Page 1 of His Curvy Temptation

1

Andy

“Bad news.Deepti quit. We aresoscrewed.”

“Good morning to you, too!” I say to Tricia, walking to the back room of The Angel Spa.

I find my locker and unload my heavy backpack into it along with my well-worn flannel hoodie. Wednesdays are hard; I’m juggling a full time job as a massage therapist along with grad school, and on Wednesdays I have four hours of classes before I even begin my shift at the spa.

By the end of the day, I’m usually exhausted, with sore feet and tired eyes.

“No two weeks notice,” Tricia continues, having followed me to the back room to continue her venting session. “No warning. Not even a phone call. Shetextedme. Can you believe that?”

“I sure can,” I say as I change into my uniform: a pair of crisp white scrubs and plain black shoes.

“Did she tell you she was going to quit?” Tricia presses, narrowing her eyes.

I think for a moment. Did Deepti, my flighty friend of nearly five years, tell me that she was going to quit her job without notice?

No.

But did I see it coming?

Absolutely, yes.

How did I see it coming? Because a few weeks ago, Deepti met a man. And when Deepti meets a new man, she becomes impulsive and unpredictable. She dyes her hair, quits her jobs, moves into their apartments, takes up new hobbies that she was never interested in before…

It’s unhealthy, and it always makes me worried for her. And after five years of watching this cycle, I’ve learned Deepti’s patterns and habits.

Still, I’m irritated that Deepti quit The Angel Spa in this way. I was her internal referral, and she was only here for a few months. This is not going to look good for me.

“She didn’t tell me anything,” I say to Tricia. “I’m as surprised as you are.”

Tricia scrunches her nose, the thing that she always does when she’s annoyed. I know that she, who is technically my boss at the spa, means to look intimidating when she does this. But no matter how angry she is, the nose scrunch always reminds me of one of those fluffy bunnies at the petting zoo.

I look away from her quickly, hoping that she can’t tell that I’m nearly laughing right now.

“Well, like I said,” she continues. “We’re fucked. With Leah on her honeymoon, Deepti and you were our only massage therapists. And Deepti has a travel appointment today with a client we can’t afford to lose. So I guess this means…”

I groan.

“Tricia please no,” I say. “I just came from classes. And if you haven’t noticed, it’s about to rain like hell!”

I glance outside at the cloudy sky, which seems to be growing darker right before my eyes, in sharp contrast to the bright and sterile white interior of the spa.

“It’s the only way to make it work,” Tricia sighs. “I’m not happy about it either, obviously.”

I open the scheduling binder on the desk nearby and flip through it.

“I’m booked solid today anyway,” I announce with satisfaction. “We have to cancel.”

“We can’t cancel.”

“Why the hell not?”

“I told you, we cannot afford to lose this client. He brings in new business regularly and aside from that, he’s high profile. We don’t piss off our high profile clients.”

“If he can’t understand that we’re short-staffed and it’s outside of our control then that’s not my problem,” I snap.

---