Read Online Citizen Girl by Emma McLaughlin - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Emma McLaughlin
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my lip. ‘Hello?’ he asks again.
‘Yes! Hi! Hi. Can I speak with,’ I tilt the card back towards the lamp, ‘Guy, please?’
‘Yeah, this is Guy.’
‘Oh, okay. Hi, we met at the … the job event the other night—’
‘Uh-huh.’
‘Sorry, I wasn’t expecting you to be there this late.’
‘We met at the Bluelight thing?’
‘Yes!’ I rerun our interaction and sickeningly register that we didn’t talk about anything memorable. ‘I have brown hair, um, it’s long, and I’m tall.’ Note to self: no more networking calls after dark.
‘Yeah. So how’s it going?’ His voice drops a sexy notch. ‘You, ah, want to get a drink or something?’
‘Uh, maybe. Actually, we spoke about my work with social services. I’m following up about your—’
‘Righhhht.’ His voice returns to its original tone. ‘You were talking to the entertainment kid – he’s such an asshole. You work with women.’ Ding, ding, ding!
‘Yes! Yes, I do.’ Did. ‘I just wanted to follow up as you mentioned that you’re hiring and I’m currently in transition, so I thought—’
‘Great. Can you come in tomorrow afternoon at, uhhhh,’ I hear a few fast clicks on a keypad, ‘six thirty?’
‘Definitely!’
‘Very cool. See you then.’ He hangs up.
I stand and flick on the overhead in one deft move. Clicking on the stereo, I turn up the volume, letting Blondie tell me ‘One Way or Another’ as I carefully iron and lint-roll the unraveling H&M suit. ‘Come on, baby, Mama needs a new pair of ev-e-ry-thing .’
4. The One, The Answer, The Reason
Having spent the day tap-dancing for overstocked, underutilized temp agencies, I zip into a public library to download everything I can about My Company. But confronted with a two-hour line of kids and dodgy-looking men in oversized raincoats, I hustle to Kinko’s, cursing my fried laptop. At a disgusting dollar a minute, I pound in the URL and find myself before a pixilated collage of Gibson girls and Vogue covers: ‘One hundred years of being female at your fingertips.’ The cursor prompts me to enter a search item. Beneath Twiggy’s awning of eyelashes, I scroll down through the options – predominantly beauty products – and click ‘Mascara’. While logos from Almay, Revlon, and countless other brands pulse in the margins, I’m told that there are two thousand, seven hundred and twelve matches. I open the first article from Galatea , a woman’s magazine of the suffragette era. ‘Blacken the tips of your lashes with a simple paste of soot and cod-liver oil.’ Yick.
Over ten dollars in, but now handily equipped to make lipstick out of old candles and tartar paste, I click on the tiny hand-mirror icon for ‘Company History’ ‘MC, Inc. is the award-winning designer of highly innovative search engine software and proudly manages the patented online portal linking every major women’s magazine datingback to the turn of the last century.’ Fifteen minutes later I’ve burned MC’s website and mission statement into my brain in case there’s a pop quiz at the interview.
Heading west towards the Hudson, I burrow into the frigid wind like a salmon on a mission, silently pitching My Company to Grace as a conscionable use of my public policy degree. I stumble, my big toe popping through my last pair of tights.
Oh, yeah. I’m going to Whitney this one so hard Guy won’t know what hit him.
On Twelfth Avenue I pass crews of construction workers transforming crumbling auto-body shops into art galleries, whose anemic interns steal cigarettes in the frigid sunshine. The gusts off the river sting my face, forcing me closer to the brick façade of my destination. ‘HEY, LADY! WHAT THE FUCK?’ I jump aside as a steamroller backs out onto the sidewalk. The driver points belligerently and I dart out of his path and into the cold copper lobby of the former warehouse, where the security guard is huddled like an ice fisherman over his New York Post and space
‘Yes! Hi! Hi. Can I speak with,’ I tilt the card back towards the lamp, ‘Guy, please?’
‘Yeah, this is Guy.’
‘Oh, okay. Hi, we met at the … the job event the other night—’
‘Uh-huh.’
‘Sorry, I wasn’t expecting you to be there this late.’
‘We met at the Bluelight thing?’
‘Yes!’ I rerun our interaction and sickeningly register that we didn’t talk about anything memorable. ‘I have brown hair, um, it’s long, and I’m tall.’ Note to self: no more networking calls after dark.
‘Yeah. So how’s it going?’ His voice drops a sexy notch. ‘You, ah, want to get a drink or something?’
‘Uh, maybe. Actually, we spoke about my work with social services. I’m following up about your—’
‘Righhhht.’ His voice returns to its original tone. ‘You were talking to the entertainment kid – he’s such an asshole. You work with women.’ Ding, ding, ding!
‘Yes! Yes, I do.’ Did. ‘I just wanted to follow up as you mentioned that you’re hiring and I’m currently in transition, so I thought—’
‘Great. Can you come in tomorrow afternoon at, uhhhh,’ I hear a few fast clicks on a keypad, ‘six thirty?’
‘Definitely!’
‘Very cool. See you then.’ He hangs up.
I stand and flick on the overhead in one deft move. Clicking on the stereo, I turn up the volume, letting Blondie tell me ‘One Way or Another’ as I carefully iron and lint-roll the unraveling H&M suit. ‘Come on, baby, Mama needs a new pair of ev-e-ry-thing .’
4. The One, The Answer, The Reason
Having spent the day tap-dancing for overstocked, underutilized temp agencies, I zip into a public library to download everything I can about My Company. But confronted with a two-hour line of kids and dodgy-looking men in oversized raincoats, I hustle to Kinko’s, cursing my fried laptop. At a disgusting dollar a minute, I pound in the URL and find myself before a pixilated collage of Gibson girls and Vogue covers: ‘One hundred years of being female at your fingertips.’ The cursor prompts me to enter a search item. Beneath Twiggy’s awning of eyelashes, I scroll down through the options – predominantly beauty products – and click ‘Mascara’. While logos from Almay, Revlon, and countless other brands pulse in the margins, I’m told that there are two thousand, seven hundred and twelve matches. I open the first article from Galatea , a woman’s magazine of the suffragette era. ‘Blacken the tips of your lashes with a simple paste of soot and cod-liver oil.’ Yick.
Over ten dollars in, but now handily equipped to make lipstick out of old candles and tartar paste, I click on the tiny hand-mirror icon for ‘Company History’ ‘MC, Inc. is the award-winning designer of highly innovative search engine software and proudly manages the patented online portal linking every major women’s magazine datingback to the turn of the last century.’ Fifteen minutes later I’ve burned MC’s website and mission statement into my brain in case there’s a pop quiz at the interview.
Heading west towards the Hudson, I burrow into the frigid wind like a salmon on a mission, silently pitching My Company to Grace as a conscionable use of my public policy degree. I stumble, my big toe popping through my last pair of tights.
Oh, yeah. I’m going to Whitney this one so hard Guy won’t know what hit him.
On Twelfth Avenue I pass crews of construction workers transforming crumbling auto-body shops into art galleries, whose anemic interns steal cigarettes in the frigid sunshine. The gusts off the river sting my face, forcing me closer to the brick façade of my destination. ‘HEY, LADY! WHAT THE FUCK?’ I jump aside as a steamroller backs out onto the sidewalk. The driver points belligerently and I dart out of his path and into the cold copper lobby of the former warehouse, where the security guard is huddled like an ice fisherman over his New York Post and space
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