though!” I said enthusiastically. I was so proud of Polly. I knew how hard she worked just to get the audition.
He rolled his eyes and glanced away from me again. His head fell back to the folders, his eyes transfixed on them. “She’s useless. She just has an audition. That’s not a gig,” he said, with what I deemed to be poor, uncalled-for taste.
“What?” I asked. How dare he? He had no idea how many hours of work Polly had put in for this audition. She had worked hard just to get to the audition stage. He obviously had no idea how the acting scene worked in this city. You didn’t just have open auditions like a school drama. It was a cut-throat business that left many broken and battered, emotionally and physically, along the way.
It was serious.
And she was serious about it.
And I for one supported her and her decisions. I wanted to be there for her.
“I said loser actresses in the city think that they can get big just because it’s a ‘city of opportunity’ but the truth is, she’s a failure. She doesn’t have a dream yet. Tell her to call you when she’s done something worthy of mentioning to your boss again. Because right now, I’m upset that you wasted my time.”
My mouth fell agape. I couldn’t believe the words that I was hearing. How could anyone be so mean?
“Don’t talk about her that way!” I unintentionally blurted out. I tried to stop the words from coming out, by physically lurching after them with my hands—but no matter how hard I tried, I wasn’t going to have the ability to catch them and pull them back in. “She’s my friend,” I managed to finish.
“Well, that says a lot about you, then. Your choice in friends is a huge tale on who you are as a person,” he replied, nonchalantly, as if he didn’t even have a care in the world as to what we were talking about.
“You have no friends!” I pointed out, angrily.
“Excuse you?”
Chapter 10
T he office air was tense, as I watched people run in and out of Derek’s office throughout the day. I wasn’t sure what was happening. I just knew that several had been in, and none looked too pleased when they left.
It wasn’t until Julie-Anne, one of the women who worked across from me in a cubicle, walked up to me, her eyes puffy and face red.
It didn’t take an expert to know that she had been crying, especially by the smeared mascara beneath her swollen eyes.
I wanted to ask what was wrong, but by the expression on her face as she walked towards me, I knew that there was no need to ask. I was about to find out without asking.
“If you know what’s good for you, you will run,” she blurted out loudly, yet not in a volume loud enough to quite be considered an exclamation. And without any further examination, she left.
I knew, though, I knew that she had been fired.
“Are you ready to go?” Derek asked sternly, storming out of his office, with very little real regard to me. He barely even looked at me, and he certainly wasn’t asking as he crossed in front of my cubicle.
It was a rhetorical question, if I had ever heard one. His snooty, jackass of a voice was really telling me to get my hump off my desk and get to his house now. But he was far too refined to ever behave like that, far too posed and dignified to ever be truthful about what he meant.
My daddy was a totally different kind of man. He would have told me to get my rear end up and get to stepping towards my car. Because if he was ready to go, then damn it all, everyone else should have been too.
But rather than harp on it, or rather than question his motives aloud, I merely shrugged it off and nodded.
I was ready to go.
I was always ready to go when it came to Mr. Sholts. I knew to be.
So without further instruction, I made my way to the parking garage to retrieve my car and sadly head towards his apartment rather than Polly’s audition, like I had promised.
The parking garage—like every other parking garage—was dark, and I hated going
He rolled his eyes and glanced away from me again. His head fell back to the folders, his eyes transfixed on them. “She’s useless. She just has an audition. That’s not a gig,” he said, with what I deemed to be poor, uncalled-for taste.
“What?” I asked. How dare he? He had no idea how many hours of work Polly had put in for this audition. She had worked hard just to get to the audition stage. He obviously had no idea how the acting scene worked in this city. You didn’t just have open auditions like a school drama. It was a cut-throat business that left many broken and battered, emotionally and physically, along the way.
It was serious.
And she was serious about it.
And I for one supported her and her decisions. I wanted to be there for her.
“I said loser actresses in the city think that they can get big just because it’s a ‘city of opportunity’ but the truth is, she’s a failure. She doesn’t have a dream yet. Tell her to call you when she’s done something worthy of mentioning to your boss again. Because right now, I’m upset that you wasted my time.”
My mouth fell agape. I couldn’t believe the words that I was hearing. How could anyone be so mean?
“Don’t talk about her that way!” I unintentionally blurted out. I tried to stop the words from coming out, by physically lurching after them with my hands—but no matter how hard I tried, I wasn’t going to have the ability to catch them and pull them back in. “She’s my friend,” I managed to finish.
“Well, that says a lot about you, then. Your choice in friends is a huge tale on who you are as a person,” he replied, nonchalantly, as if he didn’t even have a care in the world as to what we were talking about.
“You have no friends!” I pointed out, angrily.
“Excuse you?”
Chapter 10
T he office air was tense, as I watched people run in and out of Derek’s office throughout the day. I wasn’t sure what was happening. I just knew that several had been in, and none looked too pleased when they left.
It wasn’t until Julie-Anne, one of the women who worked across from me in a cubicle, walked up to me, her eyes puffy and face red.
It didn’t take an expert to know that she had been crying, especially by the smeared mascara beneath her swollen eyes.
I wanted to ask what was wrong, but by the expression on her face as she walked towards me, I knew that there was no need to ask. I was about to find out without asking.
“If you know what’s good for you, you will run,” she blurted out loudly, yet not in a volume loud enough to quite be considered an exclamation. And without any further examination, she left.
I knew, though, I knew that she had been fired.
“Are you ready to go?” Derek asked sternly, storming out of his office, with very little real regard to me. He barely even looked at me, and he certainly wasn’t asking as he crossed in front of my cubicle.
It was a rhetorical question, if I had ever heard one. His snooty, jackass of a voice was really telling me to get my hump off my desk and get to his house now. But he was far too refined to ever behave like that, far too posed and dignified to ever be truthful about what he meant.
My daddy was a totally different kind of man. He would have told me to get my rear end up and get to stepping towards my car. Because if he was ready to go, then damn it all, everyone else should have been too.
But rather than harp on it, or rather than question his motives aloud, I merely shrugged it off and nodded.
I was ready to go.
I was always ready to go when it came to Mr. Sholts. I knew to be.
So without further instruction, I made my way to the parking garage to retrieve my car and sadly head towards his apartment rather than Polly’s audition, like I had promised.
The parking garage—like every other parking garage—was dark, and I hated going
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