Chapter 9 #4
“I just had no idea that opportunity would present itself now, after all this time.” He smiled.
“That’s the thing about opportunities. You can’t prepare for them.
You just have to keep yourself in a position to jump when they turn up.
That’s the challenge. If you don’t, everything goes by the wayside, and you’ve lost out.
Other people look at you and mope and whine because you got certain things that they didn’t, acting as if they’re victims of some conspiracy, but they’re not. ”
Allen nodded. “They just weren’t ready for the opportunity that popped up.”
“Exactly.”
Allen smiled. “It’s always fun talking to you.”
Simon snorted. “Yeah, I can so see that. Glad I could improve your day,” he muttered.
With reassurance from his attorney in hand, Simon got up and headed back out.
As he stood outside on the street corner, he picked up a coffee from a vendor, smiled at him, left a decent tip, then walked back toward one of his other rehab projects, calling Joe, his foreman there.
“I’m headed your way.” He stopped, looked around, and added, “I’m about a ten-minute walk away. ”
“Don’t rush on my sake,” Joe replied cheerfully.
Simon arrived at the rehab site and stopped to look at it appreciatively. It was coming along nicely. It wasn’t quite as far along as the other one, but it was getting there.
They’d certainly had their fair share of labor issues, and that was a problem that one had to deal with constantly too.
But he had hopes of getting through this one without too much more in the way of trouble.
Labor was a big part of that original trouble, but he thought they had the bulk of it handled.
As he walked up to the office trailer, Joe came down from the second floor of the building, calling out to Simon. He detoured to where his foreman stood.
Joe said, “It’s up here. Come on up. We keep finding this greenhorn’s screwups. He was only here a couple days, so it’s frustrating as hell to see that everything he touched he fucked up.”
As Simon approached the area, he didn’t need to be told what the problem was. He frowned at the metal column, then turned to his foreman. “You fired him months ago and rightly so. You don’t ever need me to make that call when the work is so shoddy.”
“Right,” he agreed, “but we’ve been short on staff, and I was hoping you would take a look and give the okay.”
“Jesus, look at that,” Simon muttered, as he saw the welds were not only not acceptable, not up to code, but would have caused a complete shitshow if it hadn’t been caught. “How much other work has this guy done?”
“He was only here for a few days, then we got sidetracked with plumbing and electrical. So I’m backtracking to see what all he touched.”
“He’s a liability, and you don’t need somebody you have to watch that closely. Did you warn the other contractors?”
“Sure did. We watch each other’s backs.”
Simon nodded. “Good. I don’t want this fool even stepping on-site, much less picking up another tool here or wherever again. Got it?”
“I hear you.” Joe was almost dancing with joy.
“You fired him months ago, and you never have to get me to second your gut instincts, you know?” he muttered.
“And I did, but I’m still finding his shit work. It’s so much better when I know for sure that you’ll back me up.”
Simon turned to him and asked, “Have I ever not backed you up?”
Joe pondered it and shrugged. “No, but getting the okay means I don’t have to worry about it later.”
And, with that, Simon headed back to the on-site office trailer. When he stepped inside, one of the women who worked there looked up, surprised. “Hey, good timing, we have paperwork for you.”
He rolled his eyes. “When do you not have paperwork for me?”
“Plus we’ve got four containers’ worth of supplies sitting at the docks,” she explained, “and they’re giving us a bit of trouble.”
“In what way?”
She shrugged. “Some of the paperwork wasn’t filled out completely, so they’re giving us the, Hey, you didn’t do the paperwork song and dance, complete with fees and fines and all the rest of it.”
He stared at her and picked up the phone as he looked at the paperwork she held out, and it gave him immense satisfaction to have somebody to snap at. By the time he got off the phone, he handed the forms back to her and saw the big grin on her face.
“See? That’s what I mean,” she said. “When you come by, you make that call, and people listen and step up and do what they need to do,” she shared. “When we try to handle things without you, it’s nowhere near as effective.”
“You picked a good day for it too. I was just looking for somebody to snap at, and that was exactly what I needed,” he shared, truly happy to rid himself of his pent-up tension. And, with that, he tossed her a big grin and added, “I’ll see you tomorrow. As always, call if you need me.”
She waved him off. “Maybe you should go for a run or something. The way you were snapping at them on the phone, you’ve got more than this to deal with.”
“Not anymore,” Simon stated. “I’m actually pretty good now that I just had somebody to snap at. I’m feeling pretty decent at the moment, but I still have two more job sites to see.”
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I’m really glad to hear you have other jobs going. This job will be done before we know it, right?”
“Your job probably won’t be. It’ll be at least eight or nine months yet, and then hopefully I’ll have two others on target at the same time.”
“I was thinking that this would be it,” she admitted and eyed him with relief.
“Hey, that’s not how I do things. There’s always paperwork and office work that needs to be done. Even as one project wraps up, we’ll be looking to the next one. So I’m not looking at laying you or anyone off. If you want to keep the job, I’m sure that won’t be a problem.”
She smiled, and, this time, she upped the wattage. “I’m really glad to hear that. I hadn’t really considered what was coming after this project was finished, but I did hear Joe say something about another six months, and hoping it’ll be less than that.”
“If we can get it done in four, I would be all the happier.”
“Of course,” she agreed, “I mean, two months without staff would save you a bundle.”
“Two months without staff on this job,” he stated pointedly. “Everybody will move to one of my other jobs.”
“Really?” she asked, ever hopeful.
“Yes. I haven’t laid off anybody in probably ten years,” he reported, “and, yes, that goes for office staff too. And you can be forgiven for not knowing that, as you are new.”
She beamed at him.
“So, if you want to work,” he stated, “there’s work for you.” With that, he headed out the office door, took one last look at the building that had gone up, not without issues but at least in a reasonable time frame, and he smiled as he walked away.
There was a lot of good in the work he did, but one of them was working with good people.
So, when he found good people, he wanted to keep them.
And when he found pieces of crap who couldn’t or wouldn’t do the job properly, he got rid of them as soon as he could, which is why he wouldn’t hesitate to fire some greenhorn spouting to be some expert.
Joe took care of that one, as did his other foremen when some newbie showed up to do construction work, professing to be some expert.
Simon didn’t have a problem firing people when needed.
With that thought, he turned and headed toward his next rehab.
As he went to cross the street, he froze as a voice pulled his attention.
The whining, crying, beseeching was in a voice he recognized as his own.
He was stuck midway across the street, until a vehicle honked at him.
He rushed across, trying to stop the voice pounding through his head.
When he got to the other side, he sank onto a park bench, and muttered, “Knock it off.”
There was silence at first, and then a voice snapped at him, a woman’s voice. Who are you?
His eyebrows shot up, and he asked, “Who are you?”
Sarah, she whispered. I’m Sarah. And then she added, Are you God?
He couldn’t help but smile, and even that took a toll on his mind. “Oh no, I am so not God,” he muttered. “You won’t put that on me. You know how much responsibility that would entail?” She was so confused, and he sensed her questioning his humor.
Sarah asked, But, if you’re not God, then … are you the devil?
“No, I’m not the devil either. My name is Simon St. Laurant. Why are you talking to me?”
I’m not talking to you, she corrected. I’m praying.
“More like lamenting,” Simon corrected in a stern voice, “because all I’m hearing is an awful lot of grief pouring out of you.”
You can hear me? she whispered.
“Yes, I can hear you, but I can’t hear the details.”
She seemed a little mollified as she realized that he couldn’t hear all the details about what she was saying. I’ve just been going through a rough time. I still don’t know who you are.
“Are you in a church?” he asked, as he got up and started walking again to the other rehab. “I don’t know why I would ask that, but it seems like something you would do.”
Well, … kind of.
“Kind of?” he repeated, with a headshake, glancing around. He usually avoided trying to talk to people while he was walking, in case something even more bizarre happened, but it seemed as if this was his best option right now.
She noted, I’m just looking for help.
“Fine,” he told her, “that might be something I can do, but I need to know where you are and what kind of help you need. Is it money?”
No, no, no, she argued. I don’t need that kind of help.
He frowned. “Do you know what year it is?”
A long silence came, and then she announced, I think I need to go now. You might need to get some help.
He groaned. “I’m not the one who needs help. You’re the one who needs help.”
I don’t need help from you anymore, she stated hurriedly.
Since he’d asked her for the date, she probably thought he was a little bit cuckoo. So he explained, “Look. I know what year I’m in, but I need to know that you know what year you’re in, and that it’s the same.”
With dead silence between them, she gasped, then everything went blank.
When Simon looked around to see where he’d walked to, he found himself standing outside a huge cathedral. The steps to go in were literally right in front of him.
Taking a hesitant step, he knew he had to be here for some reason. He just didn’t know what it was. As long as he remained outside, he would never find out.
So, he took the first step and walked up into this massive stone cathedral.