I settle the cash register drawer. I take the profits, wrap them in a receipt and drop them in the safe in the office. Every room’s been swept and mopped. (I know I said I didn’t care but I’m dedicated to any job I always do.) The laundry’s done and the trash has been taken out.
Normally I would gather my stuff and head out.
But today is different.
Because Kita’s in a stand up tanning bed getting tan. I haven’t seen her in months and the last time I saw her was insane.
I should have seen those encounters coming. What did I think? A naive inexperienced young girl leans on me for support and I exploit it. I feel horrible. I’m a dad. I should’ve never let that happen.
Why did I go on all of those little dates with her? Why did I buy her all of those little gifts?
This a young girl who was adopted into a wealthy family. She’s lived a sheltered life. She went to a private school for girls.
She has no clue when it comes to navigating affairs of the heart.
She had a loser boyfriend that grew tired of her and dumped her before her freshman year at university.
He was her first love and she lost her virginity to him. They both didn’t even realize what they had with each other.
Sure, she’s a zero, but I’ve seen pictures of him. The usual thumb. I use the word thumb because my friend Molly used that to once describe a guy that was a nothing. I like that. Hold up your thumb. That’s him. A nothing.
She doesn’t know any better. She’s 22. No clue.
I look back on myself at that age and you think you knew better, and then you realize your whole life was run by desire, emotion, inexperience and privilege.
You have no idea at 22 what life’s really like.
It’s so much more complicated than that, but only if you make it that way. With relationships, and possessions.
Life can be simple if you want it, but most people when they’re young don’t want that.
It’s sad, really.
The shoes with the red soles. The hand bags with the MK, LV, or Coach on them. So sad. So empty. You’re just a walking advertisement of assumed affluence.
You sad fools.
That idea of success, and affluence, when really you just got ripped off by a large corporation that sold you and idea that buying their shitty stuff made you look rich and successful.
That’s the world today.
Our social media that shows the greatest hits, and hides all of the fear, loss and debt most people have.
It’s all a lie.
I look at the timer and Kita’s been cooking in the booth for eight minutes. She’ll be out soon. Of course she does the full nine minutes to ensure she’s dark enough.
Funny how everybody wants to be dark, but nobody really wants to be black.
I’m in an odd moment here on a Sunday at the salon.
I thought by now I’d have some sort of business partnership with Achilles. Turns out it was all just careless talk at a tanning salon. After everything we discussed for the last year and a half… NOTHING came out of it.
I’m not bitter. I get it. Achilles is stuck in the past and has the inability to recognize a real opportunity when it’s presented to him. Sadly, because of who he is, he can have the best employee that he’s ever had working for him, and he’ll simply treat them like they’re any other $9 employee he’s ever had.
His ignorance to elegance doesn’t surprise me.
Sadly, I left corporate America and the rat race, but actually fell into a similar situation. My talent squandered by ignorance or sadly… jealousy.
So same thing, but in an entirely different business.
But happily, I adapted and found a better job to make my life extremely better from learning how to do this kind of job. I’m so… grateful.
Not to Achilles. But to myself.
Poor Achilles.
He’s a sad cliche. Greek. 50. Balding and always wears a hat to hide it. Works out and eats crazy supplements all the time. The 30-year-old girlfriend he’s been banging since she was 22. He’s been clear on no kids, so this poor girl never gets that with his misogynist. Never talks about his ex-wife, or his other two sons. owns a $20k Italian motorcycle. also has a red 90’s Z28, with a booming stereo and an exhaust that is extra loud. Don’t get me started on the outdoor jacuzzi….
Here is a man who’s trapped in his no game/no personality teen life, who fears aging.
I thought this was my key out of the corporate rat race and it didn’t happen.
But this story has a happy ending.
I get out in the final reel of this movie.
Kita will be out in a minute and now I have to deal with her.
Where the fuck is this going?
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