As they do with “sensitivity training,” companies also bring in an affirmative-action officer to fight or fend off accusations of racism, but it’s usually nothing more than window dressing, a cosmetic addition that has no internal effect on the company’s institutional policies. And given its track record, Your World would certainly follow that lead and practice another form of tokenism by filling this position with a person of color (more than likely Black) but not giving them the power to really do their job. But thanks to item number two, that wouldn’t happen.
Our plan would require them to employ two high-school seniors of color as summer interns (one must be Black) and two college seniors of color as writing fellows, one during the school year and one during the summer (and again, one has to be Black). But they won’t be able to just bring a couple of us in, stick us in a corner and give us next to nothing to do, then bid us good-bye at the end of our stint yet still count us as “staff” when those “minority” numbers are tallied (I’ve been there). Every two years, they must have hired and retained one of their summer interns as a contributing editor and a writing fellow as a staff writer or editor (or filled these positions with individuals from outside of the company with the help of the National Association of Black Journalists). The other departments, though, won’t be off the hook: summer interns of color will also be familiar faces in graphic design, marketing, advertising, public relations, sales/subscriptions, and yes, even the mail room (which remains all white). And every time they award a fellowship and host an intern orientation, they will be reminded of who forced them to do it—and that would give me more satisfaction than a million-dollar settlement.
But, of course, it’s those seven figures that most matter to Jozette. “This will make me a partner. Ha, it better, or I’ll be suing for racial discrimination.”
I laughed. “You really think they’re going to fork over three million dollars?”
“No. But you always gotta ask for twice what you think they’d go for so all the bases are covered. That way, you get a great payday, we get a great payday, and they still get screwed.” Her phone beeped. She picked it up. “Yes? … Good. Put him through.” She hung up. “Well, this is the moment of truth.”
I nodded.
Her line beeped again. She pressed a button. She smiled. “Stan, how are you feelin’?” Stan being Stanley Weitz of Kragen, Weitz & Brooke. His firm was representing Your World.
“Not as good as you’ll be feeling in a few minutes.” His voice was deep but nasal.
Jozette’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, really? Well, talk to me. I always love feeling good.”
He cleared his throat. “I’ve discussed your counteroffer with my client. They are willing to accept the terms … but would like to put another figure on the table.”
“I’m listening.”
“Seven-fifty.”
Jozette shook her head. “Nope.”
“That’s as high as they’ll go, Jozie.”
She wasn’t buying it. “A few days ago they were only willing to go as high as three hundred.”
“Look, they plan to implement all the programs suggested, but it’s going to take a lot of resources.”
“Oh, come on, Stan. We’re talking about one of the few magazines in the universe that actually made a profit over the last few years.”
Wow … I didn’t know that.
She glared at the phone. “And I’m sure I don’t have to remind you who is partly responsible for that.”
He sighed. I giggled to myself.
“And you know and I know that Your World’s reputation as a publication with integrity has to be worth more than that.” Jozette said she hadn’t disclosed that she had the joods on them, but that must’ve been the closest she’d come to spilling those beans.
Instead of a response, there was paper rustling and then some mumbling. I guess the publisher, Martin York, or someone from the board of directors was listening in and strategizing with Stan.
“How about one-two?” Stan asked with some caution in his voice.
Jozette nodded at me. She smiled. “Make it one-five and we have a deal.”
There was more mumbling. “It’s a deal.”
Jozette grinned. “Terrific. I’ll let my client know.” She winked at me. “Why don’t you draft up something with the conditions and items we’ve discussed, we’ll take a look at it, and if there are any problems, we’ll work on it.”
“Fine.”
“Oh, and Stan, I want to keep this process as smooth and uncomplicated as possible. Let’s try and have all this worked out before, say”—she began flipping through her desk calendar—“March twenty-second, exactly one month from now. I’m pretty sure your client wants this matter settled as soon as possible, and mine does also.”
“Indeed. I’ll have something to you in writing next Wednesday. How does that sound?”
“Sounds great. We’ll talk then.”
“Fine. Have a good day.”
“With news like this, you know I will. Till next week.” She clicked him off, then pressed another button. “Kent?”
“Yes?” It was her male aide, a brother from Nairobi who is in his second year of law school at New York University.
“We should be receiving papers from Kragen, Weitz & Brooke next Wednesday regarding Mr. Crawford’s case. If they don’t arrive by eleven-forty-five A.M., make sure you place a call to Serena O’Day, Stanley Weitz’s assistant.”
“Will do.”
“Thanks.” She clicked him off. She smiled. “You gotta catch folks while they’re still in a working mood and that’s usually before lunchtime.” She frowned. “For somebody who heard with his own ears that he’s going to be a millionaire, you sure don’t look happy. I’ve seen more joy on the faces of husbands who’ve been sued for and lost everything to their ex-wives.”
I shrugged. “It’s … good news.”
“Ha, it’s better than good,” she corrected me.
I chuckled to myself, thinking about Pooquie. “Yes, it is.”
She leaned forward. “Mitch, I know it might seem like a hollow victory, but given what you will come out of this with and what they have agreed to do, this has to be one of the best settlement deals I’ve ever seen, especially for one individual. Be glad there aren’t twenty or thirty other people attached to this. Litigation would really go on for years and you’d end up with pennies in the long run—if you ended up with anything.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“It’d be great if we did have the agreement signed and the first check within the month, but now comes the tricky part: coming up with language that says what it’s supposed to and that everyone can live with. Sometimes a deal can fall through because the parties disagree over the inclusion or exclusion of one word. One word. So you can’t go on any wild spending sprees yet.”
I laughed. “I won’t.”
“Oh …” She searched her desk. She handed me a yellow stickie. “It’s Phillip’s number.”
I frowned.
“He wanted me to give him yours. You don’t have to call him.”
“You know I won’t.” And I wasn’t. Yes, he gave us the “smoking gun,” but, as usual, he did for his own self-serving reasons. Some things—or, rather, people—never change.
Jozette shrugged. “Well, at least I can say I passed it on to you.”
I looked at her desk clock: 4:25. “Well, I have to go. Got essays to read.” I rose.
“Okay.” She walked over and hugged me. “But make sure you take some time to enjoy this moment, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
“Good.”
I smiled. “Thanks so much.”
“No problem.” She grinned. “I know what’ll cheer you up.” She linked her arm in mine. We started walking toward her door. “We’ve got a new UPS man on this floor and he should be here any minute. Let’s go by the watercooler and lie in wait.” She batted her eyes, her very long l
ashes flickering.
I giggled. “Sounds like fun.”
We waited for five minutes, but he was a no-show. Either he came early or was running late. I didn’t want to be caught in rush-hour traffic, so I said good-bye and headed for the elevators.
One was waiting for me. I got on. I pressed for the lobby and was about to tap the close button when …
“Could you hold that door, please?” a baritone voice sincerely asked. It sounded familiar. The man’s footsteps came closer and closer.
It was Montee, the brother from Body & Soul. He must’ve been the man we were waiting for. He was dressed in a different uniform today—UPS. And, like the army fatigues he had on Sunday night, he wore it hellafied well.
He grinned. “So, we meet again.”
I smiled. “So we do.”
He got on, his electronic tracking tablet under his left arm. “And I see you do know how to honor requests.”
“Excuse me?”
“Normally, when I ask someone to wait for me, I expect to find them when I get back. Like I said, I was only going to be a minute.”
“You were gone longer than a minute; ten to be exact.”
“You were counting the minutes I was gone?”
“Not … exactly.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I waited. But my friend and I had to leave.”
“Uh, the brother you were dancing with who looks like Arsenio?”
I hadn’t heard anyone describe Gene in that way in some time. “Yes.”
“Ah. Well, I ran into a brother I hadn’t seen in a long time, and before I knew it, the minutes flew. I’m sorry. Can you forgive me?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Silence.
He sighed. “I just knew I struck out.”
“You didn’t strike out. I wasn’t even pitching.”
He considered it. “Yeah, that is true. I was the one throwin’ it, and you were the one catchin’ it.” He winked.
I blushed. “I had a good time. It was fun.”
“It was.”
“Uh, I would’ve told you, but you rushed off so quickly. I’m involved.”
“With?”
“You know.”
“No, I don’t.”
“With someone.”
“Ah.”
We looked up at the elevator display. Eighth floor.
“So, when can we get together and do the bump off the dance floor?” He smirked.
I eyed him in disbelief. “Didn’t you hear what I said?”
“Yeah, I did. You said you’re involved with someone. But you didn’t say how. I mean, I’m involved with a few people—”
“Are you, really?”
“Yeah. But in different ways.”
All right, then … I can play along. “Okay … I am involved with someone in a relationship.” He was about to respond, no doubt with What kind of relationship?, when I added: “A monogamous relationship.”
He nodded. “You catch on quick. Well … ya can’t blame a brother for tryin.’”
“No. I guess I can’t,” I said to him, but more to myself.
We looked up at the display as it reached L. The doors opened. He gestured for me to leave first.
“Thank you.”
“You’re more than welcome.”
I opened and held the lobby door, allowing him to walk outside first.
He nodded. “And thank you.”
I peeped the azz—damn. “You’re more than welcome.”
He turned with his hand out. “It was good seeing you again.”
We shook; seismic, just seismic. “You, too.”
Neither one of us wanted to let go. I forced myself to. “You enjoy the rest of your day.” I smiled, walking away.
“I will. You do the same.”
I could feel his eyes on me as I ventured by what I assumed was his truck. Something was calling me to turn around and catch him before he sped off (in the other direction). After reacting rather nonchalantly to learning that I’d soon be rolling in dough, I wanted to ask him if he’d like to help me celebrate my very jood news.
But I knew if I looked back, there’d be no turning back.
9
YOUNG WILLING AND ABLE
Have you ever found yourself waiting to purchase groceries, toiletries, or clothing, and wondered why the shortest line—the one you happen to be on—moves the slowest?
It’s the strangest, most aggravating phenomenon. You just know you’ve beat the crowd. There’s just two, three, or four people ahead of you, and they each have the same number of items as you—or fewer. You’ve got the money in one hand, your items in the other, and you’re all revved up to hustle out of there and take care of whatever other bizness you have to tend to.
And then you realize you’ve been standing in the same place for a minute (or two or three) while the other lines you bypassed have not only moved along, they’ve got a whole new set of customers who came in around the time you first got on line.
I’ve been playing this waiting game all day. Thursday is when I usually run all of my errands so that I can chill on the weekend. Now that Pooquie is on the road and I am working full-time, I make sure we have the right kind of quality and quantity time together—and I refuse to let our lazy Saturday or Sunday afternoons and evenings be interrupted because we’ve run out of toothpaste, soap, toilet tissue, Wheaties, orange juice, or, worse, condoms (nothing spoils the mood more than that).
Every other week, the post office is the first stop on my journey—and I’m sure it is the last place most people would want to visit before punching a time clock (next to the Department of Motor Vehicles, it’s got to be the most stressful environment for one to work in and be serviced at). But the tension between employee and customer hasn’t blipped on the radar that early in the morning; in fact, I’ve found postal workers to be very considerate and friendly in the A.M., not the snotty, condescending lot they are often viewed as. Some do live up to that reputation, but I can empathize with their being a little testy; some customers can be downright nasty (I’ll never forget one man telling a clerk: “How many times did you have to fail the inkblot test before they gave you this job?”).
I usually just pop in to buy some stamps from a vending machine. But today I had a package to send out to an editor at Premiere magazine in the hopes of being a New York correspondent. I was praying the line would be short when I arrived, and it was (well, there wasn’t one—I was next). But there was only one window open, even though there were four other employees behind the counter who seemed to be doing next to nothing (one was sipping on coffee reading his paper and the other three were having a gabfest amongst themselves). Given that the woman being waited on had several large envelopes to mail and didn’t have the right zip for any of them, I might as well had been last on a line of ten. But then another clerk opened up and took care of me.
Next, it’s the bank at lunchtime. I receive my check when I walk in to work—and getting it a day earlier has been a lifesaver. I avoid the crazy crowds on Friday and use the newly installed automatic teller machine to deposit it (given how robotic a real teller can be, there is not much difference between the two). I’m usually in and out in a couple of minutes, but today a dozen other folks wised up and decided to follow my lead—the line for the ATM was just as long as for the regular tellers. To make matters worse, two of the three machines had some glitch: one wouldn’t dispense cash, the other receipts.
The final stop of the day is the supermarket, where I am now. And one would assume that this would’ve taken no time at all—after all, I’m on the express line.
But the folks ahead of me … what a bunch they were. One didn’t see why his having ten items on a seven-items-or-less line was such a big deal. Another ended up paying in cash (after putting back two items) when her two credit cards were declined and her personal check was rejected (she didn’t have a picture ID). One wanted to pay for a Kit Kat with a hundred-dollar bill—and got upt
ight when he was asked for something smaller. And the last couldn’t understand why she should have to shell out an extra nineteen cents for a can of Chicken of the Sea tuna when it was on sale for two for three dollars. As the manager, whom she requested to speak to, explained to her, “The list price is a dollar sixty-nine. But if you buy two, you save.” She didn’t want to save.
Then, when it was finally my turn, the receipt tape in the register had to be changed.
In any other case, I would’ve eased onto one of the other lines. But if I did, I’d miss getting my weekly discount from my favorite cashier.
Skye is his name. He’s a seventeen-year-old senior at Brooklyn Tech, a bright young man who wants to be (what do you know) a journalist. He actually went to Tech to study engineering but found his true calling when he joined the school paper.
“You’ve been moving kinda slow,” I teased.
“Ha, I haven’t. The customers have.” A woman was about to place her items on the counter when he told her, “Sorry, ma’am, this line is closed.” After she rolled her eyes in disgust, she stomped off. We looked at each other and laughed. “I told her nicely and she still gets an attitude. I tell ya …” He took a sign that said closed and put it on the counter behind my items. “That will take care of that.” He grinned at me. “So, how are you?”
“I can’t complain. How have you been?”
“Much better, now that my favorite customer is here.” He winked.
Hmm … he had never publicly acknowledged me in that way. I didn’t know whether to smile or not, but I did.
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