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Boredom

Gwendolyn

I can’t keep doing this.

The loud chime startled Gwendolyn.

The tail end of her neat, dark braid whipped along her back as she searched for the source of the unpleasant song.

“Whoops, that’s my bad!” Sierra chirped as she pushed her chair back with a loud bang.

Gwendolyn tried not to wince at the sound, keeping her mouth firmly shut as Sierra darted to the nearby rack of employee lockers.

None of them had proper locks.

A side effect from years of turnover, and Mary’s barely disguised irritation at having to break into the lockers every time they hired someone new.

That hadn’t discouraged her from providing her own lock.

She had learned from her first job at an ice cream shop how little coworkers respected privacy .

Sierra retrieved her phone from her locker, a banged-up thing, covered in glitter, with a large smile on her face.

It matched her bright colored, beaded bracelets.

Gwendolyn didn’t observe farther than that, easily slipping back to her own thoughts.

Pink or teal.

That had been what she had been stuck on before the unpleasant interruption.

Gwendolyn had been debating which color would better suit her project at home.

Both colors were appealing in their own right.

Pink was soft, gentle, and could easily be mistaken for white, if the shade was correct.

Teal, on the other hand—

“Oh, my God, I can’t believe Tom!”

Gwendolyn already knew where this was going, but maybe if she just kept quiet—

“He’s trying to get me to take his Wednesday shift!” Sierra plopped into her vacant seat and proceeded to loudly scoot forward with it.

“He’s such a jerk. He knows Wednesday is the day after the Fourth of July! Can you believe him?!”

I believe he exists, yes, Gwendolyn thought before shrugging helplessly.

“Like I don’t have my own plans! I’m training the new hire today! We have two days to get her up to speed on the register, then we’re off for America’s birthday—”

Because America will never celebrate another birthday, and this one REALLY matters—

“—and he totally just wants Wednesday off so he can stay up late and not show up to work hungover!” Sierra groaned, dropping her head onto the break room table with a loud smack.

Yes, knock yourself unconscious.

That’ll show him.

Gwendolyn hummed in polite acknowledgment, fingers fiddling with the ends of her bright blue, company issued cardigan.

The material itched like crazy, but she had come to endure it.

It was better to keep her internal monologue to herself.

Gwendolyn had learned at an early age that sharing her thoughts wasn’t always appreciated.

Though, even nearing her late thirties, Gwendolyn still couldn’t understand why it was appreciated when everyone else voiced their opinions but her.

Just follow the script, she thought with a small nod before shifting her priorities back to the task at hand.

Pink or teal.

Teal was bright, bold, and a definite eye catcher, but it was terribly hard to find the right shade.

She was more fond of bluer teals than greener shades.

Not quite aquamarine and not quite cyan, either.

If Gwendolyn went with that color, there would be more opportunities to lean into other themes.

Oceans? It had been a while since she—

“I’m not covering for him,” Sierra mumbled into her sun kissed arm.

Oh, just tell him you want to fuck him already!

Saying that wouldn’t go over very well, despite Gwendolyn knowing it was true.

She may have felt very little of it herself, but Gwendolyn could still recognize attraction.

She had seen the way Tom’s blue eyes dilated when he was around Sierra, had seen how he would lean into her athletic frame.

Sierra wasn’t any better.

She would use any excuse to straighten up the collar of his company issued polo, and would frequently take her sweet time returning items to his department section.

“Then don’t,” Gwendolyn replied with her typical silvery tone as she eyed her wristwatch.

She had another twenty minutes before her shift started.

Twenty precious minutes that Gwendolyn would have preferred to spend contemplating if she was going to go with pink or teal.

Instead, she was working very hard at making small talk with a young woman who continued to pretend like she didn’t have a crush on their coworker.

All for the sake of keeping herself employed, and keeping her apartment.

“I won’t.”

“Good.”

Now that was settled—

“He doesn’t deserve it,” Sierra grumbled as she straightened up and reached for the pudding cup in the middle of the break room table.

Gwendolyn’s amber eyes flicked to her coworker’s profile in irritation.

The feeling was familiar, near impossible to avoid in retail.

But it was usually the customers that were the problem.

This recent development—of finding her coworkers irritating —was concerning, but not unprecedented.

She had been with the same employer for over a decade.

There was an ebb and flow to the monotony, and Gwendolyn had reached a low point.

She couldn’t pinpoint when it had started exactly, only that Gwendolyn’s goal was to swallow down all of her rotten feelings and continue to go unnoticed by the majority of her coworkers as normal.

The less she spoke, the better everyone got along with her, and the quicker Gwendolyn could do her job.

The quicker she did her job, the faster she could get home and tackle what really mattered.

And even if it were possible, you’d probably get written up for drowning your coworker in chocolate pudding.

A jovial knock at the door drew their attention, yet another distraction.

Gwendolyn managed to school her face into a mask of politeness as the door to the break room opened.

A small anxiety pinched at Gwendolyn’s sides at the sight of her manager.

Mary was a woman in her late forties, who styled her hair the same way she had in the nineties.

She was a brunette with a bob, wearing the same awful, company issued polo shirt and cobbler apron.

The latter Gwendolyn also wore, though she suspected it wasn’t for the same reasons.

Mary carried pens, markers, buttons, and note cards in her cobbler apron, and that was why she preferred them.

Gwendolyn disliked the attention her breasts would get, and that was why she wore hers.

“Hey, team!” Mary beamed.

“Hi, Mary!” Sierra beamed right back.

Gwendolyn didn’t beam so much as give a dull nod of acknowledgement.

She had already greeted Mary when she bumped into her on the way to the break room upon arriving at the store.

It made no sense to repeat the social exchange.

“I have the print off for the store updates,” Mary said as she approached the table.

“I went ahead and highlighted the important parts!”

The team gave the freshly printed pages a quick look over, and Gwendolyn had to suppress her disbelief.

Apparently, the important parts were all of it, as there was barely a line without any bits highlighted.

“Are you excited about the Fourth of July?” Mary asked.

Another thing that confused Gwendolyn.

If her boss wanted her to read the weekly store update, why was she interrupting her reading time?

“Oh, I’m just so excited!” Sierra replied, practically bouncing in her seat.

“I’m going to the bay to see the fireworks! ”

If her coworker was going to volunteer to talk, Gwendolyn wouldn’t let the time go to waste.

She quickly reviewed the weekly store update in the hopes of going back to her color problem.

Most of the news was the same reminders of company policy—dress code, holiday promos, the usual.

However, this particular issue left Gwendolyn surprised enough to interrupt the women.

“They’re no longer going to be carrying the Miss Moxie Dolls ?!”

The other women appeared surprised by her outburst, but Gwendolyn didn’t care at the moment.

Why would the company discontinue the Miss Moxie Dolls ?

They were one of the few commercial dolls the store offered to—

“Well, they haven’t been doing so great,” Mary explained.

“They don’t perform as well as our Betty Anne Dolls .”

Gwendolyn’s jaw tightened.

The Betty Anne Dolls were carbon copy wooden peg dolls.

Ideal for painting, but outside of wedding cake toppers and Christmas manger kits, they were objectively boring.

The Miss Moxie Dolls were anything but that.

The line of plastic dolls had debuted back in the 1960s, showcasing popular fashion and bright colors.

They had a good run before sales tanked and the company went bankrupt in the 1980s.

Luckily, the dolls saw a resurgence in 1999, capitalizing on Y2K fashion.

If their history wasn’t interesting enough, the sheer variety of doll shapes were.

Miss Moxie Dolls were one of the few that offered fashion dolls of different heights and sizes.

Gwendolyn’s favorite of the fourth-generation line was Lyra, a doll that sported a cute pear-shaped figure—

“Don’t you collect those dolls, Gwen?” Sierra asked, scooping up some of her pudding .

It was difficult not to flinch at the careless question.

Gwendolyn liked to keep her work and private life separate, but her coworkers made that difficult.

Gwendolyn couldn’t ring up her own purchases, even if she was a cashier, too.

Naturally, Sierra had a front row seat to every purchase Gwendolyn made, but she was hardly the first of the many workers to have a hobby.

They all did. Sierra liked to decorate with glitter and sequins.

Mary was a knitter, as evident by her earrings.

Gwendolyn didn’t collect Miss Moxie Dolls .

Gwendolyn customized Miss Moxie Dolls .

She took the commercial designs and made them better.

Painstakingly removed the cheap hair from their heads with needle nose pliers, and replaced it with a higher quality synthetic one plug at a time.

She removed the mass-produced paint from the dolls’ faces, and hand drew new ones with acrylic pencils and paints until they were just right.

She sketched, drafted tiny patterns, and sewed new outfits for every doll without missing a single detail.

To call what Gwendolyn did a ‘hobby’ was insulting.

But she would sooner destroy one of her dolls than tell any of her coworkers what she did in her free time.

The constant demand for access to her personal life was one of the more annoying things about work.

The insistence that everyone was one big family continued to baffle Gwendolyn, especially given how she knew it was a simple tactic to keep employees docile.

And with her temperament growing rapidly worse over the last few weeks, Gwendolyn had to try and gain back some kind of control.

“I have a lot of nieces and cousins,” Gwendolyn lied with a closed-mouth smile.

“You know how big Filipino families are. ”

She sincerely doubted Sierra actually knew, given she was not Filipino or even Asian.

But large families were relatable enough, and with the younger woman’s nod, Gwendolyn hoped the moment would pass without issue.

“That’s just so sweet of you, Gwen,” Mary cooed.

“It makes me so happy that you’re so close with your family.”

Gwendolyn was, in fact, not close with her family.

She hadn’t spoken to her parents in over a decade, and last she heard, one of her many cousins had gotten married three summers ago.

But that was another matter that Gwendolyn preferred to keep private.

No one needed to know that she wasn’t on speaking terms with her family.

“I try,” she murmured.

“You know, my sister, Cherry—she’s my older sister,” Mary wiggled her fingers.

“We just had lunch at the nicest little Filipino restaurant in South Everett. We had adobo!”

Her manager’s attempt to connect with her employee left a lot to be desired.

Gwendolyn could feel the ends of her closed-mouth smile smart as she nodded in agreement.

Mary wasn’t that much older than Gwendolyn, but these rare awkward moments with her made the age gap feel so much wider.

“I had adobo once at the Seattle street fair,” Sierra added.

“It was a lot more vinegary than I expected.”

A wave of exhaustion hit Gwendolyn suddenly.

If her nerves wouldn’t get her through this, she knew old reliable would.

“I have to go to the restroom,” she said with what she hoped was an apologetic look.

The two women nodded, making space for Gwendolyn to quietly leave her chair with little fuss.

Mary took her seat, inquiring if Sierra was excited to start training as Gwendolyn exited with a sigh.

She walked at her usual pace, just shy of a brisk walk, as to not alert anyone to her distress.

The restrooms for the employees weren't that far, just past Mary’s office.

A moment later, Gwendolyn found herself locked in the single person restroom, staring at her reflection. Half-formed thoughts came to the surface about her conservative appearance. Her entire work uniform was a giant beige and basic blue advertisement for the company. A signal to customers that Gwendolyn had no personality outside of being of service to them.

Beyond the itchy fabric, Gwendolyn lacked a visual personality. The meticulously braided hair that went down her back was the same as it had been months ago. No makeup, save for the simple lip balm that lacked any color. The small wrinkles at the corners of her amber eyes were fairly new, but no one noticed the signs of age like she did. The only thing of interest was the gap between her two central incisors, something that had given Gwendolyn grief in elementary school.

Everything is just so…

Gwendolyn sighed.