Accidental Encounter

Accidental Encounter

“ Jan, I heard you got a new job!” Kathie exclaimed. The warmth in her voice was as real as yesterday’s coffee.

Trapped! Right here in the rest room, and neither of us wants it. Kathy fakes it well though, Jan thought. She always fakes things well.

“What is it exactly that you heard?” Jan asked.

“That you got a job working on-line as an editor somewhere, some writing forum or something.” Kathie was still doing her best to sound enthusiastic; but in the face of Jan’s cool reply, it was failing.

“Where did you hear that ?”

“Maranda said you were waiting for a call-back on a job and couldn’t talk.”

That explained it.

Last week she had been elated. This job had fallen out of the blue, and she knew it was perfect. She could learn to do everything she needed in a few days. She could work on her own time schedule, from her own cozy chair, doing something she was good at. How much better could it get?

She had been skeptical at first, because it happened so quickly. The employer was in such a hurry to leave on vacation that she’d left out some details, like how much Jan would get paid. There had been little red flags, she had to admit that. Right away she was rewriting sentences that supposedly good writers had written, correcting their spelling, making their verb tenses agree. She had worked really hard that first week, more hours than she had intended, but it was fun.

“So, did you get the job, or didn’t you?” Kathie demanded.

“I got it all right,” Jan said. “But don’t be too happy yet. You’ll still have to keep paying my unemployment. This website only pays with Gift Points.”

Word Count: 298