Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 78765 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78765 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
My right leg bounces up and down.
Why am I so itchy?
I last another five minutes before lunging to my feet with a curse of Bow Tie’s existence, and I start hunting through drawers for the laptop charger. What’s the worst that can happen? I submit the application and they never respond?
No, that’s what will happen. I’m an ex-convict.
But for some crazy reason, I send it anyway.
I’ll never hear back.
2
Aiden
I sit down at my desk and clap my hands. “It’s going to be a good day.”
On the other side of the office, my assistant’s fingers pause in the act of typing out God knows what at two hundred miles an hour. “And what exactly is your basis for that theory?” asks Leland over the top of his wire-rim glasses. “It’s a Monday and it’s snowing.”
“Both of those things are the sign of a clean slate. It’s like we’ve got a fresh spiral notebook from the drugstore and this time we’re going to use good handwriting the whole way through. Not just on the first page.”
Leland stares through the floor-to-ceiling window at the big, chunky flakes falling from the sky down onto Fifth. “The extra-wintery vibe is a reminder that I haven’t done any shopping and there’s only twelve days until Christmas. I’m never going to make it in time.”
“You always make it on time,” I reassure him.
He picks up a ballpoint pen and uses his forehead to click it open. Closed. Open. “I bet you have all of your shopping done. Wrapped. Thoughtfully written cards attached.”
“Everyone knows you don’t wrap presents until the twenty-third of December.”
“I don’t know that.” Curious, he stops clicking and arches a cautious ginger eyebrow. “Why do you wait?”
Realizing I forgot to take off my overcoat, I stand up and cross to the rack by the door, draping it over the top hook so the hem won’t brush the floor. Snow falls from the collar and melts onto the gray carpet, leaving little wet spots behind. “Let’s say you bought your aunt a green scarf. You bought it assuming she didn’t already have one. But you have to leave yourself a cushion in case she shows up wearing one three days before Christmas. Or out of the blue she might say, ‘I hate green scarves. I hope no one ever buys me one.’”
Leland sputters. “Now what are the odds of that?”
I hold up my hands. “You want to wrap presents pre-twenty-third and gamble with Scotch tape, that’s up to you. You just better hope my theory doesn’t stick.”
Slowly, my assistant turns back to his computer, muttering, “You asked. You know better than to ask,” to himself.
I chuckle under my breath and tap a key to wake up my computer. Leland is twenty-nine—three years younger than me—but he has the disposition of a cranky senior citizen and the pessimism of Eeyore. That’s one of the reasons I hired him five years ago. Hell, someone needs to balance me out. He also brings a mean homemade peach habanero salsa to company parties and that is a quality that cannot be underestimated.
My calendar alerts pop up onto the screen, causing an odd pinch in my chest.
Same odd pinch I had in my chest on Friday during that impromptu conversation outside of the store. How…odd. Rubbing at the spot with a knuckle, I hide the calendar alert that reads Noon interviews with window dresser applicants and open the drive file I share with Leland. There are sixteen applications inside. Is one of them her?
“Before you ask, all the applicants have been vetted,” Leland says without looking up from his computer. “In the interest of saving time, I weeded it down to the ones that have potential. Excluded anyone who used all caps or used the word thrive in their cover letter. That word is literally draining in and of itself. My personal pick is Vivian Blake, former Bergdorf’s window dresser. She was responsible for the elf runway show design of 2019. Iconic.”
Leland is right. That window beat the band.
Santa’s little helpers in bustiers and wigs? Tends to stick out in one’s memory.
I definitely never have nightmares about one of them breaking through the glass and chasing me down the avenue waving an ice pick heel.
“Did anyone else stand out?”
I’m not even sure why I ask. There’s nothing Leland could say that would make me positive one of these applications belongs to her. Like a bozo, I didn’t get her name. I didn’t get any information about her whatsoever, except for the fact that she’s a little standoffish and a whole lot of pretty. Insightful about window design, too, and that’s what counts. That’s why I encouraged her to apply.
Not because I want to see her again.
Ignoring the twist south of my throat, I click through the applications, positive that I’ll somehow know which one belongs to her. I just will. There’s going to be some defining characteristic. Past work experience in an edgy coffee shop/gamer lounge or college spent abroad somewhere like Bruges or Berlin.