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BLAKELY

My ass is numb from sitting in my chair all day. The tightness between my shoulders is impossible to roll out as I lean over my desk and stare at the time on the corner of the computer monitor.

4:53. Only seven more minutes until I can get the hell out of this prison and back home. I take the next customer off hold and speak into my headpiece.

“Thank you for calling Wavelink. My name is Blakely. What can I do for you today?” I ask, reading off the script that’s become imprinted in my mind.

There’s a very loud, very male huff. “Finally! I’ve been on hold for twenty minutes. Do you people just sit around doing nothing all day?”

I smile tightly despite nobody being here to see it. I’m in a tiny cubicle surrounded by fifteen other tech support workers, and not a single one of us gives a shit about the other. We’re all here for a paycheque and nothing more.

“I’m sorry, sir. What can I help you with today?”

“Do you not talk to one another over there? I’ve already explained this issue to three other people before you!”

“I’m sorry. Can you just repeat the issue one last time? ”

Or, depending on your attitude, I can wait until you’ve explained it and send you to yet another worker to do it again.

“My bill is completely wrong! I’ve been charged three times more than I have been the last several months. I’m not paying this!”

“I understand. Can you give me your account number, please?”

He rattles it off, and I quickly type it in before opening his last five phone bills. Despite only being on a call, I swear I can feel the dude breathing down my neck as I scroll through them.

“Have you been keeping track of your bills, sir?” I ask.

“Of course I have. What type of person do you think I am? Do you think I’m dumb?” he attacks.

I inhale, letting his anger roll off my back. “No. I’m just asking because your last bill was only twenty dollars higher than the previous four, and I’m seeing that you’ve added on another phone to your plan.”

“I added another phone but didn’t agree to a price raise!”

“You added an additional phone plan to your account. Every phone has its own charges, so it wasn’t possible for you to stay at the same price,” I explain, hoping I don’t sound as shocked by his stupidity as I feel.

Even after doing this job for three months, it never fails to surprise me how assuming some people are. And just downright rude.

News flash: if you expect help from someone, you should at least try to keep your asshole comments to yourself until after you’ve gotten it.

“You’re kidding me. Why wasn’t I told this when I added another phone?”

You absolutely were. “I’m not sure, sir. But there isn’t anything I can do to lower your bill for the past month as the charges were what they were estimated to be. The only thing I can offer is to remove the additional phone if you don’t want to pay extra in the upcoming months. ”

“No!” he screams into the phone. “I need the second phone! If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have added it. God! Do you know how to listen at all, or are you deaf as well as stupid?”

4:59.

I’m burning with rage both inside and out. Reminding myself that this is just part of the job isn’t working this time. Maybe it’s my lack of sleep last night from taking care of a sick teenager or, honestly, just a lack of patience for men who don’t understand how to treat people—women specifically—with respect.

I show up to do the same job as thousands of other people, and I’m good at it. Even though I constantly feel like I’m wasting my days away slouched over a computer desk with the same rehearsed speech on my tongue, I continue to show up because I need the money. Still, there’s only so much a person can take, and three months of this has worn me very thin.

I’m not lesser than anyone because of my job or my gender, and I’m really, really fucking tired of feeling like I’m a piece of trash they’re shoving to the bottom of a garbage bin. I may need this job, but I’ve never wanted it. If it weren’t for needing to put food on the table for my brother, I wouldn’t be here at all.

With a white-knuckled grip on my computer mouse, I watch the time change on the monitor and let loose.

“You know what? The fact you didn’t even think for two seconds that you’d have to pay for another phone plan makes you the stupid one. And I mean that in a really offensive way. Come on, you have to pay for everything in this economy! Why would you ever get a phone plan for free? Are you the freaking owner of the company? Or are you just like the other millions of people in the world who believe that you deserve whatever you desire on a silver platter? Wake up, buddy! Because I can promise you that the world really isn’t all that great or kind and that spending your time yelling at me won’t change that. Now, pay your goddamn bill and decide if you want me to just delete your account so you’ll never have to pay another bill to us ever again! ”

I widen my eyes as my breath saws in and out of my lungs. Staring at the sheet of paper taped to the side of my cubicle with the reminder of every call being recorded, I debate backtracking and apologizing for everything I’ve said.

I don’t. I won’t.

Someone shuts a file cabinet door, and it’s so quiet in the office that you can hear it rattle. If someone dropped a pen on the carpet, I’d bet everyone from a floor up could hear it.

The customer doesn’t say anything, but as the busy line light continues to flash, I know he hasn’t hung up. I release my hold on the desk and press my fingers to my brow.

“Look—”

“Enjoy your last day of pay. I’m going to be calling your superiors the moment I hang up on you to make sure he starts hiring more competent employees!”

Thank God I didn’t apologize to this man.

I curl my fingers into a fist and lean over my desk to the point I’m nearly falling out of my chair. “Oh, you can get fucked, asshole!”

Hanging up on the call, I bring my fist down hard on the desk, making it shake with the force. The gasps that fill the office try to bring me down to a normal level of realization, but I ignore them and fall back into my chair, head shaking. With a push of my leg, I spin myself away from the computer.

I’m not expecting to come face to face with my boss.

Arms crossed and scowl prominent, he stares me down from the entrance to my cubicle. His eyes are so angry that one look at him has my stomach turning and my bag already in my hand.

There’s nothing personal on my desk besides one framed photo, so I shove it inside my bag and stand, refusing to hunch from shame.

“For the record, he was a douchebag,” I mutter.

The guy doesn’t so much as soften his glare slightly. “HR will contact you.”

“Great. ”

He doesn’t give me extra room me to pass, so I make sure my shoulder makes contact with his and keep my nose turned up to the sky.

Then, I walk out of this building while ignoring the icy dread of not having a plan for what to do next.

“It’s okay. That place wasn’t good enough for you, anyway,” Nate says, his cheek pressed into his pillow.

For being only fifteen, my brother is smarter than most people double his age and has such a calm and understanding view of the world. I always said that’s why I was born with such a short temper. We had to even each other out somehow.

I press the back of my hand to his forehead and frown at how hot it is. “I’ll figure something else out for work.”

“You know, I have enough money saved to buy my own uniform this year. It’s not that much, is it?”

Lying is easier than telling him just how expensive it is to outfit a teenager for minor football and afford everything else that comes along with the season.

“No. You’re not buying anything.”

He pushes himself up onto his elbow and frowns at me. “What’s the point of me working if I can’t help out around here?”

“It’s not your job to take care of us. Your money is for you to have. Buy yourself something nice or save it. It doesn’t matter what you do with it as long as you aren’t using it on things that are my responsibility to provide. I’m your guardian, Nathan. That’s that.”

I stand from the bed and cross the small apartment to the kitchen before starting to heat up some soup in the microwave. The backs of my eyes prickle, but I refuse to cry. I’ve figured out how to fix worse problems than I’m facing right now.

Ever since our mother left on my eighteenth birthday, five years ago now, I’ve been taking care of Nathan as I would a son more than a little brother. That’s meant working shitty jobs during any hours of the day and night and scraping together pennies to keep this apartment over our heads and cheap food on the table.

We’ve hardly made it these last five years despite my shrinking belief that if I only give it a little more time, everything will end up working itself out. If anything, it’s only grown harder to keep going.

Between unpaid rent that I’ve had to beg the owner of the building for yet another extension on, the costs for Nate’s football this season, and the power bill that’s been rolled over for a second month, I feel like I’m drowning just thinking about having to find a new job.

“You’re too stubborn,” Nate says.

His voice has me turning from where the bowl spins in the microwave. Sweat drips down along his temples as he leans against the wall. It’s been the year for the flu, and we’ve both had it one too many times at this point.

“And you’re not supposed to be walking around. Go lie back down, and I’ll be there in a second.”

“I’m sick, not dead. I can microwave my own soup.”

“Practice starts next week, Nate. You’re not missing your first day of school either, so you need to get better quickly. That starts with resting and letting me feed you.”

I pull open the cupboard above the microwave and stare at the empty shelves once stocked with medication. The bottle I finished this morning sits on the countertop as a reminder that I forgot to pick some more up on my way home.

“How are you feeling now? Have you thrown up since this morning? Once I get you into bed with some food, I’ll make a trip to the store to pick up some more medicine,” I ramble, pulling the microwave door open.

The bowl is blistering hot when I grab it, and I curse while setting it on the counter, the soup nearly sloshing over the rim. Steam swirls into the air, and I’m quick to take the sleeve of crackers I left out earlier and pull a few free to crunch into the soup. I dig a spoon into his dinner and swirl it around.

“I can live without more meds, Blake. Stay home and watch TV with me tonight. I made sure not to get ahead in our show while you were gone today,” he says, discreetly trying to bribe me.

I smile at that and use my shirt sleeves to protect my fingers while carrying the bowl to him. “We can watch an episode when I get home.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

We walk together to the only bedroom in the apartment, and I let him enter first.

While we’ve been here since before Mom left, it’s only been the last few years that Nate’s had a room to himself. He’s fifteen and needs his own space. Some privacy. Before the shift, we shared the pull-out couch in the living room. While we might not be financially thriving right now, this is the best option I can give him. It works for now.

Nate flips the light on and tosses himself onto the messy bed. Once upon a time, the comforter was covered in little footballs, but those have long since faded, leaving brown splotches amongst the blue.

I focus on the trophies on his dresser and find reassurance in my choice to keep him in football regardless of the cost.

“Come on, get under the blankets,” I order, placing the soup on the nightstand.

His textbooks and pencils clutter the small desk on the other side of his room, but otherwise, he’s kept the space clean and tidy. Laundry is in the bin, and dirty dishes are in the sink .

He groans while yanking the blanket over his long legs and propping himself against his pillow. His stomach growls when I move the bowl of hot soup to his waiting hands.

I exhale, brushing his hair away from his sweaty forehead. It’s too long, but I know he likes it this way. With his deep brown eyes, strong nose and jaw, and a love for the world that doesn’t seem well-deserved, he reminds me of our dad in too many ways to count.

Yet, I swear that every day he becomes a little bit more like him than the last.

Watching him grow into a good man is all I want. If I can help him get there, I’ll know that it was all worth it. That’s why I push myself the way that I do.

Always for my little brother and the life I yearn for him to have.