CHAPTER FOUR SHIFTING OVER
CHAPTER
FOUR
Shifting Over
Cora drove to the office distracted and spent all day with only half her mind on the work in front of her.
Worry for Roscoe filled the other half. It was the four-year anniversary of their icy-cold February wedding day and neither of them mentioned it.
Cora didn’t feel married, and she couldn’t imagine Roscoe did either.
He was more like a surrogate brother, slipping into Benny’s role in the family while they waited for him to return.
She didn’t want her marriage to drag on now that the war was over, even if Lee didn’t seem interested in rekindling what they had, or even talking about it.
But with Roscoe struggling to find his feet, asking for a divorce seemed selfish and heartless, especially when marrying her had been such a generous thing.
She decided she had to be patient, biting her tongue every time she was tempted to bring it up.
Now that the shoe was on the other foot, she couldn’t turn her back on him.
His main problem was America itself. He didn’t have a single good word to say about it since he’d gotten back, but Europe seemed near about the greatest place on earth to hear Roscoe tell it, even with a war going on. And Great Britain was like a slice of heaven.
‘If this were Britain, I could walk in there right now and sit down and order whatever I like,’ he’d said when they passed a soda shop. And again when they passed a restaurant and a drug-store lunch counter and an ice-cream parlor.
It got to where he’d make a comment at every public toilet and water fountain. ‘In Britain, I could use that, no problem.’
‘You told me,’ Cora snapped one day when she’d heard it one too many times.
He stopped and looked at her. ‘Yeah?’ His eyes flared, like an electric surge. ‘Did I tell you in Wales I danced with white girls?’
Cora didn’t know what to do with a statement like that. And no. He hadn’t told her.
As distracted as she was, she still had work to do and she welcomed the busyness of her tasks that helped to keep her from dwelling on her problems. With her mind two places at once she didn’t notice Mr Griffin hovering until he practically stood over her.
Cora smiled at him extra sweet. ‘Is there something you needed, Mr Griffin?’
‘I … uh,’ he stammered. He shook his head and went back to his desk.
At five o’clock, Cora gathered her things and called goodnight to Mr Griffin, her frazzled mind glad to be done for the day.
‘One minute, Cora,’ he said as she slipped on her coat. ‘I need to speak to you about something.’
His desk sat in the middle of the smaller space they’d moved to when everyone but Cora quit, seeking out better-paid factory jobs or going off to fight.
In front of his desk, he’d positioned two armchairs for the few clients who came in.
Recently, though, there’d been more than a few.
With people starting to think of the future again, business was picking up.
Cora stepped over to his desk and he motioned for her to sit. She unbuttoned her coat but left it on, visually reminding him that she wanted to go home.
Now that she drove Benny’s car to work, she didn’t have the excuse of having to leave on time to catch the bus, which Mr Griffin sometimes used to his advantage, keeping her working later and later.
She considered telling him that Benny had come back for his car and she’d need to dash for the bus, but of course he hadn’t.
She hadn’t heard a word from Benny since before Lee came home nine months ago.
In the last days of war, there had been pockets of bad fighting, and her stomach was in knots with worry that Benny had gotten caught up in it.
It was too bitter to think that, after making it through to the end, he should be taken from them in the last pointless days of fighting, but as the days dragged on and they heard no word from him, Cora’s heart sank and toughened, bracing for the news that was sure to come.
‘I’m sorry to do this, Cora,’ Mr Griffin began, when she’d sat down.
Cora sighed. He was keeping her late again.
She wished she had the gumption to tell him no.
That she was tired and couldn’t think straight any more, and that whatever it was could wait until tomorrow.
That she’d put in a full day’s work, and she needed to go home and see about her husband, who was sinking into some kind of depression, and Momma, whose nerves were even more frayed than hers worrying about Benny. Instead, she took off her coat.
‘What do you need me to do, Mr Griffin?’
‘You’re a great worker, Cora.’
Inwardly, she rolled her eyes. Outwardly, she held her tongue and tried on a smile that felt more like a grimace.
‘We’ve made a great team, you and me, these last few years.’
Her grimace tightened. She’d never thought of them as a team when he was the one who gave the orders, but they’d worked well together, and the business had done better than expected.
‘That’s why I think it’s a shame. A real shame,’ he repeated for emphasis, ‘that I have to let you go.’
Cora sat up, suddenly alert. ‘You mean fire me?’ She said it a little too loud, her shock taking the smoothness from her words. His expression clouded at her outburst, so she quieted her voice, lowered her tone. ‘Mr Griffin, why would you … how could you—’
She felt her anger mounting so she stopped, took a breath, tried again. ‘Is there something about my work that you’re not satisfied with?’
‘No, no, nothing like that.’ He folded his hands over his desk and leaned closer, as if taking her into a confidence. ‘It’s just, now that the war is over, some of my clients are wondering why the only employee I have is a colored woman.’
She stilled and blinked. She didn’t need to hear the rest, but he pushed on.
‘I got away with it during the war when there weren’t enough workers to go around, but now folks are looking for any kind of job they can find, and here I am with you for my secretary.
It doesn’t look good, and people have noticed. ’
‘I see,’ Cora said, the sharp clip of her words piercing the air. Her hard stare making him shift uncomfortably.
‘Some of the old secretaries came to me asking for their jobs back when they had to make room in their factory jobs for the men coming home.’
‘You mean the secretaries who quit on you?’
He straightened the pens on his desk. Then the notepad. Then a folder. ‘Everybody’s shifting over, Cora. That’s just the way it is.’
She ground her teeth together as the blood throbbed in her neck.
‘I’d keep you on if I could, but what can I do?’
She stood and put her coat on. ‘I understand, Mr Griffin.’ Her clipped voice was rock hard and ice cold.
The Hoffman letter had to go out tomorrow and the Maguire account was overdue on payment and needed to be chased up.
She didn’t tell him either of those things, or that she’d been speaking to the printers about a discount and that he should talk to Mr Palmer and not Mr Nelson about it.
The outrage whirling in her gut kept her mouth clamped shut.
‘I’m sorry, Cora,’ Mr Griffin repeated, ‘but I need to do what’s right for the business. Besides, you’re a top-rate secretary. I’m sure you’ll find something else.’
Cora walked to her desk, not trusting herself to speak. She collected her few photos and tucked them into her bag.
‘If it were up to me …’ He shrugged, leaving the thought incomplete.
She wanted to point out that it was up to him, and that this was what he’d chosen. She took two slow, steadying breaths.
‘Good luck, Cora.’ He thrust out his hand for her to shake, but she turned quickly, pretending not to see it and hurried to the door.
‘Goodbye, Mr Griffin.’
She hadn’t taken more than ten steps before she lost the fight to hold herself together. She put up her collar and ducked her head so that no one would see her face streaked wet with salt tears.