Louise and The Men of Transit

New Respect

Louise had woken up an hour earlier than usual to style her hair. She felt pleased with her accomplishment as she grasped the knob to the Customer Convenience Team Vision. She walked in, erect, confident, every strand of her new blonde hair waving into place. She followed her habitual path around the front of Harold's desk, and Harold choked on his Egg McMuffin. His face transformed from pink to beet as he coughed and gakked. The offending ball of bread and egg ejected across his desk. Louise skipped neatly out of the way. Having finished his fit, Harold squinted up at her, twisting his body to keep her in his line of sight, as she made her way to her desk. Jim, not hearing Harold beginning to chew again, turned his head then swivelled his chair to follow Louise. His tie was already hanging loosely from his shirt's open top button. Louise preened and went to sit down elegantly, but her chair was too close to her desk because of the duct tape behind the back wheels. She bent a little at the knees, crab-shifted a little between chair and desk, as at the same time, she contorted her hand to slide her stuffed sack of a purse off her shoulder. Her plan was to lay it delicately into its drawer, which still stood open from the previous day.

"Here," Jim rushed over. "Let me help you." He grabbed the back of her chair and pulled it firmly over the duct tape bump. Louise tipped forward, wobbled backwards, and landed with a whoosh of air on the chair seat, her purse landing on her chair arm. She twisted her head around and up. She stared open-mouthed up at Jim. Wow, she thought, being blonde is better.

Jim took four giant steps to his desk, extended his left arm, grabbed the back of his chair, and wheeled it over to her desk. Louise blinked, forgetting about her purse. She absent-mindedly withdrew her arm out from its straps; they drooped on her chair's arm. Jim swivelled his chair around on its axis and sat down as the chair seat spun to face the back of his thighs. He smiled, his brown eyes glinting.

"Did you read my report?" Louise said, unable to think of anything else to say.

"No, I didn't. But let's talk about The TTC Way, you and me."

"Okay," Louise replied bewildered and excited.

Beside her, hidden by her body, her head turned away from it as she faced Jim, her purse slumped over, its zippered top hanging down, its bulk still resting on her chair arm.

"I've been remiss. Well, Andy has. He should've trained you. Me and him, we can't read your report. You know that. You haven't been here long enough. But you're ready, I think, to do good work."

Louise nodded eagerly, her hands clasped into her lap. "I am. I am."

"I know. That's why I'm going to teach you about customer convenience. You're Andy's diversity hire, but I can see you'll fit in. You're already fitting in."

Louise smiled broadly.

Her purse's top declined a little further, releasing its straps to dangle over the open drawer.

"You see," Jim said, advancing his chair closer with his feet to lean his left elbow on Louise's desk, his left hand fisted authoritatively. "The TTC Way was a group effort. Van said it best when she said that our space depends on all of us working together. The TTC Way is all about making our space a community space. You see?"

Louise nodded vigorously.

Louise's purse began to slide off the chair arm, its straps leading the way.

"It's all about values."

Louise's lips parted slightly as photons of tawny brown spread outwards in her irises.

Jim became serious as he leaned forward, his forearms on his outspread legs, his feet firmly on the worn carpet. "Barg entrusted us here at CCTV —"