Serendipity

  Mark was tired of trying to find a job.

  He had been sitting in front of his Mac all day long, trying to find a job. Not even a proper job. He just needed a little summer job that could get him enough money for a birthday present, and he would be satisfied. He didn’t even like money. He only knew that without money, he would never be able to get a proper gift to Lynelle.

  Who is Lynelle? I’ll get back to that.

  But right now, I’m telling you the story of this one boy who couldn’t find a job. He was sick. He was tired. He was cold, even though it was in the middle of summer.

  He wasn’t even asking for a job that could give him a lot of money. He did a simple calculation and figured out, that, if he earned around forty dollars per day, he could save up enough for Lynelle’s birthday in precisely 10 days, 14 hours, 2 minutes and approximately 48 seconds from then. It was her sixteenth birthday and he really wanted to surprise her, and he wasn’t about to change his plan just because of this stupid, silly obstacle that was blocking him from that precious, precious necklace. Or, that was what Lynelle thought, not him. He was thankful that men weren’t attracted to accessories, or otherwise he’d be seeing jewels in his sleep every other day.

  He clicked. He scrolled down. He let go. And he did that again, and over and over again until he had to go onto the next page.

  Nobody seemed to be hiring a 17 year old and give good pay at the same time. He was willing to work for all the hours except for the 8 hours he slept just to get enough money, but even if he could work for 16 hours a day (which, of course, just wasn’t in his seeable future), he would never get enough with the jobs he’d found that could accept underage workers.

  That was when the phone rang.

  Oh, shit, He thought as he picked up the phone. “Clement residence.”

  “Mark?”

  The unmistakable voice of Lynelle Meyers rang through the phone. (See, I told you I would get back to her later.)

  “Oh, hey,” Mark said, trying to not sound like the undead. “What’s up?”

  “Oh, um, I just wanted to tell you about this job I found…”

  Mark’s hairs stood up at the word ‘job’.

  “…And it’s really unbelievable, the pay, I mean…”

  Mark found it unnatural that Lynelle sounded nervous. Lynelle Meyers never felt nervous. But he was concentrating on nothing but the job Lynelle had found.

  “…so I thought…maybe I’d tell you, just if you were interested, you know, if you wanted some quick cash.” She said, and giggled at the words ‘quick cash’.

  “That sounds amazing,” Mark replied, his insides bursting into a happy-dance. “Where can I find the details?”

  “I’ll text you the URL,” She said, and a few seconds later, his cell phone, which lay forgotten on his bed. He grabbed and quickly typed the URL into his browser.

  “And…are you here, Mark?… the details should be on there. If all goes well, I’ll see you at the place the people who applied are meeting the day after tomorrow.” Lynelle said.

  “Oh, okay,” Mark said, surprised that Lynelle had made the first move to hang up. “Bye,”

  “Bye.” Lynelle said, and Mark heard the faint click on the other side.

  What sort of bothered him was the fact that she had hung up first. Lynelle was simply out of her mind. She never did that. Never, in the 7 years they had met, that she had ever done that.

  Since this boring phone call has finally ended, I shall fulfill my promise and tell you about Lynelle. She was Lynelle Meyers (I shall be surprised if you hadn’t figured that out by now, or you need to go to an eye doctor), the daughter of the guy who owns the most popular bakery in town and a fashion designer for Chanel who she both hates. She was one year younger than Mark and 10cm shorter than him, but she made up for her height with her words. She was the type of person that could everyone feel happy just by smiling, or so Mark thought. She was an amazing person who had a great personality and an attitude to match, or so Mark thought.

  Mark and Lynelle had met at the tennis club that some genius decided to start at their primary school. They became friends quickly, despite the different age and gender. They didn’t care if people insulted them for ‘fraternizing with the opposite gender’ or ‘trying to get in close with the higher grade’. Friendship had no limits.