LITTLE NEW YORK

LITTLE NEW YORK, SOUTH DAKOTA

(sample section)

The florescent light above hummed impatiently, or at least it seemed that way to Molly. She’d been typing since nine in the morning, and she was getting tired. She glanced over her computer’s monitor, to see if anyone to be wary of was around. She didn’t see anyone. She quickly closed the window on her desktop she’d been working with, and pointed her mouse to the Napster program. Slowly, it opened. Molly’s eyes darted around, as her machine was connected to the server. She glanced at the clock on the opposite wall. If Fetor walked by now, she’d be dead. Finally, the program finished loading. Molly quickly flipped on her playlist, and cleared Napster from her screen. She glanced at the clock again. Eleven forty-three. He’d be walking around any minute. Her hand moved to her speaker’s volume knob. She turned it slowly, making sure that it was audible to her, but to no one else. Quietly, the strains of Elton John’s, "Daniel" came floating out of the speakers. Molly cold barely hear it herself which meant nobody else could. She moved her hand back to the mouse, and restored her work window and continued with her typing. Within a minute, he walked by. Fetor tried to look as casual as he could, but everyone knew, you’d better appear to be working fast and furiously when he came by, otherwise you were reported. Too many bad reports and you were fired.

Molly hated her job. She’d been working at this place for three years now; she’d received one promotion, which added extra responsibility, but little extra pay. She was in charge of the data entry department. The whole department consisted of four people, and she was in charge. It was her job to make sure everyone was working fast and furiously, but Fetor still came around every fifteen minutes. Fortunately he was predictable, and the whole department knew it. Everyone knew the good moments to check their email, or call their friends, but the conversations never lasted more than twelve minutes. Even lunch at your desk was hard to manage, since Fetor felt if you were sitting in your chair, you should be working not eating. Not that Molly ever wanted to have lunch at her desk. She spent enough of her time in this place. She glanced at the clock again. It was eleven forty-six. She wouldn’t have to worry again until one.

Larry, who sat at the next desk, stopped typing, and took out his sketchpad. Larry was a talented artist, who hadn’t caught a break yet. He was trying desperately to get into the company’s graphic arts department, but hadn’t gotten there yet. He had been working for Molly for six months. She thought he was awfully cute, it was too bad he was gay.

Moo, the girl at the desk next to Larry, was still typing away furiously. Fetor never had to worry about her. She sat down at nine, started working, stopped at twelve, started at one, and except for breaks, didn’t stop until five. She was the best data entry person in the department. She was also the most interesting in the department. Molly loved going to lunch with her. Moo always had a story to tell about the latest guy she was dating, or just sleeping with. Molly tended to keep that kind of information private, when she had that kind of information, that is. Moo was a recent college graduate, and was considering business school, if she could ever get the money together.

Molly turned back to her work. She’d been working on the same pile of papers for three days now, and only now was she starting to see a difference in the size of it. She continued with her data entry work, as Elton John subsided, and The Beatles began.

"I look at all the lonely people…", Dudley sang. Molly lowered her music slightly more, but Dudley kept on singing loudly. Molly shot him a look. Dudley smiled, and continued working, sans music.

Everything about Dudley Barchinski bothered Molly. He was sloppy, lazy, and what Molly could only refer to as a dim bulb. Molly had wanted to fire him for a long time, but she couldn’t get up the nerve. He never met his quota. If it weren’t for the rest of them going over quota every day, the department would be in serious trouble.

Molly glanced at the clock again. Would it ever be twelve? She felt the need to go outside, to grab a salad from the Korean Deli across from the office, and sit by the fountain and eat. It was still a little too cold to eat outside comfortably, but Molly loved New York in all seasons. She loved to watch people walk by. She loved listening in to snippets of conversation. She even loved the sounds of traffic, passing by. She could see Radio City Music Hall when she ate by the fountain. Most people she worked or hung around with couldn’t care less about Radio City. They claimed it was for tourists. That was probably true, but Molly even liked tourists. Of course in Manhattan in early March, with Easter still a month away, there weren’t all that many tourists around. On really nice days, Molly would walk up to Central Park, and grab a bite to eat in the zoo café. Sometimes she would spend her lunch hour in the theater district, hoping to pick up a little culture. That tended to work best on Wednesdays, when the shows had matinees, and the area was bustling with excitement.

There was no question. Molly loved New York, and that was the only thing that kept her at her crummy little job. She wished she could afford to live in Manhattan, as she had growing up. Unfortunately the price of rent in Manhattan was far out of her reach. She lived in a small one bedroom in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, a forty-five minute ride on the R train, which seemed to get longer every night. She paid seven hundred and seventy-five dollars a month, which for what she had was ridiculous, but all her friends were envious. She had her own place. They were all saddled with roommates. Of course, her friends didn’t have to spend their entire lives riding the subways.

She continued typing her numbers, keeping one eye on the pile of papers in front of her, and one on the clock. Although she was fully aware of what was going on with each, her mind was wandering. She was daydreaming about her usual things. What she wanted to be when she grew up, even though she was supposed to be grown up already. What would her dream home look like? This was a common fantasy for Molly. She had always wanted to live in a townhouse in Greenwich Village, but she wanted to modernize it. She wanted lots of open space, a big curved staircase, exposed brick walls, fireplaces. This would be the house she would have when she struck it rich. She would wake up every morning; at whatever time she wanted. Her career would leave her lots of flexibility. She would walk her dog in Washington Square Park, breathing in the spring air, (in her daydreams it was always spring), and pausing to look at the splendor of the Arch. After the park, she would walk over to the Bagel Buffet on eighth street, and get herself a sesame seed bagel with cream cheese and lox and a large coffee to go, and enjoy the rest of her morning, sipping coffee, eating the bagel, and looking out her large kitchen window. She tried to go through a similar scenario on Sunday mornings, but walking Spencer, her two year old West Highland Terrier, along eighty-sixth street in Bay Ridge, and being forced to get the lox spread and make coffee at home due to financial reasons, just never was the same.

Finally, the clock read, 11:58, and Molly stopped her typing. Larry was long gone; Dudley was reading something on the Internet, and Moo, typed on. Molly grabbed her jacket from the back of her chair, and put it on. She checked the pockets. She felt her wallet in one, and in the other was about ten dollars in singles. Plenty of money for lunch. The clock struck twelve. "Lunch, guys," Molly said. Her voice seemed to wake Dudley out of a deep sleep. He turned off his monitor, grabbed his jacket, and ran out. Moo stopped her typing finally, put on her coat, and turned towards Molly.

"I’ve got a doctor’s appointment at 12:15. I’ll see you later." She smiled and waved.

Molly was glad to be alone and free for an hour. She took the elevator the twenty-three floors down. When she stepped outside, she discovered it was way too cold to sit by the fountain. She ate her salad piled high with imitation crab and tuna in the small seating area upstairs in the little deli. She ate quickly, which left her with about forty minutes of free time. There was a small clothing store on Forty-seventh Street she wanted to look in. They sometimes had good sales. She once got a handmade wool sweater there for fifteen dollars.

She spent thirty minutes trying on a blue dress, with a matching sweater over it. She couldn’t quite decide if she really needed them. The outfit looked cute on her. It kind of looked like something she would have worn in high school, if she were prone to wearing skirts in high school. She wasn’t really prone to wearing them now either. She was still a jeans and sweatshirt kind of girl. She finally decided she would take it. The whole outfit was only eighteen dollars, and she figured she could wear it on her next date.

She paid for the outfit with the twenty-dollar bill that she kept in her wallet at all times in case of emergency. She made a mental note to go to the ATM after work. She rushed back to work, and hopped on the elevator, just in time to make it back. Fetor was already making his after lunch rounds. Everyone in her group was back, except Moo, but knowing her, she’d probably already emailed Fetor about her doctor’s appointment, and was hurrying back.

Molly’s email alert was flashing. She clicked on it. Her message was from Tracy, the receptionist. "What would you do if you had a million dollars?" It said.

Damn it! Molly had completely forgotten about contributing to the lottery pool. Everyone gave a dollar in, and Tracy bought the tickets. Now, if the office struck it rich, she wouldn’t be a part of it. She set up a reminder on her computer to be broadcast right before she left; "Buy a Lottery Ticket", she typed. Now it was just four more hours of straight typing, to think about.

The afternoon passed surprisingly quickly. Molly found a good talk radio station to listen to, which kept her entertained and made her type faster. She stopped in the small magazine shop in the lobby of her office building, and bought her lottery ticket. She picked the numbers 4, 8, 10, 12, 22, 27, and 52. You never got to pick your own numbers when you bought with the office. Maybe that was why she never won, she mused. The drawing wasn’t going to be until the following night, but she knew the lines would be long tomorrow. The jackpot was high. It was near 12 million, and getting higher. She made sure she checked the "lump sum" box, and handed her slip to the clerk, which he processed, and wished her luck as he handed it back to her. With ticket in hand, headed out the door, onto the street, and almost immediately into the Rockefeller Center Subway station, and waited among the rush hour crowds for the B train.

She was surprised to actually find a seat, but once she did, she used the time to thumb through her latest issue of Glamour magazine. As always she began with the Dos and Don’ts on the last page. She always felt so sorry for those women, who had been classified as a Don’t. She was sure if she ever made the Don’t category, she’d recognize herself instantly, despite the small box they discreetly used to cover your eyes. So far she’d been lucky, and hadn’t appeared in the magazine at all. As much as Molly couldn’t stand the long commute home, she found something magical in the rhythm of the subway. She was able to lose herself in a magazine, to the point where the time past quickly, but she continued to be completely aware of her surroundings. She heard the disabled Vietnam Vet ask for money to be put in his blue coffee cup with the words, "It’s our pleasure to serve you", written on the side, between two Ancient Greek figures. She noticed the guy who walked by selling light up yo-yos, among other things. She was even aware of the college student, buried in his textbooks, trying hard to study, while the large Asian woman next to him was snoring. However, the only time she pulled her nose out of the magazine completely was when they rumbled over the Manhattan Bridge. Molly loved to look at the back at the Skyline of Manhattan, which she found to be the most glorious landscape she’d ever laid her eyes on. As soon as they reached Brooklyn, she buried her nose in an article about what never to give your boyfriend for his birthday.

The train finally pulled into the 36^th street station, where Molly and all the other Bay Ridge residents got out to wait for the R train. Sometimes you got lucky, and a train came right away. Most of the time they waited and waited and waited. Molly thought of poor Spencer, sitting at home waiting for her, bladder full, and tummy empty. He was such a good dog. Fortunately her upstairs neighbor owned a golden lab, and the two dogs were able to spend their days together. Molly was glad that Spencer wasn’t home all by himself every day.

The train finally arrived, and Molly finally got home. She unlocked the front door of her building, and entered the foyer. She checked her mailbox. She had a couple of bills, and some regular junk mail. There was nothing personal. She thought back to a summer she spent at sleep away camp, where mail really meant something great. Every few days there would be a letter from her parents, her grandparents, or her friends. She would look forward to getting mail. Now the nicest thing she ever received was Visa telling her she was pre-approved.

Molly closed her mailbox, and unlocked the second door. When she came through it, Spencer came tearing down the stairs to see her. She had created a doggie door in her kitchen, so he had free access to the entire building. So far no one had complained, and that’s how he’d met Nicki, the golden lab from downstairs.

"Hiya, Spence!" Molly bent down and hugged the little white dog. "Let’s go upstairs and get your leash."

Spencer wagged his tail and woofed in agreement. The two of them walked up the stairs. Molly unlocked the door, and went inside. She quickly checked messages. There were none. Typical, she thought. She put the mail down on her desk, grabbed Spencer’s leash, put it on him, and the two of them took off down the street.

After Spencer was done with everything he needed to do, Molly took him over to the local diner, and ordered a cheeseburger deluxe to go. She was tired, and really didn’t feel like cooking. When they got home, she gave Spencer his dinner, and settled on the couch to eat her burger. She flipped on the television, and found herself watching old syndicated sit-coms. Spencer finished his dinner in about one minute, and settled himself on the couch to watch Molly eat her burger. Molly broke off a tiny piece and gave it to him. He finished that in less than a second and continued to watch her. Once dinner was over, Spencer settled himself on the other end of the sofa, and napped contentedly. This was how Molly spent nearly every night. She sat with Spencer and watched TV. She missed the days she was flooded by phone calls by her friends, and men asking her out on dates, but those days were long gone. Many of her friends had moved or gotten married. The rest of them had jobs, and were also too tired to spend their nights doing anything other than sitting on the couch and watching television. Besides, no one ever wanted to schlep all the way out to Bay Ridge, Brooklyn to come over to her place. She lived too far, and she owed it to Spencer to come home every night. Maybe it was time to start looking for another job, and a better salary, so she could move to Manhattan, and have a social life again. She was still thinking about that when she fell asleep that night.

The next day was more or less the same as the day before. She got to work right on time, and Fetor was standing there, making sure she did. Didn’t that man ever go home? Molly had lunch that day with Moo, and they talked about looking for other jobs. Moo was serious about moving up in the company, so she was definitely staying, but what should Molly do? They went over her interests. She had been an English major in college, but had taken a lot of history and music courses, and she had taken an urban studies class which she loved. She was a typical liberal arts student, who didn’t have a primary interest, but loved to learn. Moo suggested that she go back to school, and earn more degrees. Molly admitted that sounded interesting, but it didn’t pay. Besides, she was happy that when she came home, she didn’t have any homework to do, or any tests to study for. Molly didn’t tell Moo about the fantasy she’d had ever since she was a child. Her parents had taken her to see "Fiorello!" when she was very young, and ever since then she’d wanted to be the singing and dancing mayor of New York. She just had no idea how to go about getting to be a singing and dancing mayor.

After lunch, there was an email from Fetor, asking if she could come see him when she got back from lunch. Oh oh. This could only mean trouble. She searched desperately in her mind for what she may have done wrong, but couldn’t come up with anything. She glanced at the clock and wondered if she had time to go to the bathroom before she went to his office. She decided against it. The longer she waited, the longer Fetor would think she was at lunch, and the more trouble she could get into.

She ran over to his office. He was sitting, eating a sandwich, and playing Solitaire on his computer. She supposed he was still at lunch, even though it was five after one, and if he caught anyone else sitting at their desk eating a sandwich and playing solitaire at five after one, he would throw a fit. Molly knocked on the open door. Fetor immediately shut down solitaire and spun around in his swivel chair. His mouth was still filled with his last bite of his sandwich.

"Molly," he said unclearly. "Come in."

Fetor gestured to the chair on the other side of his desk. Molly looked around the office. She could never get over how small it was. The room hardly had enough room for a desk, let alone the large file cabinets Fetor kept in it. It was always a mess, and was only lit by the Fluorescent light above. It had no windows. Fetor was a manager in the department. He was an ass, but Molly always felt he should have been treated better by the company.

Molly sat down, and tried not to look nervous. Fetor grabbed a file from under his sandwich. It was her file. Nice to know he respected it enough to use it as a placemat. He opened the file and looked inside it, keeping his nose buried in it as he spoke to her.

"I see that your department has had some difficulty hitting your quotas lately." He said.

"No," said Molly. "We haven’t missed a day, yet."

"According to my files, you have two people who haven’t been making their quotas, and two people who have been carrying the department." He looked up at her.

"Well, it’s a department quota, not an individual one." Molly pointed out.

"The head of the department should recognize when there is a problem, and deal with it. " Fetor said. "From what I can tell, you have two people who are problems, and since you have not dealt with it, you are forcing me to." Fetor looked up for a moment, and then buried his head into the file again. "As of today, I am taking over as supervisor for the data entry department. Both Larry and Dudley will be relieved of their duties. Maureen will be promoted out of the department within the next two weeks, and you will be demoted to your original data entry job, and your salary will reflect that." He looked up at her for a moment, and then put his head back down.

Molly was stunned. She felt like crying. She stopped herself, since she supposed it would be considered unprofessional. Demoted. Back to her original salary. She couldn’t believe it.

"Why is my salary being cut?" She asked.

"You won’t be the supervisor, so why should you get the supervisor’s salary?" Fetor said.

"What will happen to that money? The money I’m not getting?"

"That’s no concern of yours." Fetor said.

Suddenly Molly knew. She knew what this was about. Fetor was taking over the position. He was taking over her salary, on top of his own. He was already making more than her, now he was stealing from her. Anger burned up inside her. She made a calculation in her head. With her original salary, she wouldn’t be able to pay her rent, take care of her dog, commute to work and still eat. How did they expect her to live? She was almost going to ask, when she realized he didn’t care. She remembered a few weeks ago he had asked for a raise, and had been turned down. This was his way of getting one. By taking over for someone else. By stealing money from someone else. He was forcing a person who had been doing a good job to do something they weren’t prepared to do.

"Mr. Fetor, I quit."

And with that, Molly walked out of the office, and out of the building.

Later that night Molly was going over her bills, and her bankbook, trying desperately to find a way to live until she found another job. Spencer tried his best to cheer her up, but it wasn’t working. Upon arriving at her front door, she’d taken Spence for his walk, fed him, laid down on her bed, and cried for about forty-five minutes. She was glad nobody called her anymore. She wasn’t up to speaking with anyone. Spencer was worried. He tried his hardest to cheer Molly up. He licked her face, he lay right next to her, he even brought his beloved, plush, baseball. Knowing that he cared made Molly feel a little better. She stopped her crying, and got practical. She made herself a grilled cheese sandwich, and that was when she started going over her finances. She soon realized that if she budgeted herself right, she could survive for two months without a job. She’d start looking in the morning. Maybe this time she’d find something she liked. She had a friend that had interned in the mayor’s office one summer. Maybe she’d give him a call, and see if he still had any contacts.

Molly decided to stop being practical for a while. She picked up Spencer, gave him a kiss, and flipped on the television. It was almost ten. Usually she went to bed at ten, but she didn’t have to get up at the crack of dawn tomorrow, so she could stay up. She watched episodes of the Facts of Life on Nick-at-Nite, happily remembering when these episodes were new, and the only worries were over homework. At eleven, she decided to go back to being a grownup, and watch the news. She watched the first fifteen minutes, but then found herself switching to an I Love Lucy rerun on the other channel. She turned out the lights, pulled a blanket over herself and Spencer, and fell asleep to the black and white images on the screen.

The next morning Molly panicked when she woke up. The sun was streaming into her small living room. Spencer was sitting by the door whining. Why hadn’t her alarm gone off? Then she remembered. She threw on her jean jacket, grabbed her keys and a plastic bag, attached Spencer to his leash, and hit the pavement. Spencer rushed to the tree right outside her building. There were a few people on the street. They were dressed, and heading to work. Molly felt kind of embarrassed to be standing on the street, still in her pajamas, during the latter part of rush hour. When Spencer was finished, Molly grabbed the newspapers from the front stoop and carried it into the apartment. She had to start her job hunt immediately. When she got upstairs, she made herself coffee and a bagel, and settled on the couch with her newspaper. She flipped on Sally Jesse Raphael, just for the background noise, but soon found herself full of breakfast, and completely drawn in to the lives of the anorexic fifteen year olds on the screen. It wouldn’t be so bad to spend one day relaxing, would it? After Sally, and fifteen minutes of another I Love Lucy rerun, Molly took a shower and got dressed. She put Spencer’s leash on, and the two of them spent the rest of the morning walking around the neighborhood, blissfully window-shopping. They had pizza for lunch.

By the late afternoon, Molly felt completely relaxed, and felt she was now ready to start her true job hunt. She looked at the two newspapers sitting before her. She subscribed to both the New York Times and the Daily News. She decided to pick up the Daily News first. They may not have the greatest resources for finding a job, but they did have one of the best comic sections this side of the Hudson River. Molly read through the comics, Ann Landers, and several columnists before picking up the Times and turning to Classifieds. There wasn’t much there. Sunday would be a much better day to look. Maybe she should wait until then. Maybe she could find something at City Hall; get herself on a political career track. Then all she’d have to do is take singing and dancing lessons.

The phone rang. It was Moo. She wanted to see how Molly was. She’d received her promotion today. She was going to be working for one of the Vice Presidents of the company. Molly congratulated her, and asked what happened with Fetor. Moo told her that he took over Molly’s desk, as well as keeping his own office. The guys hadn’t been fired yet, not until they found replacements for them, Moo mused. Moo said for the first time in months the department didn’t make their quota, because Fetor just sat there and watched them all day, and even though the guys worked a little faster, the fact that the department was down one of their top people, there was no way to catch up. Moo thought that Fetor would be fired if he continued what he was doing, since sitting and staring at other people was about as close to doing nothing as you could get.

The girls talked for almost an hour, and decided to get together that weekend. Maybe Moo could help Molly fax resumes to all the interesting companies that were going to have ads in Sunday’s paper. Molly realized she’d have to update her resume. She’d also have to think about references. Moo said she’d be one, but usually you need at least two. Molly certainly couldn’t use Fetor. The man was such a sniveling, little weasel, he’d probably make up all sorts of awful things about her. In college she’d worked a part time desk job. Her old boss was still there, she kept in touch sometimes on email. Maybe she could use her.

After Molly had hung up the phone, and made up her mind to suspend her job hunt until Sunday, there really wasn’t much else to do. She flipped on the television to New York One, the twenty-four hour news channel serving all of New York City. She rubbed Spencer’s belly, and stared at the TV until she’d seen all the top news stories repeated four times. By then the sun had set, and Molly was pretty relaxed. She’d spent the day doing what she had wanted to do. She’d spent the day not being watched by Fetor. In fact she really hadn’t felt stressed all day. She supposed the long cry from the day before had helped with that, but now it was starting. The realization of being unemployed was starting to affect Molly. The worries of being idle, of not being able to pay her rent, of having to move, were all settling in. The thought of having to move out of New York City sickened Molly. The most time she’d ever spent out of the city was six weeks for sleep away camp, and she had had a miserable time. In fact, she was supposed to stay eight weeks, but she’d carried on so, that her parents came to take her home early. Molly was so happy that day. Everyone had thought she’d missed her parents, which she supposed she did, but it was the city. From day one at camp, Molly had had trouble sleeping in pitch blackness, and with no sirens or horns blasting all night. The wildlife scared her, and she hated nature walks. She didn’t mind the walking so much, as much as she minded that they were walking on dirt paths, and there wasn’t a store for miles. The day that Molly’s mom had come up to get her was one of the happiest days of her life. They drove back into the city, saw a Broadway matinee, went shopping at Bloomingdales, and took in Chinese food that night. Molly never wanted to see another glass of bug juice for as long as she lived. Since then, Molly made up her mind to never leave New York again for longer than a week or two.

One of the reason’s Molly had taken that god awful job was because they paid pretty well, and they seemed to promote quickly and often. Molly had been working less than a year when she was promoted to department manager. Then Fetor joined the staff, and the office became a terrible place to be. She was hoping to move up the ladder, even if she hated what she was doing, just so her salary would increase, and she could move back to Manhattan. She figured she could stand being miserable for eight to ten hours a day, as long as it meant coming home to a nice one bedroom apartment in a doorman building, maybe with a terrace. She wanted to be able to come home, change out of her work clothes, and walk around breathing in the life from the streets. She wanted to be able to think about any style of food, and be able to get it at any hour of the night. She wanted to be able to shop until ten o’clock even on the weekdays, and not have to go into a single mall. The only mall Molly could stand was the Manhattan Mall, and only because you had to enter it if you wanted to go to Sterns. A friend of hers had taken her to a mall in Jersey City that was accessible by the PATH train, and it was nice. There was a lower sales tax, and the movies were cheap, but any true New Yorker knows that the only reason to go to New Jersey, is if you happen to be driving to California. Molly had always tried to stay on her own side of the Hudson River.

The next morning Molly got dressed in slightly nicer clothing than what she normally wore on a day off. She packed a bag with several copies of her updated resume, a notebook, and a couple of pens. Then, Molly headed into Manhattan.

Molly had had an epiphany the night before. She decided to walk around to all the companies that she was interested in working for. She’d looked up addresses the night before, and she decided to fill out applications and leave them all a resume. She figured some Human Resources person was bound to like her. Maybe she’d call Moo and try and have lunch with her as long as she was in the city.

Molly decided to start with the longest train ride and work her way down back to Brooklyn. There was a publishing company on the Upper West Side. Molly figured she’d hit them first while she was still fresh. It was Friday, and Molly knew she’d have to reach everyone early, before people started getting ready to leave for the weekend.

While she rode the B train, Molly began mapping out where she was planning on going and when. After the publishing company, there was a music video producing company. Then she was going to try a travel agency that was only a block from Central Park. Then there was a music video cable station, a fashion cable station, a performing arts cable station, and an arts and crafts cable station. The last one was in the same building as her old company. She hoped she didn’t run into anyone she wasn’t in the mood to see. After that she was heading downtown to apply at another travel agency, a commercial production house, and NYU, since a lot of her friends worked there in administrative assistant jobs. Then she was heading way downtown to City Hall, to see if there was any way she could work in the mayor’s office, which would definitely be her first choice.

Molly got off the train, and headed up the block to the publishing company. The corporately dressed receptionist looked at Molly’s attire, and gave her a snooty look. She then took her resume, and said she’d be sure to give it to the HR manager. When Molly asked what was the name of the HR manager, the receptionist said Molly didn’t need it. If she liked what she saw, she’d be in contact. Molly insisted on knowing, and the receptionist told her to ask for Abe Colright. He was her assistant. Molly left the office, and already felt frustrated with her job search.

The travel agency was a few blocks away, and they were much friendlier. The manager actually took a few moments to speak with Molly while she filled out the application. She seemed interested in her data entry background, and said they always have work piling up since none of the agents ever have time to enter everything into the computer. She said she would definitely be in touch, and that made Molly feel a little better. Molly sat on a bench right outside the park and scribbled out a thank you note to the travel agent, and dropped it in a nearby mailbox.

Molly decided to walk across the park to get to her midtown companies. Even though Molly had practically grown up in this park, she never got over the sheer beauty of it. She loved this huge patch of greenery completely surrounded by skyscrapers. She loved the hidden paths, the carousel, the baseball fields, the castle. There was nothing about Central Park that Molly didn’t adore, with the exception of the rollerbladers that she was constantly having to dodge. She used the 7^th Avenue exit, passed the handsome cabs, and headed towards Times Square.

The music video station, the fashion station and the performing arts stations were all very similar looking. There was a hip young receptionist, who happily handed Molly an application, and promised her the Human Resources person would get back to them. Molly glanced briefly at the large Broadway theaters, and wondered if she should speak with someone in there. She had a friend who had ushered for a while for Damn Yankees, but she remembered the pay wasn’t too great, and you really had to know someone to get in. Molly decided to wait on that one. Instead, she headed east to Sixth Avenue, to go to her old office building which housed the Arts and Crafts channel as well. She would have loved to go visit Moo, but it wasn’t quite lunch time yet, and Fetor was sure to be sitting there watching them. She no longer feared him, but the thought of seeing him disgusted her, so she decided to skip dropping in. She’d wait until Sunday brunch to see Moo.

The security team at her old office building stopped her when she came through the door. Actually just one security guard did. "We’re not supposed to let you upstairs. Mr. Fetor’s orders," he said.

Molly told him she was actually going to drop off a resume at another office. He let her upstairs, but said they’d have to keep it on the "QT". Molly smiled and went upstairs.

It turned out the Human Resources director of the Arts and Crafts station was a woman that Molly had been stuck in the elevator with six months earlier. They were stuck for over an hour, and to keep themselves calm, they told each other all sorts of nasty little secrets, figuring they’d never see each other again. She was very friendly to Molly when Molly handed her resume over, but Molly wasn’t sure if they’re adventure in the Otis would be good or count against her getting this job.

Molly rode back down in the elevator, and walked past the magazine shop in the lobby. There was a big sign on the door in very excitable letters. "WE HAD A WINNER!" That’s nice, Molly thought. Maybe her old office team had won, although if that were the case, Moo certainly would have said something. Molly reached into her coat pocket and felt the small square of paper sitting there. She realized she never checked the winning numbers. Maybe she got two or three of them. She once won ten dollars by getting three numbers, and right now even ten dollars would be helpful. Molly walked into the store, and pulled out her ticket. She handed it to the clerk, who looked bored as he took it and looked at it.

"I just want to see if it’s worth anything."

The clerk stuck the ticket into the machine. He suddenly looked less bored.

"Lady," he said. "I can’t cash this." He handed the ticket back to her.

"What?" Molly asked. "Is it worth anything?"

"They do this at the State Lottery Office."

"How much is it worth?" Molly asked. She knew if it was more than $600, then you had to mail away the ticket.

The clerk looked nervously around at the other people in the shop. There were only three of them. He pointed to a cardboard sign with the winning numbers for that week. Molly smiled at the clerk and looked at the sign. The winning numbers for the previous Wednesday were, 4, 8, 10, 12, 22, 27, and 52. Molly glanced at her ticket. 4, 8, 10, 12, 22, 27, and 52. She looked at the sign again. The numbers were the same. They matched. She glanced at the Clerk. He gave her a small smile. He’d obviously not wanted to start a mob scene. Molly waved at him, and exited the shop, leaving her in the lobby.

What should she do? She wanted to jump up and down, and yell and scream, but not alone. Moo! She could call Moo. Better yet, she was right upstairs. Molly sneaked by the guards again, and took the elevator up to her old office. She went in through the back way, and saw the back of Fetor sitting at her old desk. Moo was right. He wasn’t doing anything. Dudley and Larry were typing away. The company was going to fall way behind with just those two working.

Molly walked over to the department where Moo was supposed to be working, carefully avoiding the eyes of Fetor. She certainly wasn’t in the mood, plus she didn’t want to get any of the guards in trouble. Moo was standing in front of Rose’s desk. Rose was in her late fifties, and had been with the company forever. She was taking an early retirement, and Moo was taking over for her. They both smiled when they spotted her.

"Molly, Hi!" Rose said.

"What’s up, girlfriend?" Moo asked.

Molly found it was hard to even find her voice.

"Molly, what is it?" Moo said.

Molly inhaled deeply. This would be the first time she would ever say it. This would be the first time she would ever hear the words uttered.

"I just won the lottery".

After ten full minutes of jumping up and down and screaming, Fetor threw Molly out of the building, but Moo came downstairs with her.

"I have to go to the lottery office." Molly told Moo, breathlessly. "Where is the lottery office?" She stopped and thought about what she just said. "I have to go to the lottery office," she repeated. She leaned against the wall. "I won the lottery," she said quietly. She slid down the wall and sat on the floor. "I won the lottery." She burst into tears. People stopped to stare at her, but Moo shooed them away.

After some great sobs, Molly finally pulled herself somewhat together, and said, "I wonder how much I won?"

The lottery office was downtown on Beaver Street near City Hall. Moo had forced Molly into the women’s bathroom to wash her face, and then Moo asked the clerk in the magazine shop where Molly needed to go. Unfortunately Moo couldn’t come with her. Fetor was sure to have her docked for the time she’d already missed, and since she didn’t win anything, she still needed that job. She did make several copies of the ticket to keep with her, in case Molly needed to prove anything, but Molly had to venture downtown on her own. She used her Metro Card, and took the subway, keeping the lottery ticket in her breast pocket. She considered how funny it was that she might be a multi-millionaire, and here she was riding the subway, but she didn’t have any money yet. In fact she was still technically unemployed, which meant there was no extra money around for taxis.

The lottery office was in a dusty old building near City Hall. Molly suddenly remembered the resumes in her bag. Somehow she thought the job hunt could wait, she mused. There was a line to speak to a clerk in the lottery office. In New York there was a line for just about everything. Molly got to the end of the line behind an old woman carrying a leather purse, and a netted shopping bag that was filled with two Italian breads among other things. She turned to Molly.

"I won $1200," she said.

"That’s great."

"I’ve won before," the woman went on. "I play every week. Usually I win ten dollars, and I can cash it at the grocery store, but they won’t cash it if it’s over $600, so I had to come all the way down here."

Molly nodded.

The woman continued. "They said I should mail it, but I don’t trust the mail. It would be way too easy for them to say they never got it. Plus, a mailman making a civil servant’s salary, they could easily steal it."

Molly doubted that any post office employee would risk their career for $1200, but she wasn’t in the mood to argue with this woman. She was nervous. She was scared, and her stomach was killing her. She stopped paying attention to the woman, as she went blathering on. Molly knew that the old woman wasn’t really talking to her, but was lonely and excited about her winnings. It occurred to Molly that she still wasn’t sure exactly how much she won. She wasn’t sure how many winners she’d have to divide the money up with. Who knows? She may have been standing there for $1200, too.

The line moved slowly with all sorts of happy people signing papers, and lottery office clerks promising them their checks within six weeks. The old woman was not happy that she wasn’t going to get her money right there and then, spouting off again about crooked mailmen. Molly was starting to wonder if this woman ever worked in a post office. The clerk assured the old woman that the check would be sent registered mail. The old woman seemed to agree to that. She took one of the loaves of bread out of her bag, and gave it to the clerk. For luck, she said.

The clerk looked confused as the old woman walked away, and Molly took her place. "Bread for bread I guess," Molly said.

The clerk continued staring blankly. It seemed that she made up her mind to ignore the loaf. "Ticket, please." She said to Molly.

Molly handed over her ticket. The woman put it through the machine.

"I’m not even sure how much I won. I know it’s more than $600. I mean I know it’s the jackpot. How many winners were there?" Molly asked.

The woman eyeballed the ticket, and looked at Molly. Then she looked back at her computer, and then looked at the ticket again. "One."

"One," said Molly. "One winner?"

"One winner," the clerk repeated.

"Omigod," said Molly, and she fainted.

The next thing Molly knew, she was on the floor of the lottery office, surrounded by people. One heavy-set man, with a receding hairline and a gigantic grin was standing over her with a glass of water.

"I swear," the man said. "With the amount of time that happens we might as well have padded floors." He smiled again. "Are you all right, miss?"

"Yes. Yes, I’m fine." Molly said. The man helped Molly up.

He held up the lottery ticket. "Is this your ticket, miss?"

Molly nodded.

"Congratulations!" He smiled that beaming smile, and shook Molly’s hand. "Come to my office, we must talk."

The heavy-set man with the receding hairline and the gigantic grin turned out to be Mr. Gleibel, the lottery district manager. His grin continued as he congratulated Molly over and over again. He said that this was the single biggest win in the history of the New York State lottery, and the type of thing that made his job all worthwhile. He handed her the glass of water. Molly felt short of breath. She tried to drink the water. It was difficult. She listened as Mr. Gleibel explained the entire process of her receiving the money. Since she checked the lump sum box it would take some time for the money to be hers. Plus she’d be losing a lot to taxes. She would end up getting about six million dollars in about 10 weeks. Six million dollars. No more worrying about finding a job. No more long subway rides to Bay Ridge. She could live in Manhattan. Hell, she could own Manhattan. In ten weeks she’d have no worries ever again.

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