Chapter Nineteen

True to her word, Sara was just as sturdy and stalwart as she had ever been the next day. She had complete control over the front end despite the Sunday morning crowd and the less than stellar crew on the front end that morning.

“Rhonda!” I barked. “Get back to your register!”

Rhonda gave me a face that looked like a cat’s rear end and waddled back to her register with the attitude of one who had been severely victimized by a tyrant. Maybe I was a tyrant, but it was worth it to see the look of gratitude on Sara’s face as she was forced to contend with fewer customers clogging up the register at the customer service desk.

As expected, Shay had failed to show up once again without calling in and so, the nightmare of acting as if she were still an employee at the Fresh Face Co-Op was over.

Normally, the whole process would have irritated me because, if I knew anything about Jaime, I knew that she would put off putting up a help wanted ad for the front end until the very last possible minute. When I was looking up the records for the employees I saw that Sara had received disciplinary documentation from the union representative for working too many hours for a part time employee. When I asked her about this, she explained that a mass exodus of front end employees had taken place and she had felt compelled to take up additional hours because Jaime hadn’t hired replacement employees, much less trained them. I went on to question Jaime about this and ask why she had chosen to take a vacation during this time, according to the records.

“I had already purchased the plane tickets!” Jaime had exclaimed in protest. “You can’t very well expect me to cancel a vacation that had been planned so far in advance!”

The importance of vacation for the managers was becoming clearer and clearer as time wore on. Benny Duncan, for example, took several of them over the course of the years for the purpose of celebrating his “marriages”. No, he wasn’t a polygamist, but he had a habit of getting married so quickly that he didn’t have the time to get things in order with the government before he wanted to get married again and thus, he went through a series of elaborate commitment ceremonies where they promised to stay together forever and called it a marriage until it inevitably fell apart. The one true commitment in Benny Duncan’s life was being the maintenance manager at the Fresh Face Co-Op.

But do I really have the right to criticize? I wondered to myself. Would I really be any better?

I tried not to think of Jerry as these questions popped into my mind and failed. I had never had a romantic relationship in my life. It’s not like I was some sort of horrific failure at attracting anyone; it’s just that it had never been a priority. Whenever the question of pairing off came up, I would assure myself and others with “later; I’m too busy right now.” However, as the years ticked by and I never stopped being “busy”, I began to wonder when “later” would come.

It never really struck me as a problem, since there wasn’t even anyone around that I wanted to spend excessive amounts of time with. Sure, I liked my friends and family, but after three hours, my thirst to spend time with them was always more or less quenched. No matter how much time I spent with Jerry, I was always left wanting more.

Now, I’m not under the delusion that this feeling would last forever. Eventually, that initial period of infatuation fades. This was something I had seen in all the couples I knew, both in the ones that worked out and in the ones that didn’t. Plus, it was a truth stated by so many books, movies and other forms of popular culture, it was practically cliché. Honestly, this simple fact was something I had to keep reminding myself of so that I wouldn’t have such a hard time disassociating myself from the idea that Jerry and I would become more than what we already were.

Don’t give up everything just for this guy, I told myself. He won’t be so fascinating forever, especially since he’s an artist!

The 'artist' argument I gave myself was weak and based on stereotypes. I can admit that. However, it was good enough if I convince myself of it. Anything that would prevent me from throwing away any chance I had at improving my beautiful, charmed, life in California for Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was a thought exercise for my own good.

I began to develop a caricature of my potential life with Jerry to prevent impractical flights of romantic fancy whenever the thought of his beautiful, dimpled, smile entered my thoughts throughout the day.

I imagined myself at my worst: depressed and neurotic, clinging to whatever semblance of an identity I could craft in the frozen wasteland of the upper Midwest. (Yes, I know I’m being dramatic, but the more economically depressed areas literally did feel like wastelands at the time with the litter and the graffiti, especially as the cold seasons set in and the foliage that covered it up began to die.)

I had known some people who had dated different kinds of artists in the past. No, none of these artists had been quite like Jerry, primarily in the fact that it was exceptionally rare to find any talented artists at all, much less artists as talented as he was.

Still, they had to see something in their respective artists when things first started out. I had to admit, they did tend to be charismatic and being around them could be exciting, especially if they were the sort of people to go to important galleries and clubs. They would name drop celebrities and tell stories about the places they had been when pivotal events had taken place. Sure, they had only interacted with the famous people when they had gotten in the way and they had to say, “excuse me”, but the glamour of it all made the story seem much more interesting than it would have been otherwise!

Well, at least Jerry didn’t seem like the sort of person to rely on bumping into famous people to fuel all his social engagement at parties, but he was very charismatic in his own way. Sure, the charisma seemed authentic, more authentic than mine, which was for sure. But as someone who had developed and cultivated the power of my own ability to socialize for the purposes of work over the years, truly charismatic people made me suspicious. I couldn’t help but wonder what they wanted out of me. What if their true intentions were insidious? What if Jerry was the exact sort of person who wanted me at my worst because it elevated him to be in the vicinity of someone who was depressed and neurotic, clinging to whatever semblance of an identity they could craft in the frozen wasteland of the upper Midwest? He didn’t seem that way, but I’m sure neither did any of the artists my friends dated in the beginning, but time proved otherwise.

Long story short: I was apprehensive. Ever since that night at the casino with Elijah, I had tried to be mindful of not being dazzled by the superficial appeal of people, places and things. Perhaps, in the absence of any appeal in a place like this, superficial or not, I was falling for the appeal of someone like Jerry even harder?

I was about to find out as Sara had just punched out and I could assure myself that there would not be another incident on that day that would put her at physical risk.

I gathered up all my paperwork, got into my car and punched the location where we were supposed to meet up into my G.P.S. even though I was pretty sure I would know how to get there on my own.

Okay, I thought to myself. Here we go.