Page 43 of Throwing Shade
11
Monday morning wasthe same mad rush as always when Sadie was switching over to her dad’s place for the week. A multitasking marvel, she took a bite of her bagel while pulling on her red sweater. Her head got caught and she swore, jamming her arms into the sleeves and then fixing her ponytail.
I sipped my coffee, shaking my head as she dumped the contents of her backpack onto the table and frantically pawed through everything.
“I need my calculator for my final.” She sniffed the leftover sandwich in her lunch bag, shuddered, and dumped it in the trash.
“You don’t have math until tomorrow. Look for it after school.”
“That means I have to come all the way back here.” She frowned at a sheet of paper and then slid it over to me. “Sign.”
I motioned for her to get me a pen. “All the way back from next door? How lazy are you?”
She unzipped her pencil case and tossed me one. “I have stuff to do. Like study?”
“Tone the attitude down a notch.” I read the form she’d given me. “You probably left it at your dad’s in the first place. Check there and then if you don’t find it, take ten minutes to conduct a calm search of your room here.”
“Fine,” she muttered. “Jeez. Do you have to read everything? It’s not a contract signing my soul away to the devil.”
“Which I would do with no hesitation.” I tapped the field trip permission form. “This is due this afternoon.”
“Yeah, I—” She waved her hands around, her leg jiggling.
“Breathe, honey.” We’d gone through counseling with Sadie for the perfectionist pressure she put on herself. When things spiralled out of her control, her throat would close up and she couldn’t form coherent sentences. Her leg bouncing was another sign I’d learned to recognize that she was agitated and heading for the breaking point.
She took a few slow breaths.
“Better?” I signed the form, my stomach in my toes.
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Come here.” I held out my arms and she hugged me, her head resting on my shoulder. “Worst case scenario and you can’t find it, ask your dad to go on a Staples run tonight.”
“Okay. Thanks, Mom.”
I kissed her cheek. “Anytime. Love you, Sades.”
“You too. Oh, man. The time.” She tore through the kitchen like a tornado, stuffing school supplies and lunch items into her backpack, remembering the form at the last second, then ran out the back door. “Bye!”
It slammed shut behind her and now I was the one who breathed deeply, taking in one moment of perfect silence. The kitchen was a shambles from breakfast, but I didn’t have the time or inclination to deal with it. Today was my performance review and I was going to nail a much-needed raise. Then tonight, I’d meet Laurent and we’d find Jude.
I headed out the back door, preceded by Delilah who tossed her hair and sashayed to the car. Hell, yeah. I had this in the bag.
* * *
Shirley, the firm’s HR manager, closed my file, setting it atop a listing pile on her desk. “You’re always one of my easiest staff to review. As usual, we’re delighted with your work and we hope you’ll be happy with your cost of living increase.”
My chair was upholstered in a color only found in nature as the result of a digestive disorder. Its nubby fabric didn’t help with the impression that I sat in the contents of a blown-out colon.
“Thank you,” I said. Mortgage rates, utilities, food, all of them had risen across the board, not to mention that Sadie had been accepted into a youth theatre troupe for next year that was going to cost money, and my car was almost twenty years old. “It’s definitely appreciated.”
Shirley steepled her fingers together. “I have something else that I think you’ll be excited about.”
Increased benefits? Extra vacation days? “What is it?”
“As you know,” Shirley said, “we’ve taken over another floor because we’re adding immigration law to our services. That means the library will be expanding. You’ll have a larger budget to work with for purchases.”
I matched her bright smile. “I’ll also have a further fleshed-out job description and more work on my plate.”
