The Significant by Kyra Anderson Page B

some
cleavage, though it’s not bad now.” He stood straight and walked around her,
looking over every inch. “That dye in your hair will have to come out. It’s
poorly done.” He continued to circle her as she tried not to shiver in anger.
           She closed her eyes, hating the scrutiny.
She felt like something less than a Trid as she stood there, being examined for
her worth as a Significant. She was tempted to storm out and never return, but
the thought of Theo being executed was enough to make her stay and bear up to
the humiliation.
           “Not bad at all.” Jak finished his circle
and walked back to his desk. “I will admit, you do have some potential, and you
are a little darker, so you have an exotic look.”
           He sat down at his desk.
           “Why do you think I should hire you?”
           Kailynn was thrown off by the question.
She hesitated, thinking carefully about what he wanted to hear.
           “Because you don’t have anyone like me,”
she finally said.
           “How do you know that?”
           Kailynn smiled, tossing her jacket over
his desk and leaning forward once more.
           “Because I’m not like these pretty little
bitches you have around here,” she said. “You have someone that no one else
wants? I’ll take them. Someone your little, soft-skin babies can’t handle? I
can handle them. I’m one tough bitch and I can handle more than these kids
can.”
           Jak smiled, nodding shallowly.
           “How old are you?”
           “Twenty-two.”
           “Let me see your papers.”
          

 
 
 
 
 

 
    Chapter
Five

 
           The last thing Kailynn expected was to be
a natural as a Significant.
           Jak had hired her and immediately put her
in classes to learn how to act as a Significant. The class in which everyone
else struggled, she excelled—communication.
           Since people rarely spoke face-to-face,
most applicants and other Significant trainees had to go through schooling to
learn the art of conversing with another human, but Kailynn was a natural.
Having grown up in Trid, where there was nowhere near the technology available
in Anon, Kailynn knew how to hold a conversation, how to read body language,
and how to hold eye-contact.
           Manners and etiquette, on the other hand,
were a struggle.
           But she forced herself to behave in
class, trying to learn how best to act like a Significant. She figured the
sooner she learned, the sooner she could earn money, and the sooner she could
leave Companion and get the hell out of Anon.
           But the classes were difficult for her
without the skills of reading or writing. She stumbled through and was teased
by the other trainees in the classes until they got to conversation class and
she excelled.
           It got the attention of everyone at
Companion and, before long, she was doing simulations where teachers and
evaluators for the company would act as clients and have the students come in
with different requests for behaviors and those students had to perform as though
they were with a real client as a paid Significant.
           At first, Kailynn had trouble with the
simulations, since they felt incredibly fake and she had difficulty staying in
character, but she disciplined herself to keep a straight face.
           It was a small relief that everyone
called her Jacyleen rather than Kailynn. It made her feel like someone else was
acting as a Significant, not her.
           The day that she had her picture taken
and her promotional video made for the Companion page, she felt accomplished
and disappointed at the same time. She was thrilled that she could now get
clients and earn money, but her Trid upbringing made it hard for her to accept
that she had pleased those in Anon enough to excel in the job.
           Shortly after she was made available