The perfect job did not exist.
All you could hope for was that the level of imperfection was something you could tolerate.
The coffee was prepared by someone else before she got there. How was it possible that it tasted like convenience store coffee that had been sitting in the pot for several hours, bitter and stale and barely drinkable? Maybe Reynolds came in at 3 in the morning and fixed it, and by 8 AM, it had acquired its full crusty glory.
She tried to mask its flavor by putting in two packets of dry creamer and an unhealthy swath of processed sugar. Yes, she realized that so much sugar was not good for her, but it was either that or Sweet 'n' Low, which was the rough equivalent of adding battery acid to and already bitter cup of coffee. She kept meaning to bring in Stevia and liquid creamer, but that was a difficult thing to grasp with her slow-moving morning mind. She saved what limited organizational ability she had for the job. There was nothing left over for anything else. She felt privileged just to be able to remember the way home at the end of the day.
There was a small refrigerator, but it did not make ice. That was a major work shortcoming. Ice is civilization, to quote the author Paul Theroux. It was just another of those imperfections she would have to tolerate.
"Good morning, Dabs!" cheerfully greeted her workmate Sarah. They shared a cubicle in the central office. Sarah was tolerable, but way too bright and chipper in the morning. Most of the time, she liked to talk about her pets or kids or husband, but sometimes Sarah would stray into politics. Dabs had long ago learned an important lesson of office life - it was A-Otay to talk about religion and politics at the workplace, as long as it was THEIR religion and politics. If you dissent, why then you are violating the decorum of not discussing politics or religion. Agreement within thee Christian Reich framework was all that was allowed. Thy Kingdom come, everyone else shut up or suffer the consequences.
Dabs smiled fleetingly at Sarah and then took her seat, firing up the computer monitor in front of her. Sarah had adornments all around her part of the cubicle, bible quotes, and pictures of her pets and family. Dabs only had a photo of her son, his high school graduation picture. She loved her son immensely and reminded herself that it was for him and her daughter, who was just starting high school (Bennett Christian Academy, which was the best she could pick from now that public schools were no more). Her son had been drafted and was currently fighting in the Mexican Wars, and she worried about him every day. She used to pray, but she was no longer sure who to even pray to.
They did not know that she didn't pray. There were plenty of public prayers, and she dutifully participated in all of them. Best not to stand out in that regard. Her husband found that out the hard way. As of today, he had been in the Christian Reeducation camp near Tifton for two full years, with her having no idea when or if he would ever be back.
The firm started each day with a group prayer, usually led by Reynolds, one of the two partners who ran the place and siphoned off virtually all the income. But without any workplace regulation, without any wage standards, it was easy for the partners to do. She could not complain. She was paid what she was paid. And she would be fired if she told anyone what that was.
The pay was, of course, substantially inadequate for the needs of her family. Her husband earned nothing while in the camps. She had to sell her home with negative equity and move with her daughter into a one-bedroom apartment. Her son sent her part of his military pay, and her daughter was working while trying to attend school - she was doing her best, but her grades were suffering. Dabs wasn't sure of the consequences of those lower grades - there were few opportunities for women in the Kingdom, mostly low rung office and retail jobs. The only really lucrative positions were to be the wife of a televangelist and/or politician.
Reynolds was there now, ready to start the daily prayer. Before he began, he admonished everyone to work harder, and that, if not, they were considering on farming a lot of the work out to India, who had accountants and bookkeepers willing to work for less and be more productive at it. Dabs thought it peculiar that people who had come to power in part by ginning up fear about immigrants taking your job and your country, were so willing to throw real working people in their own country under the bus.
No, the job wasn't perfect. Not by a long shot. But it was better than concentration camps or serving in pointless wars, or living in the streets.
Still. It would be nice to at least have some ice.
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