Page 18 of Employing Patience

Orson: Pity, I’m great with kids.

Griff: Yeah, maybe you can teach them how to dance …

Payne: Oooh, low blow.

Orson: Ford happens to love my dancing.

Griff: Maybe we need a demonstration.

Payne: Jfc does your dick ever switch off?

Griff: Well, Art’s not sharing his cooking, Orson’s not sharing his dancing, you’re not sharing your Beau. It’s like we’re drifting apart!

Payne: Wish it would happen a bit faster.

Orson: You love us.

Payne: Apparently I’m getting poor taste in my old age.

Art: Old is just a mindset, a limitation, an excuse we use to hold ourselves back.

Payne: He’s checked out, hasn’t he?

Orson: A good five minutes ago.

Art: Listen to me, for I am wise. Also: get your own fucking niblings.

5

JOEY

I hate days off. Other than coursework, there’s nothing to do. Hannah’s at school, and I’m glad she convinced me to get my diploma because at least the classes I’m taking now keep me occupied, but it’s a struggle to stay focused. Art pays us well, but the bills keep coming in, and Amelia’s list of college textbooks keeps growing—even e-copies of those things cost more than my grocery bill—and while my classes are at night, I still have a lot of coursework to get through each day. Exams to study for and assignments to get through. It means missing work. It means being unreliable. It means a cut to my paycheck.

Hannah has offered to pick up a part-time job, which I flat-out refused, so now I’m focused on keeping my problems from her as well. Other than the few kinda-friends in class, I have no one to talk to about any of it. My friends from high school either moved away, or we grew apart when … well, when my sisters and I moved away from our parents. When I dropped out of school.

It seems like no matter how hard I work, I can’t get a grasp on anything.

I close my laptop screen, which I’ve been staring at vacantly for the last hour, then pull the paper and pen I’ve been scribbling with toward me. There’s a blank space in the corner where I list my stresses.

Money.

Time.

Classes.

Sisters graduating.

I hesitate and add another one.

Art.

Because I should not be crushing on my boss. I reread the list, hopelessness creeping over me, knowing there isn’t much I can do about any of it.

Art’s flirty but completely closed down, and other than that one time in the stockroom, I haven’t been able to catch him alone. My sisters are doing well; so long as I continue to hide my worries from them, I can’t see that changing. Classes … I could quit. And feel like more of a failure than I already do. I can’t make time. Money … well, that’s one I can fix. Maybe.

I hate days off, and another job would help each week. It won’t make much of a dent in my sister’s or my student loans, but a little more to go toward rent and utilities always helps.

Another job will eat into my time though. And my classes. But if I can find something flexible, something where I could duck in and out for a couple of hours when I’m sitting here uselessly … that would be ideal.

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