Living The Dream

Chapter 1: This is how my job interview will go down

Mr. Sherman, there's a brilliant individual I'd like you to meet. The contact speaks my full name then nervously backs out of the room.

Sherman is a portly red-cheeked man. Always looks reclined back in his chair, even when he's leaning forward. Mild bald spot on his head. Fat stubby fingers and preferential to cheap cigars.

Of course he is prejudiced man. Anything foreign or unconventional makes him uneasy and an enemy.

Right away he thinks I'm a homosexual by my soft tone of voice, slim build, and careful manner.

I make fun of his wife among other things. Tell him how shitty his office looks and what a dump of a job his company is run, how his secretary speaks like a rooster and the floors look like a tornado came through with a vacuum. All this he receives with a big roar of laughter.

Before he even settles down, his thick pudgy digits push his phone five inches forward on his desk to signal the contact back in. He is laughing as he addresses the contact, who is apprehensive and confused that so little time past. "Give this faggot a job", he says still laughing. And that is how I became a junior member of the best and only ( ) company on the West side of Arkansas.

Chapter 2: This is my first day of work

The first day of work I had nothing to do, so I left after lunch. I thought that meant I'd quit the job, because I didn't come back that afternoon nor the next day. I had no intention of ever showing up there again. I didn't know what my job was, nobody ever told me what my responsibilities were or trained me on anything so I assumed nobody else knew either.

But then a week later, I get a call. Sherman's secretary. "Mr. Sherman says you did a great job on the inventory this week and would like you to start in management with Phil on Tuesday." I thought she was fucking with me. Was this their way of acknowledging I was fired? Was Sherman pulling his own joke on me because of the way I made fun of him?

Or was Evan doing all my work for me so he wouldn't be blamed as the one who referred me to get hired on board?

Curiosity got the better of me and I went back to see what the hell was going on. I went through reception without drawing any attention. The floors looked as usual. My cubicle was untouched, an unopened pack of pens on the desk and some push pins in a cork board. No notes of any kind left for me. If I had to guess, nobody had come here. My area was a corner that no one had reason to walk to or walk past.

I walked to Evan's cubicle. He wasn't there. "Hey I have a message to give Evan, have you seen him today? Is he out for lunch?", I asked the guy sitting in the next cubicle. "Evan?", he looks perplexed. "Yeah the guy who sits next to you." For a moment I thought he didn't know who Evan was. Maybe this guy's new, maybe Evan was new. "Naw, Evan left for vacation last week. Hey aren't you the new guy? Great job on inventory took me two years to figure that system out. I hear the boss is looking to promote you, you must have some real pull around here."

I just look at him like he's a total idiot without saying anything. I have no idea what he's talking about. But he shies away, back to his work, afraid that I might have power to influence his position to his superiors. I hastily scrawl a fake note and hand it to this guy, whose name I didn't even ask (he's probably scared to tell me himself now anyways). Acting like it's very important, I tell him please put this on Evans desk and make sure Evan looks at it when he gets back, even though he just told me Evan was on vacation. I didn't bother to ask when Evan was coming back, because then I'd look like a fool if he wasn't coming back for a long time. This guy will assume I know more than he does if that's the case, I reason.

Ok so it wasn't Evan doing the work, and if it's not just some elaborate prank which is seeming less likely... how is it I am being promoted for doing nothing at all? Who was the guy who used to do my job? What is even my job to begin with?

Turns out the hobbly crank who died and I replaced had one helluva, and I mean helluva job that took him years and years of expertise to master. He made sure nothing ran smoothly around the company, simply so that he would have something to do.

Chapter 3: I get a promotion

I was surprised to realize this bigoted oppressive man actually genuinely liked me. "You see, all you niggers come up in here and act like you're not what you are. But you, you're the first nigger that come into my office and behave like the nigger you are and don't spit in my face with lies and pretending to be like us, you see?"

"Sir, I'm not a nigger. I'm not even black."

"You don't have to be black to be a nigger, son? It doesn't matter if you're brown, red, yellow, or purple for Christ's sake. You're all niggers? Jew niggers, fagots like you with them pointy shoes, you're all a perversion of the man God intended."

"Yeah that's true."
This man was equal opportunity with his prejudice all right.

"See that's what I like about you, son. You accept who you are and you don't mind being treated the way you ought to. If you hadn't spouted all that fagot language out of your filthy mouth and confirmed what I was thinking right then to myself that first day you came into my office, I would have sent you right out that door no matter what lies you or that other fagot would tell me. I know a fagot when I see one and I don't need to be told that a fagot is not, you see what I'm saying?"

He liked me because I confirmed all the hatred he had towards every group different from his. I made it okay for him to feel the way he felt. I did all the things he thought people unlike him did when we think we're not being watched.
"I guess I am."

"There you go. Now get back to cussing and bitchin' like a little whiny dog. No need to put on a show for me, that's not why I hired you."

"For you? Dude you're a fat ugly fuck that couldn't get anyone to put on a show for you except your fat ugly wife."

"Bwahahaha!"
He especially loved it when I insulted his wife.

He wiped his forehead then grew serious for a moment.

"You think I didn't know you skipped your whole first week of work? You lazy Mexican sleaze bags will do anything to wriggle your way out of working. But the balls, the sheer balls to not show up at all!

And one day you walk in and tell Stevie (so that was his name) who's been here 8 years with the company, to put a fucking note for you on that fagot Earl's desk, hahaha. You're a real piece of work, son. I was tempted to fire Stevie the very next day and tell you to do his job!"

He resumed bawling in laughter.

"Yeah I also told Stevie to suck my dick."

"I was beginning to suspect Stevie is a fag too. Never once seen him calling in sick after sleeping with a hooker or skipping out early on a Friday. He just has a picture of his wife on his desk, but I'm sure that's his sister."

No wonder Stevie seemed nervous I might affect his position. Maybe he really is in the closet. Poor guy put up with this for eight years, maybe getting him fired would be doing him a favor.

"Yeah you wish. You'd sleep with any woman as long as its not your wife."

"All right, all right. Enough of that. We're here to talk business. Tomorrow you
work with Phil. He's the one upstairs, wears the glasses."

"So that's it?"
No description of what my position is, what I'm supposed to do, or why I'm working with Phil?

"What do you want, to suck my dick? Get out of here!"

On my way out I hear him yell "And send in Lucie." I see no one waiting outside possibly named Lucie, so I give him the finger without looking back and walk out of the building and drive home. Once again, I decided never to come back.

But a series of fateful events would lead me back to the office the next day to meet a man named Phil. In my hurry, I left my mobile phone unattended at my desk and during the night someone made an unexpected call.