“They would have let me stay in the building,” I said, “I just didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of getting to peer at me.”
He nodded. “That sounds fair,” he said.
“Mind if I make a call?” I asked.
He told me to go ahead and turned the radio on low, the sound of Patsy Cline’s voice drifting around the cab, not loudly enough to keep me from talking.
“Sarah?” I asked, when she answered. “Have you heard?”
“Are you getting married?” she asked, immediately.
“What? No,” I said. “No. Well. Nothing like that. Nothing that good.”
“Shit,” she said. “Spill, what’s up?”
“So, yesterday, I thought about being a cog, and I wanted to be a cog I liked,” I said. “So, well, when Herman told me to mess with some paperwork… I didn’t. I just moved on. He found out and blew up at me and I didn’t back down, and first thing this morning he handed me a box and a pink slip. ‘So sorry,’ he said, ‘budget cutbacks, something’s gotta give, and you’re junior.’”
“That’s such total bullshit!” Sarah exclaimed. “Seriously? The Lars kid has been there for like ten days, and those girls with the hair haven’t been there six months.”
I shrugged.
“Well, it’s pretty clear that if you don’t do what Herman wants, you’re junior,” I said.
She sighed.
“He’s afraid to fire me because I caught him being sneaky once or twice, and he knows I’m vindictive,” she said. “I should have realized that if I were out he’d come sniffing around you to see if you’d help his shady ass. Want me to call him and give him a piece of my mind? I can keep you on the line so you can hear.”
“No, thanks,” I said. “I mean, it would be pretty funny, but I don’t want to go back there, and I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of thinking that I care.”
After a few more minutes of her indignation, I hung up.
“So, that’s the full story?” Clint asked.
I looked over at him.
“You can’t have a chat like that in front of a man and expect him not to listen,” he grumbled, surprising a laugh out of me.
“I thought you would, so I didn’t have to tell it twice,” I said. “That’s about it.”
When I called Clint, I just said “I’ve been fired, will you come get me? I drove the company car to work and can’t get home.”
We pulled into the parking lot of my apartment.
“Oh!” I said. “I thought I’d go to the ranch, if you don’t mind.”
“Suits me down to the ground,” he said. “You know I want you out there more. Need to pick anything up?”
I wavered, and then sighed.
“Yeah, I could probably do with a few things,” I said.
Twenty minutes later, we were on the way out to the ranch with a bag of my clothing and a bottle of my favorite shampoo.
I pulled it out of the bag and smelled it, and sighed again.
“I guess, if I’m unemployed, I won’t be buying any more of this,” I said. “It’s stupidly pricey, but it smells so good and makes me feel pretty.”
Clint glanced over. “Tell me where stocks it, we can go get more in a few days.”