“Ulyssa... I don’t think this is a good idea. Maybe I should just watch the stuffed animals,” I whispered nervously. “Look at the size of those seats. I don’t think I’ll fit.”
“You’ll be fine.”
“Excuse me honey. You’re gonna want to sit on the end seat,” the attendant said, guiding me to the end seat and gave me a wink. “It’s a little bigger than the other ones.”
I saw him directing Ulyssa towards the other end seat lessening my embarrassment a little. I wish the exit gate was on our side, so I could sneak out. I wiggled my butt into the plastic seats and felt the edges digging into my hips.
This is not a good idea.
Mitsy patted my leg saying, “This’ll be fun!”
I looked down the row at Ulyssa wearing the same look of doubt as she pulled the bar over her chest.
I tried to pull down my chest bar to connect the safety latch. It wouldn’t latch.
Dang.
I sucked in my breath and tried again.
Double Dang.
The worker walked past everyone yanking on the connectors to make sure it was secure.
He stopped when he got to me.
“Hey Jimbo! I’m gonna need some help with this one!” His breath reeked of old cabbage and cheap whiskey.
“It’s okay. I don’t have to ride. I’ll just go over there by the stuffed animals and wait on my friends.”
“Naw. You’re fine. We’ve had to do this before.”
Jimbo walked around the side of the ride asking, “What do you want?”
“Need a little help getting her situated.”
Jimbo gave me a once over and nodded.
Without any warning, he grabbed the chest bar shoving it into my boobs and deflating my lungs. I gasped for air while cabbage-breath struggled to snap the connector closed.
“I don’t think this is a good idea!” I gasped. “This ain’t nothing but a seat belt, it ain’t gonna hold me.”
“Lean into ‘er a little Jimbo so I can get this damn thing latched. I just need bout another inch or so.”
Jimbo jumped into the chest bar pushing my arms and legs outward like a string puppet.
“I can’t breath.”
“Just a little more,” he insisted.
Jimbo gave a big shove with his shoulder.
I heard the seat belt click or my ribs crack. Not sure which.
It must have been the seat belt because they slapped high fives, stepped back and gave a thumbs up to the operator.
The machine started moving upward and my stomach began to relax.
“Wait!” Jimbo yelled at me. “The belt came undone, it came undone!”
My panicked screams of, “Stop the ride! Stop the ride!” were overpowered by the music and Mitsy’s maniacal laughter.
The ride stopped.
I’ve been saved.
Then the ride dropped.
I let out what can best be described as a Pterodactyl screech.
So, this is how I’m gonna die. A faulty safety device and the only witnesses are two Tweety birds and a unicorn.
Unsure if it would take two drops to loosen the chest bar enough for me to plummet to my death, I continued to screetch through the second drop.
When the ride finally stopped, Jimbo walked over to me first, laughing at my performance. “That’s quite a set o’ lungs you got there, missy.”
My hands were wrapped so tightly around the chest bar that they tingled when I tried to pry them free.
He reached down and unsnapped the safety latch.
“But... but... you said it came undone.”
“Naw. I was just having a little fun with ya. Trying to get your heart rate up a little,” he said, unlatching Mitsy’s safety latch.
“Heart rate? Heart rate! Are you kidding me? I THOUGHT I WAS GONNA DIE!” I shrieked, sliding out of the seat onto shaky legs. “You coulda given me a heart attack! Then what...”
Mitsy and Mitchell each wrapped an arm around me and led me over to the rail. Sam and Ulyssa trailed behind us giggling from their adrenaline highs.
I tried to catch my breath and calm down.
I’m alive. That’s all that matters.
“You okay, Shasta?” Ulyssa asked.
“I thought I was going to die. On a carnival ride. At a Roadkill Festival. Not exactly how I thought it would go down.”
That made everyone laugh, lifting my spirits a little.
I tried to pick up my unicorn, but my arms still weren’t functioning properly so I accidentally dropped it over the railing. Mitchell hopped over the railing to retrieve it.
“What the hell?” he asked, pointing under the metal platform holding the ride. “There ain’t nothing but cinder blocks holding that thing up!”
I gasped. Ulyssa crossed herself. Mitsy eek’d.
“That’s enough for me! I think I’m done with the games and rides,” Sam said. “I’m gonna go do some shopping before we head back.”
“There’s a couple things I want to pick up too, so I’ll tag along,” Mitsy said.
“We’ll meet y’all back there. Ulyssa, can we get the car keys?” Sam asked.
“Here ya go,” she said, handing her keys to Sam. “I want to go through the haunted house real quick.” Ulyssa turned to Mitchell. “You going to The Slaughter House with us?”
“No. I’m gonna go try the rifle game one more time.”
“Alright, we’ll meet y’all back at the car. Probably about 30 or 45 minutes?”
Everyone agreed and went their separate ways.
Ulyssa and I handed the last of our tickets over for entrance to the creepy looking barn. I don’t like haunted houses, especially when they’re filled with chainsaws. We were shrouded in darkness as the flaps swished closed behind us. Screams filled the air as we followed the dimly lit walkway into the next room. A woman dressed as a bloodied dentist approached us carrying a drill in one hand.
“Want a root canal? Open up!” Behind her a mutilated patient was strapped into her dentist chair.
Ulyssa pushed me into the hallway.
She’s not a fan of dentists.
I put my hands up to guide us along the dark hallway, dragging my fingers through a sticky goo. Suddenly, I felt very alone.
“Ulyssa?” I whispered franticly.
The sound of scuffling intermingled with grunts reverberated down the hallway.
“Ulyssa?”
The only response was the sound of repeated thuds.
“Ulyssa! Stop it! Not funny!” I said, crouching down, ready to pounce.
A crunching sound was accentuated by the sound of quickly approaching footsteps.
I bounced my butt in the air like a cat about to pounce.
The footsteps barreled right into me, knocking me over.
“What the...” Ulyssa complained in my direction. “Why were you just standing there? Couldn’t you hear me getting attacked? Get up! We need to get out of here!”
I struggled back to my feet. “What’s going on?”
“I’ll explain it outside. Just get moving.”
The rest of the haunted house was a fearful blur, until we reached a meat locker with masked men hiding behind sides of beef with chainsaws. I exhaled a little, knowing we were close to the end of the haunted house. They always put the chainsaws at the end. My guess is it freaks people out so much they need a quick exit to the bathroom. Normally, chainsaws paralyze Ulyssa, but whatever was chasing her was worse than anything in the house because she didn’t even break stride. We walked down the exit ramp and waited in the shadows to the left of the attraction.
“What is going on?” I asked, dropping into my angry cat pose again.
“Somebody jumped me in there,” she said, staring at the exit, waiting on something or someone to come barreling out.
“What? Are you sure?”
“Oh, I’m sure alright. They’re not supposed to touch you. But this guy grabbed me and said, ‘you’re not getting away’!”
“
Are you okay? What did you do?”
“I’m fine. I don’t know what I did exactly. He grabbed me and I just went crazy on him,” she said, pacing. “And now I’m going to wait right here and give him a piece of my mind. How dare he grab me!”
Most women would have been afraid and ran away from the scene to call the police. Ulyssa was hiding with me in the bushes to make sure she finished the job.
My lower body continued to bounce in anticipation of the confrontation.
She patted her hair where the feather crown had been seated all day. “Besides he ripped out my hair clip. I’ll never be able to find another one like it.”
“You just got jumped and you’re worried about your hair clip? You’re so country!”
“Whatever!” she said, pivoting her stare towards me. “Why are you bouncing? Do you have to go to the bathroom?”
“It’s my fighting stance...”
Her mouth dropped open as something past me caught her attention. “Uh-oh.”
I followed her stare. An ambulance was heading our way with lights and sirens going full blast.
“Did you kill him?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so,” she said, unconvincingly.
“Well, it was bad enough they had to call an ambulance. You sure you want to stick around for him to press charges?”
“What? Press charges?” she sputtered. “He attacked me!”
“Yeah. But you messed him up bad enough he needs medical attention.”
“But my hair clip?”
“It’s up to you. Do you think it’s worth going to jail for?”
“Ok. Let’s go.”
We hurried through the crowds directly to the parking lot.
Sam and Mitsy were already waiting in the car, discussing their purchases.
After shoving our stuffed animals in the trunk, we sat nervously waiting on Mitchell.
“You okay, Ulyssa? You’ve got blood on your knuckles and face,” Mitsy said, handing us some sanitary wipes.
“Yeah. I’m fine. It’s probably just gunk from the Haunted House.”
I looked down at my hands stained by food coloring and syrup. “Yeah. They had this crap all over the walls. Can I get one of those wipes too?”
That earned me a grateful look from Ulyssa.
Mitchell slung his upper body against the car windshield and yelled making all of us jump in our seats.
“Dang,” he said, opening the door to squeeze into the car. “Y’all sure are jumpy.”
“Just got out of the haunted house. It was so scary, I thought for sure somebody was going to come after us,” I said.
Everybody howled with laughter, except me and Ulyssa.
The library was a small, single level brick building tucked away on the edge of town. A couple park benches separated the library property from the city park. These park benches had been our primary hiding spot in high school, but we hadn’t spent much time at the library after graduation. The smell of old, dusty books assaulted our nostrils as we stepped inside.
I immediately recognized the Librarian. “Jennifer! I didn’t know you worked here.”
“Hey, Shasta! Ulyssa!” she said, giving us a friendly wave. “I work here part time. It’s decent pay and easy work.”
“Cool.”
“What brings y’all to the library?”
“We need to use a computer, we’re hoping you had one with Internet access.”
“Yeah. We’ve got one, but somebody’s using it right now,” she said, waving us closer so she could whisper. “It’s Ruth. She comes in here before she goes to work sometimes.”
We looked over at the computer where the red headed, wrinkled woman sat inches away from the monitor typing furiously.
“She’ll be on there forever. I checked the logs one time to see what she does for so long. She’s chatting with her boyfriend, Jackie.”
“Jackie? I thought her and Eugene were a thing?” I asked.
“I don’t know about Eugene, but her and Jackie have been an item for about a year now. He lives a few miles away in Hurricane at the Sacred Care nursing home. They both lost their driver licenses a couple months ago and she’s too cheap to buy a cell phone. The Internet is the only way they can talk during her workweek, but they use the public Nitro-Hurricane shuttle bus for the occasional booty call.”
“Ewwww!” we both complained to Jennifer.
It’s pretty pathetic that a grouchy, seventy year old woman is getting more action than me!
“There are some big, comfy chairs in the back near the biography section if y’all want to have a seat and read some magazines while you wait. I’ll give ya a shout when she’s done.”
“Ok. Thanks.”
We grabbed a stack of gossip magazines and settled into the pleather seats. We were nearing the end of the stack when Jennifer announced that the computer was open. The seat was still warm when we hopped on the workstation and searched for Craigslist.
“I guess we just select our city and state?” I clicked the blue Charleston link. “Wow. There are so many job types! Where do you think we should start?”
“Can you just click on jobs? Maybe that will just give us a list of everything.”
I clicked the link and hundreds of entries popped onto the screen. I scrolled through the links looking for something that fit our skillset.
“Look at this one!” I said, clicking the link to make the job advertisement expanded on the screen.
Evolutionary Eggs is looking for special egg donors
Donors must be between 20 – 30 years old
5’4 or taller
Blonde/Dark Blonde/Light Brown/Medium Brown (Preferably thick hair)
Blue/Green eyes
Fit/athletic/model type body
College Education or enrolled in college
Healthy, non-smoker, no tattoos or piercing within the last thirteen months
Reliable, responsible and have transportation to complete this commitment.
Compensation STARTING at $6,500.00
If you have any immediate questions, call our office (677) NEW-EGGS.
“Wow! Did you see how much they’re willing to pay?” I asked, pointing at the highlighted compensation.
“That’s gross! Ain’t nobody gonna roter-root my eggs!” Ulyssa exclaimed. “There’s got to be something else.”
Hours later, we’d finished scouring every available job ad and scheduled four interviews for Monday.
The first interview was with the Dynamic Marketing, a company housed in a warehouse on the southern part of Charleston. The sleek, modern design continued into the front lobby where a plastic looking receptionist seated in front of a shimmery wall was busily chattering into her headset. “Thank you for calling Dynamic. How may I direct your call?” she purred, “please hold while I transfer your call.”
She scanned us from head to toe as we approached her desk.
“How can I help you ladies?” Purr. Purr.
“We have a one o’clock interview with Terry.”
“Okay. I’ll let him know you’re here. You can have a seat over there,” she said, gesturing to the black pleather seats lined against another black and silver wall.
A thin, mustached man emerged from behind the wall before we settled into the chairs. He was wearing a Hawaiian shirt, khaki cargo pants and cowboy boots. If this was the dress code, I could handle working in a warehouse.
“Good Afternoon! How ya doing?” he said, shaking our hands, his gold bracelets jingled from the enthusiastic shaking. “Come on back and we’ll start your interviews.”
The warehouse was abuzz with activity with a hum of female voices from the field of cubicles.
“We don’t have your number in the database. Is this your first time calling us? This automatically qualifies you for our newcomer discount.”
“Oh yeahhhh, I’ve never had it this good before...”
“We really need more people for this to work...”
“Would you like to c
harge this to a card or add it to your account?”
Terry steered us down the middle aisle past dozens of women whispering into headsets. Most of them nodded and smiled at us as we made our way toward two empty cubicles. I’ve never had my own desk, much less my own cubicle. This place kept looking better and better.
“There are some how-to guides on the desk. Have a quick look at those and then I’ll let you answer a few calls to see how you do. When you think you’re ready, just put on the headset and hit one of the flashing buttons. I’ll be listening on another line in my office to evaluate your abilities. If you do well, you’re hired.” He walked away leaving us staring at each other. We grabbed the three ring binders and flipped to the first page of rules.
Focus on what your customer wants.
Keep your voice low so you don’t interrupt others.
Never give out your real name or personal information.
Keep it professional.
Only use company approved sounds.
The last one seemed weird to me and I looked at Ulyssa to see if she was getting weirdo vibes too. Her training manual was closed and she already had her headset on.
“What are you doing?” I whispered.
“This is easy. Just talking to folks. I don’t need a manual for that.” She hit the button and mimicked the receptionist's sultry voice.
“Good Afternoon! Thanks for calling Dynamic. How may I help you?” She hit mute and flipped through the training manual until she got to the tab marked introduction. “Some of the most popular packages we sell are adventure, athletic, party, massage, and wildlife.”
Those sound awesome! I wonder if we get discounts.
“The adventure package pushes your senses to a new level as you enjoy experiences beyond your wildest dreams... Okay, a little too crazy for you...”
She flipped pages to the next script.
“How about a party package? You can relive the exciting parts of Spring Break with crazy parties and wild women... Great. You’ve selected the Spring Break party option. The pricing plan for this package is fifty-nine ninety-five. Would you like to pay by credit or apply the charges to the account registered with this phone number?”
Fat Assassins (The Fat Adventure Series) Page 6
