2. Cecelia
“Dr. Gareth highly recommended you, Cecelia.”
My gut clenched as I followed my new supervisor down the hallway. I was glad Dr. Gareth gave me a good recommendation, but the fact that Greta Nelson seemed to know who he was, and the tone in her voice indicated the recommendation came with a certain level of expectations, made me super nervous.
This was my first job outside of the writing lab at school. Being a writing tutor had barely been a job. I mostly showed other students how to run their papers through a plagiarism checker and how to use the campus version of Pro Writer Aid. I hadn’t even held a job at a fast-food place.
“You know Dr. G?” I asked.
“We like to hire State graduates. We know they’ve received a proper social services education. Dr. Gareth served as our board president a few years ago. When he’s willing to recommend a recent graduate, we pay attention.”
I guess understanding Dr. G’s eccentric sense of humor had paid off. My aunt had always preferred dry British humor television or obscure science fiction movies. So, that’s what I grew up watching. I got his references when everyone else in class would sit and stare at him and wonder how Lost in Space commentary was considered philosophy. Lost in Space, not so much, but Forbidden Planet was definitely a reference.
Greta walked with rapid determination, a pile of file folders clutched to her chest. She pointed to various places in the office as we continued to walk.
“The ladies’ room is down that way.” She pointed in one direction, and then in another. “Copier and coffee are at the end of that hall.”
We entered a large workspace with two rows of desks, not even cubicle walls separating them. She stopped next to the third desk in the second row. “You’re here.”
I glanced around the workspace. Most of the desks were under piles of papers. Only a few other workers were at their desks. I turned a worried gaze to Ms. Nelson.
“Where is everyone?” I had heard agencies like this one were always underfunded and understaffed, but—I did a quick count—there were twelve desks. Three other people were in the room, and at least two of the desks were clearly used for document storage.
“The rest are out with their clients. You’ll spend most of your time working directly with your assignments.”
“Oh. I thought I was going to be more of an office worker. I guess I didn’t realize,” I managed to say.
“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine. We’re starting you off small, only one client.”
“But clients?” I interrupted. “I haven’t had any training, Ms. Nelson.”
“Call me Greta, and no, we don’t have any training. You’ll learn as you go.” She opened and closed a few drawers, pulling out a stapler, a tape dispenser, and other office supplies. She set them out on display.
“You aren’t even going to sit me in front of video training? Protocols?”
Geta flipped through her collection of file folders. She handed over a dark blue folder.
I opened it. It had photocopies in pockets and another set of photocopies clipped in with those poke and fold tabs instead of a three-ringed binder.
“This is the information you want. Read through everything before you visit with your client. These are the forms you will need to have completed.” She handed me another folder. “Make copies. These are your masters. You’ll copy a fresh set each time. If you accidentally forget and fill this set out, don’t worry, there’s a complete set of all originals in the copier room.”
“Isn’t everything online? Can’t I just download the forms as I need them?” I asked.
Greta let out a sigh and then a little laugh. “This must all look so terrifying and old-fashioned. But it”s temporary, I promise. We’ve been scrambling a bit since we had to relocate in a hurry. Our previous offices flooded, and we’ve simply been trying to catch up. The server room was completely destroyed. And we found out the hard way, the only thing that was stored in the cloud was our IT person’s head. We’re rebuilding from copies employees had saved to their laptops.”
“That sounds horrible,” I commiserated.
“Worse than horrible. We lost a lot in the flood, but we have no idea how much we had lost prior to that due to the incompetence of the department. It’s leaving us in the dark ages.”
I nodded. “Oh, okay. That makes sense.” It was hard to have a database of documents when the database short-circuited.
“On the upside, you’ll learn how to do things the old-fashioned way, pen and paper and filing documents in triplicate. So, if the network ever goes down again, you’ll already know what to do without skipping a beat.”
“I was told I’d be getting a laptop?”
“Oh, no. Not while the system is down. Nothing to access online,” she said.
“So, you don’t need me to help with data entry?”
“We need you to help with…” She took a moment to flip through the files in her arms. She pulled out one of the thicker ones. “Georgie Alexander,” she announced as she handed over the file.
I accepted the folder and started to flip through pages of notes. A photo of a baby was clipped to the inside front of the file.
“Baby Georgie,” Greta said. “Her mother was found overdosed. It’s so sad, it really is. Her uncle has temporary emergency custody while the biological father is being located.”
I trailed my finger down the edge of the photo. Georgie. She was adorable with short, looping curls, the biggest blue eyes I had ever seen, and a little cupid’s bow of a mouth. She looked more like a baby doll than a human baby.
“You’ll check in on the family and offer them assistance as they adjust,” Greta continued, describing the basics of my assignment.
“What kind of assistance?”
“Anything, everything. In cases like these where guardianship was outlined in a living directive?—”
“A what?”
“Directive. It’s not exactly a will, but like a will. Georgie’s mother indicated that her older brother would look after the child if anything were to happen to her or the father. And due to certain legalities, the estate is now attempting to locate the father, and we have to make sure the child is properly cared for.”
“But if she’s not in the system…?” I started to ask.
“The child isn’t officially in the state’s system, so we can’t place her with a foster family. Those families have already gone through rigorous assessments. Georgie is one of our private sector cases. We are actually a private agency. You were aware of that, of course.”
“So, I just show up and make sure Georgie is okay?”
Greta nodded. “It’s my understanding that she was left with an uncle who was not prepared for her. It’s all in the notes. You have an appointment tomorrow, so you have time to read up.”
Greta eased her arm full of files onto the desk, sorted through them, and pulled a few more out, setting them aside. “That should be everything you need. I’ll leave you to it. The green folder has your travel expenses and mileage forms.”
“Thank you.” I was pretty sure I didn’t mean it. After all, she had just shoved me into the deep end of the pool without asking whether I knew how to swim. In this particular case, I did not. I didn’t know what needed to be done during a home inspection. Was I only doing an inspection?
I sat down and put the tote bag I held over my shoulder on the desk in front of me. I looked at the file folders. Nothing was labeled. Everything was a different color. Opening the desk drawers, I located a Sharpie marker and sticky notes. I didn’t know what the policy was for writing on the folders, so I labeled the sticky notes and plastered those to the fronts of the appropriate folders.
I separated the files into two stacks, one to make copies of and the other to read. I didn’t even know what to do with half of the forms. I cracked open the folder with PROCEDURES scribbled across the yellow sticky on its front. Hopefully, after reading through this, I would know a little more about what to do.
I tried to review protocol, but my mind kept returning to Georgie. If she had a clear transfer of custody, why were we even involved? I set aside the blue folder and picked up the one with Georgie’s photo inside it.
Her file read like a romantic tragedy, poor little rich girl lost in a bureaucratic system. Just as Greta said, we were involved because there seemed to be a biological father involved with the custody. He needed to be located, and from what I read, it looked like they didn’t have his identity, but someone did.
Poor little girl.
I flipped the page and read the name of her uncle who had custody. Sterling Alexander. I gulped. No, that couldn’t be right, not the Sterling Alexander who leveraged his family’s fortune into an even bigger fortune through online streaming technology?
It was him. So, not poor at all.