First Impressions

Introduction

      The morning sun slowly rose as the sound of a needle pulling thread was the only thing heard by only one person. Diligent hands moved up and down, trying, in vain, to finish the task. Adelaide looked up, for the first time in hours, and was surprised to find that the night had passed. Soon, she would be stapling and un-stapling stacks of documents and deciding whether they belong in the shedder or in the pile to fax to corporate. Maybe they will even allow her to update the filing system! 

"Laide, are you awake at this ungodly hour?" her father yawned as he creaked open her bedroom door slightly to see Adelaide's disheveled hair and drooping eyes, hunched over her latest creation. 

"You seem to be awake, and it is only eight A.M." Adelaide checked the time on her phone. She had been awake all night.

"Yes, but it is startling to see you up, since you tend to start your day in the afternoon, or as I like to call it, 'Adelaide's Morning'." 

Adelaide decided to ignore that last comment and instead broached another subject, "Are we still going to that play at Worthington's Theater?"

"Yes, and I'm glad you brought that up. I have an appointment thirty minutes after the show is done and the drive there is twenty minutes away, and I need ten minutes to change into work clothes so..."

"You want me to come with you and not complain about not being in bed at a reasonable hour," Adelaide sighed. Her father usually asked her to come along with him to his various carpenter jobs since he needed the extra help and it is a lonely business when you're the only worker.

"Yes! Exactly what I was thinking, you really have gotten good at this mind-reading ability," her father said, overly cheery at the prospect of not having a whiny woman on his hands when trying to plaster a wall.

"Maybe I'll become a fortune-teller," Adelaide mumbled as her father left to get ready for work, "it beats having to stab paper. Better for the environment."

                                                                                       ~~~~

Three hours later, 173 documents stapled, 129 to be stapled, and 309 to un-staple and shred. 

Adelaide sat in her usual work stupor, thinking about the new book she had begun to read and how the main character was nothing like her. She was fearless.

"Have any plans for the summer? Adelaide?"

"Oh... sorry I was zoning out. What did you say? Sorry," Adelaide started, spilling paper clips onto her lap and blushed as her coworker, Darcy Davidson, addressed her while refilling her coffee mug. 

"I said do you any plans for the summer?" Darcy said in her usual warm and friendly manner, always over-emphasizing the second word of her sentence.

"I'm not in high school, which means no. I do not have any big plans for the summer. Unless you count not getting burnt..." Adelaide recalled last summer to her mind and how she made a visit to the hospital with a bad case of sun poisoning.  

"I don't," Darcy declared, rather bluntly, "and I know your not in high school just because you are a temp and three years younger than me. I'm just so bored. Sales is not so much more fun than stapling papers. And if I had thought you were in high school I wouldn't have invited you to my house party on the 28th. The theme is wine and cheese. Wait... you're twenty-one right?"

"Yes, my birthday was four months ago in January. The 28th is like two weeks away. Why are you telling me so early?"

"Oh!" Darcy said wistfully, as if she was Juliet about to declare her love to Romeo, "I just want to have one adult dinner party, and to do that you have to tell people in advance so they are sure to come."

"Well, I don't have any other plans on the 28th, at least that I can remember, so this is my official RSVP for a yes I will be there," Adelaide said as she examined her mostly empty schedule besides seeing the musical Chicago with her father tomorrow night.  

"Oh! I am so excited you can come! It will be so much fun!" Darcy exclaimed which seemed to attract the annoyance of several angry people in little office cubicles. 

"I already have five people who are coming! Ugh, I can't wait! I wish the 28th was tomorrow," Darcy said in her usual dramatic way. 

"If it was tomorrow you be prepared at all and then it wouldn't be a true adult house party," Adelaide observed. 

"Quittin' Time!" someone shouted as the clock handle turned to five . People hurried to gather their belongings, shove their unfinished work in their desk drawers, and scurry out before the overbearing boss, Michelle, burst out, demanding people finish writing up the documents. 

"I cannot believe I work nine to five to staple paper," Adelaide stated as a closing remark before heading out into the busy streets of New York City.