| What are our bodies worth? We value some over others despite unpredictable genetic variation, and mock the least "valuable" blatantly in defiance of one's feeling for their given set of random physical traits. Well shit. Good thing I'm handsome. The radio leaned against the wall, a banal tune about love, et cetera rising weakly from the speakers played by a group of oversexed teenagers too popular for their own good. Bailey slouched catatonic on his couch damp, soiled, and salty with the second-hand stench of the sea's briny lungs. His phone skitters across the floor boards in a tight buzz, a name brightly lit up on the display. "Hey, Adelaide." "Mister Bailey. What are you doing right now?" "Expelling carbon dioxide from my lungs in order to vibrate the vocal chords it takes to make noise and form a series of sounds with my lips and ton-" "You're such an asshole. Tell me what you're fucking doing." "Sitting on the couch." "Want to meet up? I just got out of work." "Yeah. I have some time." "What are you wearing?" "I don't like where this is going." "Paris said he almost got shit on by a seagull down at the docks. I assume the same is true for you. I don't need to be seen with some kid who looks like shit, literally." "No, I'm clean." "Alright. Meet me in Thayer Park." Hanging up, Bailey compulsively flipped his phone open and shut with a satisfying clap. The sun had begun its descent, shadows falling through the windows stretched across his legs in an aphotic decrescendo. You aren't beautiful. Stop telling yourself you are. How did you come about deciding that for yourself? Did a book tell you to say it to your reflection fifty times every morning? It's best in the bathroom before work, the steam from the shower slowly clouding what the slogans are supposedly clarifying, losing yourself under a soggy pile of verbiage and platitudes. I'll bet that book was written by some pretentious douche bag in his early 40s with a full head of hair and a kid doing great in college and a wife who tells him she loves him every day and really means it because why not? He's a great guy! He wrote a book! I'll bet Wham! is still his favorite band. Fuck that guy. Not you, though. You're beautiful. The park wasn't far; just three blocks west. Adelaide was sitting on a bench, her leg folded over the other bouncing restlessly as she fiddled with the charms on her phone. The October wind fluted through the few remaining leaves and twisted up the gathering piles in drab, shattered corkscrews, stretching ever further into the streets and getting tangled up in the cars that couldn't care any less about nature. "How was work?" "Caught some guy shoplifting two pairs of jeans in his backpack. He was going to fight me over it until Blaire stepped in and kicked him right in the dick. I love that girl." "Shitty." "Walk with me." The street lights flickered on, spelling the time to each other in epileptic Morse code. The two walked further west towards Adelaide's apartment out towards the docks. She always smelled like perfume and salt and something sharp Bailey couldn't quite put his finger on. Blood maybe; Adelaide was a closet Satanist. She wasn't really into that hardcore virgin sacrificing and baby eating shit you read about in tabloids but she did have an affinity for eating her meat rare. She also had a small pentagram tattooed on the outside of her left thigh and positioned a mannequin wearing a black hooded robe with a goat skull for a head and a huge dildo strapped to its crotch in the corner of her bedroom. She told Bailey she secretly hoped every night it would come alive and rape her. Bailey thought that was pretty fucked up. Why did she have to specify it as rape? "So I hear you're thinking of applying for a job at Starbucks?" "Yeah, I've been putting off writing the cover letter all day. That's kind of what I was doing when you called." "Sorry if I interrupted you." "Don't worry about it." "What happened to that job as a ‘freelance photographer and columnist'? I thought you really enjoyed doing that." "Well, turns out being sporadically employed for incredibly short periods of time doesn't pay the bills too well. Also, editors are assholes. I need something reliable and constant, even if its not something I would necessarily enjoy doing forever. There's a manager position open and I think I can do it. Besides, I'll get all the free coffee I can steal. Nobody could turn down an opportunity like that." "True enough. You can always do the freelance thing in your spare time too. You know... if the urge ever strikes." They walked in silence for a moment, Bailey using the pause for dramatic effect, to play stupid for just a few seconds longer. "Wait, you didn't really like my columns that much, did you?" "You were such a good photographer! The commentary on the subject of the photo made it feel like more than just a picture. And it was so deep. Not even in a douchey way either! I always bragged that I was friends with you when I saw someone reading it at the bus stop." "Well thanks, but I'd like to take a break from newspapers for awhile. I'll still take pictures, if you'd want to see them." They stopped in front of Adelaide's apartment complex, watching the sun desperately pull the aquatic horizon up to it's blistered neon blush. "Would you like to come in?" "No, I should really get back and write that cover letter. I told myself I'd do it tonight. Granted, I've been saying that for the whole week, but tonight feels right." "Alright. Goodnight Bailey." Adelaide leaned in and kissed him on the cheek before trotting up the steps and disappearing inside. He stood outside a while longer, eyes wandering over the address numbers to the side of the door. 417 Lord Street; a mildly ironic street for a Satanist to live on. Maybe not. Maybe that's what made it so perfect for her. He turned his back to the sun and made his way home. The apartments still smelled like fish and saline; despite being so close to the docks, the industry and traffic in the area managed to mask the scent with the heavy musk of exhaust and garbage; the ocean was as a perfume on the long-rotted corpse of the city. Bailey didn't need the job at Starbucks; money was tight but he knew his dad was always willing to loan him some money. He could probably even get a job at the newspaper he did the freelance work for, but it wouldn't be a position he really wanted; he wanted to get away from any direct contact with the media. This cover letter was going to be an experiment. He knew all the right things to say, how to appear honest and hard working and even-tempered and blatantly perfect, but nobody could keep that façade up for more than a week. That's when the real employee came out and that's when your boss decides, not if you're good enough to keep, but if you're not terrible enough to fire. Well fuck that first week and fuck the asshole boss who thinks maybe, this time, he really is hiring a perfect worker. This was going to be realistic and revealing and stupid and un-hirable. This was either going to land him a job or a restraining order. - To: Starbucks Coffee Company Re: Manager Position Thank you for taking the time to review my application. I'd like to point out specifically my experience in customer service, having previously worked as a sales/customer service associate at an American Apparel as well as a Sears and Roebuck in the men's clothing department. In an unrelated note, please disregard the reasons behind my termination from said jobs. I never used to like coffee. My father would drink it every morning before work. "It's adult soda," he'd say when I asked for some while my mother packed my Thundercats lunchbox. "It's an acquired taste for big people. You wouldn't like it." My father was a brilliant man and anyone who says otherwise has nothing but evil intentions in mind and should be handled as such. Again, I'd like to remind you not to bother reading the extraneous circumstances of my forced removal from my last two jobs. A friend once told me that I had an addictive personality. I called bullshit on this so-called "fact" and even went through the inconvenience of putting down my pipe, which was a gift from my brother for tobacco use only of course, to explain all the reasons why he was wrong and an idiot. Can you believe that? "With friends like these,"... you know how it goes. Needless to say, I celebrated my colloquial victory with a twelve pack of icy cold, micro-brewed beer and a few stiff shots of single malt whisky. Only the best; my body is a temple after all. Sadly, in an act of sheer hypocrisy, I have managed to become hopelessly addicted to coffee in the past year or so. In fact, I was in your fine establishment just the other day to satiate my cravings for the roasted beverage when, to my misfortune, an employee's incompetence bloomed radiant like a flaming bag of dogshit on the doorstep of my arid palate. I was ordering a Triple Grande Tres Rios Costa Rica Bella Vista blend, extra foam, with a shot of espresso (just like usual) but the man-child working the machine got my order wrong and gave me a Triple Grande Tres Rios Costa Rica Bella Vista blend with the espresso shot I desired, but no foam whatsoever. Unacceptable, I'm sure you'll agree. However, instead of being "that guy" and wasting someone's time with petty complaints, I simply explained to your employee the error he had made and proceeded to pop the lid off my cup and dump the contents down the back of his pants as he so rudely turned away. He said he was "in the process of going to make me another one;" oh, that's quite likely. What are the chances the new one won't have spit in it? Probably like zero percent, right? Needless to say, I was rolling my eyes quite hard. I'll bet you're rolling your eyes right now too. Let's roll our eyes one more time, together. The nerve of some people, honestly. Having returned home, I began to think that maybe, with proper managerial supervision, your place of business would no longer suffer from deplorable and entirely avoidable mistakes such as the one I had just experienced. I can do so much for your employees' lack of discipline. Please, Starbucks, we could be so much more. Did I mention I only live a couple blocks away? If I lean out my window, I can see your sign which is looking a bit dirty as of late. You should get on that. Someone already would have, if I were a manager. I'd like you to think about that for a minute. Corroboratively yours, Bailey Whelan - "Awesome," Bailey sighed, hitting the print button and leaning back, bouncing his foot to the stuttered "breet breet" dissonance of the printer doing its job so he could have the chance of working his own again. He could just walk down to the Starbucks and hand his résumé to the store owner directly with confidence and a shark's vile grin but he far preferred the mystery of mailing it and waiting for that thin, cookie-cutter, "To whom it may concern," emotionally detached masterpiece, scripted in its infinite ambivalence to the reactions of its receiver. Ah, the wonders of modern conflict circumvention. We've come so far. |
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