The Night's Legacy (5 page)

“Oh, yeah.  Right.”  That been
Lois’s senior year in high school.  As a freshman in the grips of puberty with acne, braces, and thick glasses, Melanie had been one of the few kids uncool enough to hang out with Lois.  The acne and braces were gone but the glasses remained.  She tried to think of how old Melanie would be:  twenty-five?  “What have you been up to?”

Melanie
seized the opportunity to spew out her entire history for the last ten years.  After Lois had left, Melanie had finished high school and then done two years at Ren City Community College, just missing Lois’s brief stay there.  “College wasn’t really for me.  I’m not super-smart like you and your mom.”  So Melanie had done some temping for a couple of years, winding up at Olson Steel and catching the eye of Mr. Olson’s son Oliver.  “Ollie and I just clicked, you know?  We got married after like two weeks.”

They got divorced after two years when
Melanie caught him in bed with his new temp secretary.  “I’m glad I never had any kids with that rat, you know?”  While Melanie had thought Ollie was well off, his company was wiped out in the recession, leaving her with nothing.  “So I saw the job listing and I applied and Tony hired me and I can’t believe it but now you’re here too!”  Melanie wrapped Lois in another hug and then began bouncing up and down.  “It’s going to be just like high school again.”

“Great,”
Lois mumbled.  She had hated her two years of high school.  Not only the boring classes, but also the equally boring people who thought high school was the summit of their lives, people like Melanie.

She caught Tony’s eye as
Melanie took her hand to tug her away.  He gave her a smile and shrugged, leaving her to her own devices.  She couldn’t really blame him for passing Melanie off onto her, but she promised to make him pay for it later.

* * *

Melanie folded a T-shirt and said, “This isn’t really a hard job, especially not for super-genius like you.”

“I’m not a super-genius.”

“Sure you are!  I’m surprised you aren’t already a doctor like your mom.  It must be nice that you can work at the same place, though.”  Melanie finished folding the T-shirt and then picked up another.  “My mom was a cleaning lady for some rich people.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it’s not like I wanted to follow in her footsteps, you know?”

“Yeah, I guess not.” 
Lois had done a stint as a chambermaid for a hotel, which had given her a new appreciation for waitressing.

Melanie
held up another T-shirt.  “Now the secret is you want to fold them so most of the logo or whatever shows.  That way customers don’t unfold it, though some will anyway, especially the little kids.  You want to try?”

“Sure.” 
Lois picked up a T-shirt and repeated what Melanie had done.  It wasn’t really hard.  Still, Melanie clapped as though she’d just won an Oscar.

“You’re a natural at this!  But you should do a couple more just in case.”  After
Lois did so without any folding accidents, Melanie led her over to a rack of cheap toys.  “When we get too low on these you just go back into the storage room and get some more.  Tony’s not going to have you working the counter today being your first day and all.  He didn’t put me on the register until my third week but I’m sure you’ll get to do it sooner being a genius and all.”

“What if I don’t want to work the register?”

“Oh you have to!  We all take turns doing it.  It’s not so bad.  Most of the customers are pretty nice.  A few can get mean but if they get too mean you can call security to throw them out.  And if any homeless guys get in here you call security right away.  The ticket counter’s supposed to stop them, but they can be pretty smart about that and they start wandering around up here where they think no one will look.”

“Does that happen a lot?”

“Only a couple of times.  Mostly in the winter when it gets really cold, you know?  But when it gets really hot some might come in here for the air conditioning.”

“I see.”

“I hope I’m not scaring you because they aren’t really scary.  Mostly they just smell bad.”

“Yeah, they don’t exactly use deodorant, do they?”

Melanie screeched with laughter.  “You’re so funny!  I can tell this is just going to be such a blast.  Tony’s a really nice guy and all but sometimes it’s just nice to have another girl around, you know?”

“Sure.”

“Hey, are you married?  I don’t see a ring but that doesn’t always mean anything, you know?”

“No, I’m not married.”

“Are you seeing anyone?”

Lois
looked back to where Tony stood behind the counter, going over some reports.  He could probably hear them but was pretending to be engrossed in what he was doing.  “No, I’m not seeing anyone,” she said loud enough for him to hear.  He didn’t show any reaction at this.

“Oh my God, that is so great!  Maybe we can go out to a club or something.  I got this perfect dress for it.  It’s hot but not really slutty, you know?  Oh my God, can’t you just see us at a club?  The guys would be all over us, just swooning.”  Before
Lois could say anything, Melanie had a hand in her hair.  “You ever thought about getting this straightened?  I’m not saying you’re ugly or anything but I think it would look really pretty if we got it straightened and then you could put it up.  You’d look so sexy.”

“Thanks for the advice.”  She glanced over at the counter, where Tony was laughing behind his hand.  She wanted to pick up one of the toy dinosaurs to hurl at his head.  “I kind of like it the way it is.”

Melanie gave her one of those Mom looks, as if she were about to cry.  “Oh my God, I’m so sorry!  I didn’t mean to say you don’t look sexy now.  I mean if I were into that I would think you were totally hot, you know?”

Tony staggered back to the stock room, probably so that he could laugh his ass off without
Melanie overhearing.  “Thanks, Melanie.  Thanks a lot.”

“No problem.”  She checked her watch and then shouted, “Oh my God, it’s almost time to open!  I better go count my cash drawer.  Come on.”

* * *

For her first day, Tony stationed her with
Melanie behind the counter so that she could observe how things worked.  She would also be responsible for helping him restock the shelves and Melanie with bagging things.  “It’s not too hard,” Tony said.  “I’m sure you can hack it.”

She realized after about two hours that this was going to be the most annoying job she had ever held.  The customers came in various types, all of them
obnoxious.  There were the old and middle-aged ladies who pestered Melanie and her with dumb questions, like if they thought her granddaughter would like a pop-up book on mummies or what kind of stuffing was in the stuffed giraffes because her niece was allergic to polyester.  Then were the little kids who ran around the store like the Tasmanian Devil, leaving destruction in their wake.  Much of Lois’s job the first day involved refolding shirts and picking up toys after one of the little brats ran through the store, which she thought was maybe a penance for her own childish indiscretions.  And then were those who expected Lois and Melanie to be tour guides not only about the museum but also Ren City in general.  Where was a good place nearby to eat?  How do you get to Chester Square from here?  When did the number seven train run?

Lois
was more than grateful when Tony appeared and touched her shoulder.  “Why don’t you two get lunch and I’ll mind the store?”

“Oh my God, that would be awesome!”
Melanie said.  She seized Lois’s hand, not giving her much of a choice about it.

Lois
thought maybe she would find Mom in the cafeteria, though Mom probably had her secretary bring something up if she remembered to eat at all.  A lot of the customers they had waited on earlier were in the cafeteria, giving equal amounts of grief to the cafeteria staff. 

“The food here is pretty good,”
Melanie said.  “Plus we get a ten percent discount on everything.  If you want to go out—”

“No, I’m fine here.” 
Lois would have preferred to go somewhere else, preferably somewhere alone, but she didn’t want to hurt Melanie’s feelings.  It was pretty obvious Melanie didn’t have anyone else in her life since her husband had dumped her.  She needed a friend and Lois supposed she could do worse on that front than Melanie.

Melanie
got a salad and bottle of water while Lois bought a cheeseburger, fries, and a soda.  They sat in an empty corner table, away from most of the museum guests.  “So what have you been doing since graduation?” Melanie asked.  “Probably something pretty exciting.”

“Not much.  I’ve just kind of kicked around for a while.”  She took a bite of her cheeseburger. 
Melanie stared at her, clearly expecting more details.  “I went to a few colleges but I just didn’t think it was right for me.  So I’ve been working different jobs and seeing the country.”

“Wow, that is so cool!  I always wanted to go backpacking through Europe.  Did you ever do that?”

“No, just America and a couple of times to Mexico.”

“Mexico?  Ollie and I went there on our honeymoon.  Did you ever go to Cancun?  We stayed at this really great hotel on the ocean.  I could have just stayed there forever, you know?”

“I bet.  I didn’t really get that far.”  She had mostly stuck to the border towns, where a young American girl could easily blend in.

“You are just so super-cool.  I’d have been too scared of getting raped or something, you know?”

Lois thought of Durndell and nodded.  “I’ve learned to take care of myself.”

“So why’d you come back here?  Not that this is a bad place.  I really like Ren City, but—”

“I know what you mean,” Lois said.  “I came back for my mom.  She was getting worried about me.”

“Oh my God, that’s so sad!” 
Melanie’s lip trembled as if she were going to cry.  “Your mom is such a sweet lady.  Super-nice.  But duh, you knew that already, right?  I mean her being your mom and all.”

“Yeah, I know.  Everyone likes her.”

“I haven’t seen her around all that much since she works upstairs and all but once she came in and looked around and talked with Tony about how things were going.”  Melanie lowered her voice and said, “Don’t you think Tony is so cute?  If he asked me out I would just totally die, you know?”

“I know.” 
Lois took another bite of her sandwich to avoid saying anything else, not that Melanie needed any help filling the silence.

“He’s so awesome.  And he’s like really smart too.  Not as smart as you, but pretty smart.  Him and Dr. Johnson talk a lot about mummies and stuff.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah, he’s totally into that whole Egypt thing.  Like Cleopatra and King Tut and all that.  He reads all these books when he’s at lunch.  You wouldn’t think he’d be that type to be all into books and everything since he’s so handsome.”

“No, you wouldn’t.”

“I mean, he doesn’t look like a nerd.  He looks like that guy in
Twilight
.  The werewolf, not the vampire.”

“Yeah, sure,”
Lois said, though she had no idea what Melanie was talking about.  The last movie she had seen was
The Mummy
, where she and Dr. Johnson had pointed out all the historical inaccuracies.  Afterwards she had imagined Dr. Johnson in the Brendan Fraser role, opening tombs and battling evil mummies.

“You think he’d go out with me?”

“Maybe.  I don’t really know him.”

“He’d probably blow me off because I’m not smart and cute.  Not like you.” 
Melanie smiled as if a light bulb had gone off over her head.  “You should totally ask him out.”

“You think so?”

“Definitely.  He’d probably like you since you’re all smart and everything.”

“Maybe, but I probably shouldn’t ask since we’re coworkers, you know?”

“Oh, right.”  Melanie looked down at her salad.  “There’s probably some kind of rule about that, like sexual harassment or whatever.”

“It was a good idea, though.” 
Lois reached out to pat Melanie’s arm.  “Maybe this weekend we could go out like you said.  Find some eligible bachelors.”

Her face brightened again.  “That would be awesome!  I’m sorry what I said about your hair earlier.  I just got so excited about the idea.”

“It’s fine.  Really.”  She looked at her watch.  “We should probably hurry and get back to work.”

“Oh sure.  Tony will probably want to go on his break.”

When they went upstairs, they found Tony ringing up an order for a fat man in a baseball cap.  After the customer had waddled off, Tony turned off his register.  “See you guys in a few minutes,” he said.  When Melanie wasn’t looking, he winked over his shoulder at her.

* * *

For the afternoon, Tony worked up front with Lois while Melanie mostly stayed back in the stock room.  That didn’t keep Melanie quiet; Lois heard snatches of off-key singing and humming coming from the back.  Lois shook her head, “She’s really perky, isn’t she?  I don’t know how you can stand it.”

“She’s a good worker.”

“Did you pick her up at a bar too?”