Chapter 10 – About Time
“Angel?”
Slowly, I turn around, move each time my heart pump strongly. All my senses fired up. All my hopes up. All my guards down. My tears are at the corners of my eyes just waiting for the cue to let go.
“Why did you run off like that?”
A pale stunned face of Ray put me to silence.
Tears then just burst out of my eyes as my defenses go crumbling down. I can’t keep up with the excitement that turned out to be my worst disappointment. When I thought the stopwatch has rebooted, it turns out I was pushing myself too hard to believe the out of the ordinary . The stopwatch remains at it is, in its stationary state. And it does hurt to have all your hopes high, and then all of a sudden the unimaginable happens and these hopes plunge to the deepest site of the ocean. Gone.
Ray envelopes me with his arms despite his utter ignorance of my current state.
“Hush now, sweetie… It’s okay… whatever it is.”
TV reports say that Damien is recovering well. From the TV in the living room, I can hear Drew Cohen reporting live from the Etheridge Mansion in Pine Valley. He is saying that Damien will have to stay there for fast recuperation. It appears that it is Mary Etheridge’s arrangement to keep his son away from the media and possibly from the city where his access to vices is forever infinite. Pine Valley is way too far from Trenton, even Princeton. I would need a personal car to travel there especially if I have to pass through the heavily forested area. I remember the time he drove me there. It took us hours to travel.
With Mary’s measures, she just shows the entire city how desperate she is to cut his connection from anything from within the city—which means me included.
Ray has to return to his own place to rest but he promised to help me watch after dad in the evening. His work with Stone Publishing does not start a week from now, so I guess he has all his time dedicated to helping me.
I switch off the TV as soon as some car show replaces Drew Cohen. That dose of Damien Etheridge is enough to keep me rolling for the day. No matter how I failed to make up with him, I think seeing him all better and safe is my biggest priority now. Time will come when the stopwatch will be restarted. Maybe last night was not just the time.
All prepared to go, I lock the house and go straight down the street. Time is essential for me. Within this week, I should secure the teaching assistant position in Precious Angels Montessori. I have to get a 45 minute bus ride from Princeton Borough, my town, to Trenton, the busy capital city of New Jersey where the Montessori is located. It is a little bit far from home but I need the job more than travelling this far.
RING! RING!
I pick up my phone while waiting for the bus.
“May?”
“Angel?” Screaming she calls my name. “You have to get in here! Stone’s taking over McGarry!”
“What?”
“Apparently we’re bankrupt so Stone’s taking over. His lawyers are here to kick Thatcher out.” Now she sounds like whispering. “I heard from the grapevine that Stone Publishing is going to revamp McGarry into an imprint. A new publisher is set to arrive in a week with new staffs. Here’s the surprise. Former staffs like me and you are invited to join the new team! How cool is that?”
“Seriously?” I almost drop my phone off my grasp.
Poor Thatcher then. She’s kicked out while her team is recruited.
However, shaking my head, I don’t think it’s a good idea. Working under Stone’s company will make it easier for Hunter to touch me. Power play. He’s going to do everything he can to ruin my life. And by taking the risk of being his employee just makes things easier for him.
“There will be massive changes, Angel! Bigger salary! Health and accident insurance! I heard Stone’s planning to shower us all with abundant allowances and other benefits. Isn’t that great? Too good to be true, right?” Now the whispering is gone. She sounds totally ecstatic. “Are you coming over?”
From afar, I see the bus nearing.
“No,” I answer bluntly.
“What? But why? You’re going to be Stone’s asset. You’re a natural in this. He’d love to have you in his company,” she states without falter. “And besides I’m sure you’ll get promotion easily than with Thatcher around.”
It’s exactly what I am avoiding. I don’t want Stone in my life.
“I already found a job. Teacher Assistant. Pay is good,” I answer confidently. “I can manage.”
May is silent for a while.
“May, I’ll be fine with this. I think I need a breather from the publishing industry. I think I don’t fit into that competitive world.” Of course, it’s a lie. I’d always love to work with writers and their masterpieces.
I set my foot on the bus and quickly find a seat at the back. The view by the window is refreshing. I could listen to May persuading me and the constant battle between my heart and brain while watching the green and blue changing positions, even mixing at times.
“I don’t know, Angel. I think differently. You’d be a very good publisher someday, if you know what I mean.”
Hearing those words from her makes me want to admit how I disgust myself for lying. May can be right. I can be a very good publisher someday. I can be a real one not just a publisher in a fraud name—Angel Grant, Metamorphosis. She does not even exist.
“I’ll see you around, May.” And I hang up the call.
I am not sure if ending the call raised my regrets for turning down the opportunity working with the new publishing house. I just know I felt sad about missing May and my friends, and not pursuing my dreams because I need to stay away from the enemy. If this were another publishing house, or other company taking over McGarry, I will definitely dash back there and leave this bus to its destination.
The first thing I did when I arrived at Millborne Avenue in Trenton, where the Montessori is strategically surrounded with subdivisions, was to get a cup of coffee or hot choco from the nearest department store. I am freezing. I forgot to bring my gloves and scarf because I was hurrying to leave. There were a couple of red mittens at the counter so I thought of buying one. It’s better to have one pair of thin cashmere mittens than nothing to leave my hands bare to freeze.
Truthfully, I feel anxious watching Mrs. Pia Franco, the headmistress, go over my application letter and resume. She reads like a vulture, her eyes peering over her half-moon spectacles. Tapping my fingers silently on my lap eases the anxiety. She’s been checking my papers for a couple of minutes now and all I hear from her are sighs and involuntary moans. It makes me think that she’s not interested with me or what. I made sure my resume was excellently made.
She clears her throat which is quite an irresolute progress for me.
“You have stunning credentials, Ms. Mohr.”
Finally, I am able to smile.
“Thank you, Mrs. Franco.” I thought she was going to say I bludgeoned my resume with credentials that I sounded like a desperate airhead.
“Your resume seems to be talking to me while I was reading it.” She smiles.
Is it a good thing or not? I ask myself.
“Do you think you can handle children—little children to be specific, ages 3-5?”
I nod frantically. “Yes, ma’am! I think I will be able to work with them.”
She sneers. “You don’t work with them, Ms. Mohr. You teach them. Play. Read to them. Be a second mother to them.”
What I actually meant by work with them was to teach them, play, read to them and be a second mother to them. But I just apologize as a sign of my respect to her.
Mrs. Franco again reviews my papers with her eyebrows meeting at the ridge of her nose.
She speaks her eyes not leaving my resume, “You don’t have experience in teaching, don’t you? Two part time jobs in college and brief probationary position in a publishing house. How old are you, Ms. Mohr?”
“I am twenty two years old, ma’am.”
“Very young.” Her eyes on me now. “The previous teacher assistant I had was 47. She had to leave for early retirement. She started here at the age of 26. Like you she was quite young. She dedicated herself to the children and to the school’s vision and mission that she forgot that she had her own life. She ended up missing a lot of chances at love.”
I intently look into her hazel eyes.
“I am telling you this, Ms. Mohr because like Gabby I do not want you to miss things that you will regret someday. Gabby missed a lot of her chances not because she was fastidious or picky. She thought that it was unnecessary. She started here young and all she had was us. Did you get what I mean?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I see that you are a career oriented woman. Things like love won’t be an issue with you, will it? I just don’t want you regretting things at the end. It will make me feel it is my children and my school’s fault.” The seriousness slowly evaporates after she closes the folder. She brings her fingers together and studies me.
Three knocks on the door and a red-haired woman peeped through the opening.
“Excuse me, ma’am. There’s someone on the line. He wants to talk to you,” she speaks to Mrs. Franco.
Mrs. Franco then raises her point finger in mid-air, and presses a button on the telephone. She pulls up the receiver and places it carefully on her ear.
“Yes? This is Pia Franco speaking.”
While the woman is talking to someone on the phone, I have the freedom to wander my eyes around her office. It’s a pretty small one made of mahogany walls and leather couches. Portraits of the past headmistress hang on the wall and there is a cabinet filled with medals and trophies at the left side corner. Books on the shelves seem to be outdated and old. I don’t see anything modern in the room except for the telephone and the airconditioner. She doesn’t even have a TV.
“Okay, I understand. That will not be a problem,” she concludes before putting down the call. “Ms. Mohr, there seems to be a problem. I cannot have you.”
“What?”
“It appears that a certain Ms. McCaughey has filled the spot a day earlier than you. I am sorry you came here for nothing. I should have told my assistant to take down the ads when an applicant had been selected. This is my fault.”
But why did they just tell me about this Ms. McCaughey now? They should have known that the spot is filled in before they let me in.
“It’s okay, Mrs. Franco.” But deep inside, I am literally bleeding. One opportunity lost. Perhaps this is just not for me.
I button my winter jacket from bottom to top while I cross the Montessori’s doorstep and walk along the gravel pathway. The mittens I bought aren’t actually helping. I feel the cold eating my flesh in my fingers that I have to breathe on them so that they feel warm. The pathway is all cleared from snow so it is not difficult to track. However, it is not the snow filled front yard or the little kids playing in the mounds of ice outside that captured my curiosity—in this case my sheer ire to this very man who the back of my mind strongly believes is responsible of all this.
“I am not letting you go as easily as that,” he breathes like a knife extinguishing the remaining sense I have. He’s actually turning me into a madman with his actions. He straightens himself up from leaning against the side of his car.
“I should have thought it’s you.”
“You aren’t clever enough to have not deemed me as capable of doing this.”
I smirked, disguised in a sarcastic amusement.
“I apologize then for underestimating you. Maybe next time I shall be more wary about you,” I straightly say, my voice as angry and cold as my hands.
“Stop avoiding me, Angel.” His hand grabs me by the arm.
“Hunter, you just lost me two jobs!”
“You could have saved them if you swallowed your pride!”
“What kind of mentality is that?” I can’t believe he thinks like a toddler.
He draws me close to him, his hand grasping my arm tighter as I come near him.
“I need you. Don’t you just understand that?”
“Right!” I laugh. “You need me to lie to your parents—to your family, to the world!”
His face remains stiff, his eyes hooded but I thought I saw a little hope and earnestness in there—but that was just quick. It is gone now though.
“If you could give me one acceptable reason why you need me aside from the job, for instance I am the blood that runs through your veins, then perhaps I might consider.” But that is obviously meant for a sharp and humorous argument.
“Will you shut up if I say one?”
“Hunter, you’re unpredictable, you know. This one, you take seriously. While my plea for you to leave me, you just shrug it off like waste.”
“I can make your life easier, Angel.” Not a plain statement. Hunter made sure I understood every word. “Ask and it will be given. Hell, I can even give the world to you!” His stone smoothens.
“Stop doing this!” I try to shun his hand away but he counters by placing his other hand at the small of my back and heaving me towards the length of his body. Now I am staring up at him.
“No,” he calmly but firmly answers. “What are you so afraid of, Angel?”
“I’m not afraid.” I put a strong façade. Oh how I wish I live up to what I said. I know sometimes my face ticks when anxiety overpowers me. “I just don’t sell myself to anyone, Mr. Stone. And most of all, I don’t pretend to love someone who I don’t and will never love. I don’t even think your worthy of my attention.”
He smirks.
“It’s about time you wake up,” I add.
He shakes his head.
“Such a huge wake up call,” he utters. “Here, take it.” And he hands over a plastic envelope which he takes out from his inner pocket.
“But I was never asleep, Angel. The wake up call is useless,” he concludes with that arrogant smirk plastered on his face.
“What’s this?” I ask about the envelope. If this is the contract, I’ll burn it as quickly as I get home.
“A miracle.”