2. Georgie
CHAPTER TWO
GEORGIE
Ipress my knees together, clasping my hands in my lap to hide my nerves.
Her eyes keep glancing up every so often from the resume I brought with me.
Her expression is unreadable, it makes me uneasy.
I fear I made a mistake. I should have just listened to my brain when it said to turn around, called it a day and written it off as a situation I couldn’t control.
But I didn’t do any of that and I regret it now, sitting here under Tracey’s scrutinizing gaze with my thighs sticking to the weirdly warm leather seats of her office.
There’s something about her that just seems off.
Maybe it’s the repeated blinking, perfectly timed to the rise and fall of her chest as she breathes, the matching beat of her repeated sigh, or the tiniest of nose whistles on every intake.
I swallow and look around, trying to find something to prove that Tracey isn’t a robot.
She has nothing in this office that tells me anything about her aside from being…
tidy and proper. All framed photos look like they’ve been posed and positioned from stock photos.
One is of Tracey and a greying man in an oversized suit—both with arms around each other and faces stoic, like they hardly want to be near each other.
Another is of a cat whose expression is not unlike Tracey’s resting bitch face.
It makes me want to laugh, but when I look back at Tracey her eyes are watching me with a professional calculation, and she’s set my resume down.
“So, Georgina–”
“Georgia,” I correct, and she presses her lips together again, a pinched expression. She really couldn’t care that she’s gotten my name wrong more than once.
“Right, sorry. Georgia.” Tracey looks like she wants to pinch the bridge of her nose—like her hand is just hesitating from doing so.
Instead, she tucks her hair behind her ear and clasps her hands in front of her on the desk.
She’s taking this too seriously. “After looking at your resume, I see you don’t have much… experience in this line of work.”
I hold in the sigh that wants to come out.
She’s not wrong, I don’t have experience in the field of fashion or retail.
If I’m honest, I don’t have much experience in any line of work.
Sure, I’ve done small jobs here and there—a babysitting gig here, a random wall painting job there.
Anything to make spare money, but never a full-time, permanent position.
There are reasons for this, but if there's one thing I’ve learned already, the last person in this entire building I’d want to try and explain it to is Tracey.
She hardly gives off the impression that she’d be remotely open to learning and understanding as she waits with that thin-lipped, narrow-browed stare. It’s infuriating.
“That is true. There were… certain circumstances that prohibited me from finding work until more recently. But I do have a letter of recommendation from my previous job–”
“The babysitting job,” she supplies.
I press my lips together in a firm line that nearly matches hers to keep me from saying… something. “Yes. That job. The employer–”
“Parent.”
“Yes,” I say through a clenched jaw, growing more irritated the longer I speak with her. “She wrote the recommendation letter to support my resume. I am a dedicated person. I strive to always be better and learn, and my work ethic is–”
“Do you know how to work a register?”
“No? But I can learn, I’m very quick at picking up new skills.”
“What about folding? Can you customize an outfit suited for a mannequin? Design a front of store display?”
I open and close my mouth like a fish out of water. Am I supposed to answer these questions? Or is she asking them because she already knows the answer and is trying to prove a point?
“Listen, Georgia……” She genuinely does pinch the bridge of her nose now, like she’s finding it hard to be around me.
Does she find me as irritating as I find her?
“I appreciate you coming in, I do. But I think there was a miscommunication. My HR person—Shelly—she’s just gone off on leave, and she told me last minute about this interview.
What she didn’t realize is that we were looking for someone with more…
experience. Someone we would have to do minimal training with.
Someone with a different image. Someone…
” She pauses. Her words stumble while reaching for the right thing to say.
In doing so, she gestures. To me. At me rather, at my body.
Her face manages to turn even more sour than it already was.
“Someone who isn’t me. Is that what you’re trying to say?”
Her eyes snap to meet mine. She realizes I understand exactly where this is going; what she’s saying, and what she’s explicitly not saying.
It was one thing for me to walk in here a few minutes late.
I could see the reasoning behind this. That’s on me.
But the direct lack of empathy—the obvious disapproval of me?
That’s on her. And while I could be sad, I could be ashamed, I am neither of those things. I am absolutely pissed.
In an ideal world, Karma would hit her like a strike of lightning.
Her boss's boss’s boss would just happen to walk in and realize how shitty she is, how shitty her attitude is, how shitty she’s treating me; that this is how she probably treats everyone.
They’d fire her and her shitty attitude.
She’d drive away in the shit-coloured car—the one parked crooked outside that is probably hers—and everything would be righted.
But this is real life, and sometimes the cards are not dealt even.
“You know what…” I stand almost too quickly, catching myself upright, jaw set and determined to not let her get under my skin, to not let her see me break.
But then I feel it. The searing sting on my inner left thigh, the built-up pressure releasing, that all too familiar pop and the sticky warmth on my skin.
I press my thighs together tightly, willing the universe to listen, begging for it to just let me make it out of here before the disaster happens.
“I was really hopeful—you know—to work in a place where shoppers could see that all sizes are represented in the clothing and staff. It was hard not to notice your lack of a plus-size section out there, and I hoped I was wrong. I wanted to give the benefit of the doubt. But I can see that I was wrong. So, while I appreciate… whatever this was, I will see myself out.”
I shoulder my purse and turn to make a hasty exit, and I am almost home free when I hear her say to herself, “What is that on the chair?”
The ball in my throat bobs. My eyes press shut and I sigh, head tilting back to the sky as if to ask why are you doing this to me, universe?
I glance over my shoulder to the chair where I was sitting moments before.
I can see the aftermath on the chair plain as day, a sheen of something that was not there before.
Though she doesn’t know what it is, I definitely do.
She looks over at me with a look of disgust, and it takes everything in me to not run away in embarrassment.
Turning back to the chair, I can see the drainage there in a thankfully localized spot on the easy-to-clean black leather.
I don’t make eye contact with Tracey as I reach into my bag for the disinfectant wipes I keep handy for such an occasion.
The bloody-brownish coloured mess disappears from her office chair, and I take the wipe with me. I turn to leave again; I explain nothing—say nothing—and I hope I can make it out before she says another word or before my breakfast resurfaces in embarrassment and humiliation.
But today is not my day.
“Whatever that is, it’s disgusting, and it’s on your shorts.
” She says it with such disdain and disgust. Every word becomes an arrow aimed directly at me, poised to kill.
The words stop me dead in my tracks. It’s one thing to feel humiliated when something like this happens in public, and you have to try your best to keep your brave face on and pretend that you are unfazed by it all.
It’s another thing entirely to have it pointed out to you by someone who doesn’t understand what you’re going through, for them to say hurtful things like that intentionally.
It takes everything out of me; it takes every ounce of confidence I have to brush it off, turning it to nothing.
My hands tremble, my lip follows. I silently beg the tears brimming at my lashes to go away.
I pray they don’t fall until I am out of here, out of the public eye, hidden away where I can let every emotion go and clean myself up from the mess I never meant to cause.
I don’t turn back. I can’t bear to let her see that she has bothered me any more than she already has.
I know she’s intentionally trying to hurt me.
For whatever reason, I can't be sure. I wish I could say that this was a rare occurrence, but it happens so much more often than people would believe.
You learn to let it scratch the surface.
You wear an armour so thick to protect yourself.
You trudge on—keep going, even when it feels impossible.
I make it to the storefront before the cracks in my well-built armour form. I release shaky breaths, sniffling back the tears threatening to escape.
You’re almost there, almost to a place where you can cry. Keep it together until then. This is the mantra I keep telling myself.
“Miss?" I flinch at the sound of the cashier, but something in me tells me to turn around to face her. Gone is the look of scrunched nose and distaste, and instead I am met with an expression of empathy and sincerity.
“I may have overheard what Tracey said. Honestly, I don’t feel like she gave you a fair chance and I know what it’s like to have… something like that happen. Here.” She hands me a flannel shirt and I knit my eyebrows in confusion while taking the shirt in my hand.
“I paid for it, it’s from our men's section, but I thought the sleeves might be long enough to tie it around your waist, so you’re covered.”
“Oh,” I respond, unsure what else to say. For someone who made me feel uncomfortable entering the place, she has just made me feel so much better about the situation. “Thank you. But… why are you helping me?”
“Like I said, I’ve been there, and I didn’t have someone there to help me.
But I wish I did. Besides, no one deserves to be treated like that for something they can’t control.
And I am sorry if I made your experience any worse than she already did.
It’s been a rough morning, and I know that’s no reason to take it out on you.
” After looking down at her hands and then back up to me, her expression tells me everything.
She glances toward the closed door of the office behind us.
“I know it doesn’t make up for how I treated you earlier, but I truly am trying to work on being a better person.
Hopefully I don’t end up like her someday. ”
“I…. I don’t know what to say. Thank you, I appreciate that.
” I take the shirt from her, a dark brown-black plaid that will definitely cover me until I’m able to find a bathroom or get home to clean up.
I wrap it around my waist, not caring that it takes away from the look of the now soiled white suit that I knew I shouldn’t have worn in the first place.
“Should I call a taxi for you?” She offers a smile, and I offer one back, but I know that mine does not meet my eyes. It’s a fake and forced smile I have perfected over time.
“That would be great, thank you.”
Minutes pass without us saying anything.
I take the cashier in a different light this time.
She no longer comes across as closed off and judgmental like before.
She’s slender and tall with long blond hair pulled back into a perfect ponytail.
She covers the bare essentials in a pink tube top falling just above the midriff and dark, skintight jeans.
Her name tag reads, ‘Stella’. She has a tattoo of a flower on her shoulder, the bold black lines swirling and twirling down to her elbow. Her red lipstick has smudged onto her teeth from the straw in her drink. Her blue eyes—once judging and calculated—have shifted to a softer, kinder stare.
“Looks like your cab’s here.” She points to the taxi waiting outside the shop window.
“Right, I should probably…” I point, taking that as my cue to head for the door. I can feel her watching me leave. Turning back to her, I’m just in time to see a stone-faced Tracey leaving her office and glaring at me. I glare right back, prior embarrassment be damned.
“Stella?” I call out, watching her eyes flash from Tracey to myself, head tilted in question. “There’s lipstick on your teeth. If it were me, I’d want someone to tell me.”
She gasps, quickly rubbing it off with her finger, cheeks pink.
I clear my throat, gaining her attention again. “And Stella?”
“Yes?”
I don’t break eye contact with Tracey as I say, “I think you have the potential to become a really great and caring person. I am glad you’re trying to be better than some people. We need more people like you in this world.”
Tracey’s jaw drops as I give a curt nod, turning to shove the storefront door open. Hands shaking, heart racing, confidence nearly depleted again, I don’t look back. I simply enter the car to go home and prepare to clean up the mess that is my life in every possible way.