Page 67 of A Light in the Dark
Luck had been with me. I’d spent less than a week submitting resumes and babysitting my landline waiting for a call. My firm had been the third to call me, and as it had been my favorite of the lot, I’d prioritized my interview with them. The shift from janitor to paper shuffler still amazed me at times.
As I understood their desperation, I set up a simple system for myself and my boss. I reviewed the resumes,confirmed their phone numbers or other contact information with the potential employee, and asked three questions.
Their expectations for pay, what their ideal job was, and what they had liked most about their previous job told me a great deal of things about if they’d fit in with our company. Their skills, experience, and drive would make the most difference for us when determining who we hired.
I marked the resumes for refugees with an R while the locals were labeled with an L, and if I didn’t know, I labeled them with a U. If I thought someone might be a good fit, I added a dash while those I was uncertain of received a period. When I thought we needed to have a discussion over the resume for any reason, I whipped out a question mark.
While I got to take some pictures of the booths and the crowd, we’d drawn enough attention we would need to store the resumes in boxes if we wanted to get them out of my boss’s vehicle, a smaller SUV.
During one of the lags in hopefuls, I regarded Mr. Accor with wide eyes. “We chose poorly.”
“At the start, I thought it was going well, but then I realized I was wrong. We’re going to have to return to the SUV to drop the first batch off. Can you take photographs of the cover pages of the ones you think are promising? Include all the refugees.”
That would eat up a few minutes. “I’ll take the pictures in the parking garage. I’m concerned about the number of people in this crowd.”
“Stonecreek always has an unemployment problem after the floods. Some businesses close due to flood damage. Some companies take advantage of the flood damage to do theirreorganization work. Our company tends to hire, as there are a lot of strong candidates this time of year.”
I’d applied several months after the floods, as I’d refused to move into the area until the city had been declared safe from the yearly storms. “And when I’d applied?”
“That was just luck for all of us. The person you replaced had decided to retire. Of course, that didn’t help us with that problem, but we appreciate where you’re at now. Your education grant is what caught our attention. And you don’t need a piece of paper to do your job. You need intellect, which you have. Madeline just needs to have common sense, which she seems to have in copious amounts.”
I nodded. “She’s going to save me a lot of time in the grunt work department, and even if she does get something wrong, it’ll be a lot less time for me to move stray stuff to a new pile than it is to do all the sorting on my own. She’s happy with her season tickets?”
“I even made use of a contact to get her a nice upgrade for a little extra. Her energy is refreshing. Also, her ability to use a sewing machine is insane. She made a dress in a single night, Valerie. And if any of the local seamstresses or tailors discover her, they’ll try to poach her from us!”
That I could believe. A lot of people in Stonecreek owned at least a few pieces of custom clothing. I made my own, as I enjoyed the challenge and the ability to adjust designs to my preferences without having to deal with the exhausting process of explaining what I wanted to someone else.
My current stash of silk meant I could make my own clothes for a while, and my new sewing machine would simplify the process for me. I doubted any seamstress or tailor would try to poach me, but I wouldn’t be advertisingmy enjoyment of most crafts. “Reminders our company pays sufficiently for her to purchase season tickets should be sufficient to keep her around.”
“With how much she likes hockey? We might just start issuing a yearly bonus in the form of hockey tickets. She’d be the happiest person employed by our company with no contest.”
I could believe that, too. “Let’s get this taken to your vehicle, and then I’ll photograph everything. I hadn’t expected to be ambushed on grounds of dressing nicely.”
“We look like we’re in business, and we’re at a job fair. Stonecreek doesn’t host job fairs often, which I feel does more harm than good.”
We worked our way through the crowd to the parking garage, and after he unlocked the SUV, I dumped the first load of papers onto the seat and went to work taking a picture of the front pages I’d marked as belonging to a refugee.
I would send a digital copy to my boss, and upon going home, I would send the same information to the Hunters, hoping they might be able to safeguard the refugees who weren’t safely employed or housed. My doubts remained and ate away at me, but I did my best to hide my feelings.
The last thing I needed was to draw suspicion to myself when my job was to observe and report. My thoughts wandered to the men who’d loitered near my home.
Who were they? Why had they been on a street with homes and shuttered businesses that wouldn’t open again for weeks? Had they really just been potential buyers of businesses closing down? Roger hadn’t replied to my initialquery, and I could only assume that he’d tell me something if I needed to know.
I put some serious thought into requesting a week or two off to clear my head. Wondering if such a thing would be possible, I eyed my boss while stacking the resumes into a neat pile. “Let’s say I want to take a week off after we finish onboarding Sampson Sigils.”
“Take a week off after we finish onboarding Sampson Sigils,” my boss replied with laughter in his voice. “You have plenty of time available. Was there any specific week you wanted to take off?”
“No, I just might need some quality rest and relaxation after all this onboarding.”
“A week off won’t hurt anything after they’re onboarded, especially not with Madeline helping. If she doesn’t take the same week off, you’ll return to an office space loaded with papers in penalty boxes, but I doubt you’ll mind that much.”
I wouldn’t. “Okay. I’ll request the week after we finish their onboarding, as I have no idea how long that’ll take.”
“Longer than we appreciate but faster than we imagined possible, I expect. Did you check your bonus?”
I had, but the presence of six figures in my bank account had shocked me enough I kept putting off dealing with it. “Did someone make a typo?”
“Your bonus is not a typo, Valerie.”
