you?” he asked. His voice was very low yet his features were cute and boyish. He was soft all over and his eyes were slightly close together. But when he smiled he had dimples plus a full head of dark wavy hair. Dimples and thick hair were worth their weight in gold in my opinion.

  “Just a Bud Light.” I mumbled taking a deep breath. The place smelled like stale cigarettes and as much as I hated to admit it I loved that smell. It reminded me of when my college friends took me out on my twenty-first birthday to the same place we had been going since we got our fake ID’s three years earlier. It was just a dumpy place like this but it was fun.

  “Bud Light. Coming right up.”

  I looked up at the television that was playing with the sound down. There was nothing happening there. I watched the bartender get my beer from a can and pour it into an hourglass shaped glass.

  When he set it in front of me I realized I only had about fifteen dollars to get me through the night. I took out my wallet and decided to call for reinforcements.

  My friend Diamond Everett would be by shortly. I had been through so much life with Diamond that I couldn’t imagine anything big happening without her being close by. But before I dialed her number on my cell phone I felt the strongest sensation to check out Mr. Business again but didn’t dare do it. A guy like him knew how hot he was. If I had to gouge out my eyes I wouldn’t look in his direction.