Read Online Car Pool by Karin Kallmaker - Free Book Online Page B

ice cream last night — chocolate chip. There were about six chocolate chips in the entire half gallon and that’s when I realized that I’m a chocolate chip in this cheap vanilla company.”
    Shay laughed. “Does that make me toffee?”
    “There’s more of your people than mine in this place,” Harold said with a shrug. He started the truck and it slowly moved down the roadway.
    “Yeah, but I’m the only one not doing statistics and accounting. They hire Asians at NOC-U but only to do things that Asians are supposedly so good at. There aren’t any Asians in product development and no team leaders.”
    Harold chewed his lip. “I hadn’t noticed that. You’re right. So why do we put up with this place?”
    Shay laughed. “How much do you have in your savings account?”
    “What savings account?”
    “Exactly. I had thought that the old boys’ network was dying out, but it’s alive and well here.”
    Harold stopped to let a truck filled with soil cross in front of them. Shay stared after it, then shook her head. They moved a lot of soil around on this refinery.
    Harold said, “It is there, isn’t it? I thought it was me. I’ll be walking along and get the feeling I’ve crossed a line I wasn’t supposed to cross —”
    “Like a force field or something. I feel it too. You just know you’re an alien being. Around here anyone who isn’t a straight white man over fifty is an alien — oh, women who wear skirts and type and file all day aren’t aliens either, as long as they call their boss Mister. And believe me, I noticed the only black women in this place are clerical workers.”
    “You’d think after working on a refinery for twenty-five years, some of these guys would have died off. Let’s hope they’re not breeding.”
    “Actually, it isn’t an age thing,” Shay said. “Look at Scott. He’s what, thirty-five? Mr. Roger Ramjet. And you’re the only guy who so far has asked me if I wanted to drive. The rest just assumed I would be the passenger — even the guys who are my age.”
    “My momma’d slap me upside the head when I got out of line. She always said a son of hers would learn respect for women or die young.”
    “That accounts for that pointy head you have.”
    “Who are you calling pointy? That’s rich coming from a pee-wee like you.”
    They happily traded insults about each other and then about the more obnoxious people at the trailers as Harold wended their way back to the main roads. They could talk freely here, unlike in their cube
    where every word they said could be heard by a half dozen other people.
    Harold pulled into the cafeteria lot since it was close to lunch. Shay felt a warm wave of relaxation and realized she’d been walking around tensed up every day. Maybe she’d sleep deeper and better for knowing someone shared her views of the place.
    “Wait a second,” she said, when Harold started to open his door. “Since I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship, I want you to know that I’m gay.”
    She was sure Harold would be fine about it — screw him if he wasn’t — but his response floored her. He flashed her a brilliant smile and said, “Did you think you were the only one? It’ll be nice to have a real buddy.”
    She smiled back — a long, slow smile that didn’t fade until well after lunch.
    “Do you think that all used Volvos are shipped straight to Berkeley?” Shay slowed for a school crossing. Anthea was sitting quietly in the passenger seat, something Shay took for confidence in her driving. Anthea didn’t brake reflexively, which was also nice. In spite of Anthea’s complete lack of understanding about what actually happened on an oil refinery, her flawless elegance, easy charm and obvious financial means, Shay was beginning to like her.
    “Actually, I’ve often thought that.”
    Shay’s Horizon gathered itself and managed to pass a yellow Volvo that Shay privately thought was
    the color of a baby’s used diaper. “I mean, you