Terrible Advice From a Career Temp- Chapter Three: Network, If You Must

It was early morning by the time Piper slipped into the cramped apartment.

She had taken an Uber from the bus stop, an extravagance she normally would have agonized over for at least twenty minutes. Tonight, she was too tired to care. She wanted a shower, a bed, and several uninterrupted hours in which nobody expected her to make a decision.

Dena met her at the door and immediately pulled her into a hug.

“How was your trip?”

“Great.”

Piper handed over the decoratively wrapped baby basket she and Hawk had picked out for

Sofie.

“But I’m sorry I missed the baby shower.”

Dena looked at her.

“Oh, there was no baby shower.”

Piper stopped halfway to the couch.

“What do you mean?”

“Whitney said it was a baby shower.” Dena set the basket on the kitchen counter. “What she actually threw was a Grandma Shower.”

Piper slowly lowered herself onto the couch.

“A what?”

“A Grandma Shower.”

Piper waited for further explanation.

None came.

“For herself?”

“Yep.”

“While Sofie is pregnant?”

“Yep.”

“With Sofie’s baby?”

“Yep.”

Piper stared at her mother.

“That might be the most Whitney thing Whitney has ever done.”

Dena sat beside her.

“She decorated for herself. She had a banner. She invited her friends. Apparently, the whole thing was about celebrating her becoming a grandmother.”

Piper winced.

“That bad?”

“Benny saw the banner when he drove up and turned the car right around.”

That surprised her.

“Benny?”

“Benny.”

Piper had underestimated him.

“We’re having a real baby shower this Saturday at Olive Garden,” Dena continued.

“Whitney isn’t invited. Benny’s orders.”

Piper couldn't understand how someone as thoughtful as Benny was related to someone as exhausting as Whitney.

Genetics, apparently, occasionally gave up.

Piper wanted to tell Dena about San Diego, Hawk, the restaurants, everything she'd seen, and how strange it felt to have gone somewhere entirely on her own terms.

Instead, she fell asleep on the couch before she even made it to her bedroom.

In the days that followed, Piper threw herself into helping Sofie organize the replacement baby shower.

During the planning, Sofie mentioned how much she missed her old friends since switching to online classes.

That made Piper realize something.

She hadn't spoken much to her own friends either.

Not Jackie. Not Gail. Not most of the people she'd spent years seeing practically every day.

There hadn't been a fight.

Nobody had dramatically declared the friendship over.

High school had simply ended.

Life had gotten busy in a quiet, almost sneaky way.

Even Piper's messages with Hawk had become sporadic.

She missed him.

But he was working. She was looking for work. Sometimes one of them replied six hours later. Sometimes the other didn't answer until the following morning. Eventually, conversations that once would have occupied an entire evening became:

How's everything?

Good. You?

Good. Busy.

Same.

Adulthood, Piper was beginning to suspect, was largely people telling each other they were busy.

So she focused on what was directly in front of her.

Her family.

Finding a job.

Getting out of Palm Breeze Court.

Dena and Benny took every shift they could get because they were trying to save enough to move into a larger apartment one of Dena's coworkers had offered them.

It wasn't glamorous.

It was an over-the-garage unit with two bedrooms and one bathroom.

To Piper, it sounded like a mansion.

Two bedrooms meant nobody would have to cross somebody else's sleeping area just to reach the bathroom.

It had a full-size washer and dryer inside the unit.

Piper hadn't experienced such luxury since her parents were married.

Even better, it was in a nicer part of town.

No creepy old men staring at the girls around the pool.

No mysterious substances decorating the communal laundry machines.

No neighbors screaming at each other through paper-thin walls at two in the morning.

No semitrucks rattling the building from the highway.

It wasn't wealth.

It wasn't even middle class.

But it was better.

For the first time in a long time, better seemed achievable.

Piper was determined to believe in it.

The morning of Sofie's real baby shower dawned bright and clear.

Piper had expected Sofie to remain furious about Whitney's hijacked event.

Instead, Sofie shrugged.

“I knew something wasn't right.”

“How?”

“She insisted on planning everything, but she never asked for my friends' numbers.”

“That probably should've been a clue.”

“And she never asked me what I wanted.”

“Bigger clue.”

“The registry was private.”

Piper stared at her.

“Sofie.”

“I know.”

“That wasn't a red flag. That was a Soviet parade.”

Sofie laughed.

Piper sat beside her.

“Are you mad I wasn't there?”

“If you had been there, Whitney would've dragged you into it. You would've told her off.

Then everybody would've started fighting, and instead of something we could just walk

away from, it would've become a whole thing.”

Piper considered this.

“You're probably right.”

“I know I'm right.”

“I absolutely would've told her off.”

“Exactly.”

Apparently Dena had reached the same conclusion. She hadn't even taken the afternoon off work for Whitney's spectacle.

That might have been the healthiest response of all.

Dena had reserved a small private space at Olive Garden as soon as she'd heard what

happened.

The real shower couldn't have felt more different.

It was warm and cheerful, with people Sofie actually knew, gifts that were actually for the baby, and a cake that did not contain the word Grandma.

Piper caught up with some of Sofie's old school friends over salad and breadsticks.

After the presents were opened and the cake cut, Piper found herself talking to Chevy, one of Sofie's former Girl Scout troopmates.

“So what's it like being out of high school?” Chevy asked.

Piper considered lying.

Instead, she shrugged.

“Harder than I thought. I can't even get a full week of work. I'll take minimum wage.

Anything.”

“My cousin Ansel runs a poker-event business.”

Piper blinked.

“A what?”

“He does charity events and private parties. They hire girls to serve and deal cards. The hours are random, but the pay is good.”

That had Piper's attention.

“I can't work for him yet because I'm not eighteen,” Chevy continued. “They serve alcohol at some of the parties. But you could message him.”

“Does he actually hire people?”

“Yes.”

“Like people with no experience?”

“I think so.”

“People whose résumé is basically frozen yogurt and babysitting?”

Chevy laughed.

“I'll tell him you're good.”

Piper sat straighter.

“Tell him I'm excellent.”

“At what?”

“Whatever he's hiring for.”

Chevy pulled out her phone.

“His X handle is BlackJackEventsCV. I'll send it to you.”

Piper looked at the message when it arrived.

For the first time in weeks, a job opportunity had found her.

She wasn't going to question the method.

That evening, after the decorations had been packed away and everyone was home, Piper messaged Ansel.

Chevy had apparently given her the sort of recommendation normally reserved for decorated military officers and beloved kindergarten teachers.

To Piper's astonishment, Ansel hired her almost immediately.

She stared at the message.

That was it?

No résumé uploaded into a website.

No personality assessment.

No forty-five-minute application asking her to list three professional references for a minimum-wage job.

No automated email thanking her for her interest before never contacting her again.

She had a job.

Well.

Sort of.

The pay was twenty-five dollars an hour plus tips.

Piper read that number twice.

Then a third time.

Twenty-five dollars an hour.

Ansel quickly tempered her excitement. Most of the work clustered around holidays, and he could only promise three or four events a month.

She would still need a regular job.

Piper didn't care.

Three or four nights a month at twenty-five dollars an hour was considerably better than zero nights a month at zero dollars an hour.

The uniform was straightforward: a fitted black collared dress, low black heels, dark lipstick, modest nails. Hair down.

Her Saturday shifts would generally run from seven at night until two in the morning through

New Year's.

There was only one problem.

Transportation.

Piper did not own a car capable of reliably transporting her across town.

Ansel added her to a group chat with the seven other regular workers. They frequently carpooled to save money on parking.

Ramon, the caterer, offered Piper a ride.

There was one condition.

She had to help him with the dishes after the event.

Piper hated dishes.

She hated other people's dishes even more.

She stared at his message.

Then she looked at the twenty-five-dollar hourly rate again.

Piper discovered that she could, in fact, love dishes.

She accepted.

Now she just needed to learn how to deal cards without looking like someone who had learned yesterday.

Benny volunteered to help.

Several of his construction friends joined in.

For the next few nights, the kitchen table became a low-budget casino.

Piper discovered she was surprisingly good at it.

She liked the rhythm of dealing. She liked keeping track of the cards. She liked controlling the table.

Most importantly, she liked taking Benny's friends' fake money.

“You're enjoying this too much,” Benny told her after losing another hand.

“I think I found my calling.”

“You're dealing pretend blackjack at a kitchen table.”

“Every career starts somewhere.”

When Hawk finally caught up on his messages, Piper sent him a picture of herself in the uniform.

His response came a few minutes later.

You look hot.

Piper stared at the message longer than necessary.

Then she put her phone face down.

Then she picked it up and read it again.

She decided this was perfectly normal behavior.

Her first event began with Piper crammed into the back of Ramon's catering van, using both

hands to keep a cake from sliding every time he hit the brakes.

So far, professional life was everything she'd imagined.

Wedged around her were John, Al, Trish and Daisy.

Within fifteen minutes, Piper had learned enough about her new coworkers to realize school had poorly prepared her for the variety of people she would someday share a workplace with.

John was twenty-two and recently out of jail for throwing a brick through a rival's driver's-side window.

Piper wasn't sure what kind of rivalry required masonry.

She decided not to ask.

Despite this introduction, John was quiet and friendly and smiled at practically every joke anyone made.

Trish was Piper's supervisor.

She was in her mid-thirties but looked considerably older after years of tanning beds, cigarettes, over-bleached hair and drinking.

Her favorite phrase appeared to be:

“Are you sure about that?”

Piper heard it six times before they reached the freeway.

Al was charming and easygoing. He was one of Ansel's friends but technically worked for Ramon.

Then there was Daisy.

Daisy was new too.

She was painfully thin and had watery eyes that made her look as though she might burst into tears at any moment.

Piper kept waiting for it to happen.

It didn't.

As far as Piper understood, Daisy had been homeschooled.

Piper wasn't sure what to talk about with her, so she settled for being nice.

It seemed to work.

When they finally arrived and the van doors opened, everyone spilled into the parking lot with boxes, bags, food trays and equipment.

Piper climbed out last.

She looked back at the van.

“That felt like a clown car.”

Al nodded.

“You get used to it.”

Piper sincerely hoped not.

The rest of the crew met them inside.

Most were temporary hires for the evening.

Piper immediately disliked two of them.

Petie and Sawyer had arrived together in Petie's Honda and behaved as if this gave them seniority over the building.

Sawyer was worse.

He hovered around Piper, correcting tiny things she did while somehow accomplishing very little himself.

“Those chips should go over there.”

Piper moved them.

“No, actually, probably here.”

Piper moved them again.

“Wait. Trish might want them over there.”

Piper stopped.

“Why don't we ask Trish?”

Sawyer seemed disappointed by this unreasonable proposal.

Malika was easier to like.

She was a college student who had only been hired for setup.

She announced, loudly and repeatedly, that she would be leaving after the second break cycle because she was working her way through med school.

Each time she said it, she added a theatrical wink.

Piper suspected Malika was performing for the room.

She also suspected Malika would be back the next time Ansel offered her a shift.

Money had a way of adjusting people's schedules.

The event was a retirement party for a group of old harbor workers and their wives.

Piper relaxed when she saw the crowd.

Most of them were gray-haired, weathered, and already in good spirits.

Nobody looked particularly interested in judging the new dealer.

They just wanted to play.

Piper was one of three card dealers and the only woman dealing cards. Daisy ran craps.

Petie took roulette.

The first few hands made Piper nervous.

Then something clicked.

Benny's kitchen-table training had worked.

Her hands remembered what to do even when her brain was busy panicking.

Deal.

Collect.

Pay.

Smile.

Move on.

Before long, she stopped thinking about every motion.

She was working.

Actually working.

And she was good at it.

The guests started gathering around her table.

One of the retirees slapped down his cards.

“This girl's the one to beat!”

Piper grinned.

“That's because you're making it easy for me.”

His friends howled.

Someone dropped money into her tip cup.

Then somebody else did.

By the end of the night, the cup was nearly full.

Piper stared at it whenever nobody was looking.

For the first time in months, money was coming toward her.

It was an extraordinary sensation.

Then came cleanup.

Of course there was cleanup.

There was always cleanup.

Piper helped Ramon with the dishes as promised.

Her feet hurt.

Her back hurt.

Her lipstick had largely surrendered around midnight.

She was exhausted.

She was also calculating her earnings in her head and deciding she had never felt better.

Then Petie and Sawyer approached.

“We're splitting tips,” Sawyer said.

Piper looked at him.

“What?”

“The tips. Everybody splits.”

Petie nodded.

Piper instinctively put a hand over her tip cup.

Nobody had told her anything about splitting tips.

More importantly, Sawyer had spent most of the night wandering around criticizing other people's work while Piper's table had been packed.

“No,” Al said from behind them.

Piper had never been happier to hear someone's voice.

Sawyer turned.

“We're just figuring out the tips.”

“They were already figured out,” Al said. “Individual tips belong to whoever earned them.

We're not pooling.”

Petie's expression soured.

“We were just asking.”

“No, you weren't.”

They left.

Piper finally exhaled.

“Thanks.”

Al watched them go.

“Don't worry about those two.”

“They're rough.”

“They think they're sharks.”

He shook his head.

“They're pool-hall washouts. Ansel only hired them because the crowd was supposed to be bigger tonight. He already said they won't be back.”

Piper's shoulders relaxed.

“Good.”

She looked toward Malika.

“Do you have any friends from school who need work?”

Malika laughed.

“Why?”

“So Ansel never gets desperate enough to hire those two again.”

“I'll see what I can do.”

Piper suspected that meant yes.

When Piper finally made it home, she emptied her tips onto the bed.

Then she counted them.

Then she counted them again.

Not because she thought she'd made a mistake.

Because counting money was significantly more enjoyable when you actually had some.

Her phone buzzed.

Hawk.

How'd your first night go?

Piper smiled.

You should be jealous. I got two phone numbers and a marriage proposal.

His response came quickly.

Don't go breaking my heart. I thought you were my girl.

Piper felt herself blush.

She typed:

Don't worry. Men over seventy aren't my type lol

She attached a picture from earlier in the evening. Several weathered old harbor workers crowded around her poker table, grinning at the camera while Piper stood triumphantly behind her cards.

Hawk sent back a laughing emoji.

Piper hesitated before typing again.

What are you up to?

His answer took longer.

He was in San Diego.

Then came the part she hadn't expected.

He'd probably be working out of North Carolina for the foreseeable future.

Piper read the message twice.

She felt disappointed.

More disappointed than she wanted to admit.

For a few seconds, she imagined what she might say to keep something going between them.

Then she stopped herself.

She had spent two years arranging her future around Lindo.

She wasn't doing that again.

Not for Hawk.

Not for anybody.

Then you better hang out with me if you're ever back this way.

Definitely, he replied.

Piper smiled.

Maybe they would.

Maybe they wouldn't.

She didn't know.

Strangely, not knowing no longer felt like a disaster.

She set her phone aside and looked at the pile of tips spread across her bed.

Hawk was going to North Carolina.

Her friends were starting their own lives.

Her family was preparing to move.

And Piper still didn't have the slightest idea what she wanted to do for a living.

But tonight she'd learned something useful.

She could walk into a room full of strangers, learn the job, handle herself, deal with difficult coworkers, make people laugh, and come home with more money than she'd left with.

It wasn't a career.

It wasn't a five-year plan.

It was one Saturday night.

For now, one Saturday night was enough.

Piper gathered the bills into a neat stack and counted them one more time.

Tomorrow she'd start looking for a day job.