Timeless Thoughts

As much as I wanted to punch my boss in the face for being such a racist pig, I knew she was petty enough to pay people to teepee my mother's house.

The euphoria was overflowing when I got to call her out and tell her the most famous words, I quit, straight to her glaring face as she sat with her legs crossed rolling her eyes at every word.

The country club I worked at in northern Chicago, was filled with pretentious old people demanding to be waited on hand and foot, with attitudes the size of Willis Tower. Their beloved sport was seeing who could make the waiter pace to the kitchen more and lose the soles of their shoes.

I was basically living out of High School Musical 2, with all the members being Sharpay and the co-workers being treated like poo on their shoes.

And they did it to a T.

The only exception was, of course, Casey (my stupid manager). She played Sharpay 2.0 with the ability to throw the word fired out like a flame thrower--the exact opposite of the manager from that movie.

She strung around racist comments to everyone who was of color and didn't think twice about degrading their pay if they didn't ‘act white’.

The fact she still has her job is overwhelmingly concerning and speaks volumes about the club.

One of my co-workers, Camilla, dealt with getting bad hours, low pay, and getting called names just because of the way she looked practically the whole summer.

Casey had gone on and on about keeping to ourselves and not showcasing any emotion to the members. Low and behold, Cam was caught talking to one of the decent members about a couple of the Mexican traditions she has, and from that day on it was like she was excommunicated from her nice list.

The list was dwindling by the second.

Cam was way too passive for her own good and I forced myself to keep out of their business, but the little pig said something that was not tolerable, and I snapped.

My body tensed as I pushed harder on the gas, passing up the mini-strip of grocery and food stores.

This was my last trip back to the off-campus apartment that I share with two other girls. And now, officially, I am out of my mother's house in Chicago.

The block has a couple of other apartment buildings that were similar with muddy red bricks and huge front windows. The street I pulled on is littered with a couple of cars hidden under enormous trees.

The weather in Evanston was pretty chill for being in the midwest. We got a taste of all four seasons--that honestly hosted the best fall weather (my favorite). As of now, late August was armpit sweat seepage weather during the day and got brisky at night, which set up spectacular late walks and trips to the beach.

The small porch leading up to the door was accompanied by a small hydrangea in an indigo-splatted pot.

As soon as I walked in I could smell a mixture of cigarettes and grass, which totally fit the bill of why the lobby was filled to the brim with various types of plants.

I took the elevator up to the third floor and when I unlocked the door I got the aroma of Sage’s sage.

“It's about spanking time when you come home. I was forced to sit through Sage’s conspiracy theory rant alone.” Addy said while throwing her hands on her hips.

I hung my tote bag on the thrift store bargain coat rack I found and slipped off my white tennis shoes to put on a similar shoe rack.

“More traffic than expected,” I said as I plopped down on the foggy grey loveseat.

She hummed in response, then lingered over to one of the stools at the island. “So,” a devil smirk takes over her face. “Did you push her into the pool?” she said.

The ends of my mouth curved up and I rolled my eyes. “She stormed her way into the office before I could even think about it.”

Truthfully, I was too much of a baby to actually do it, so it was a little easier to resist the temptation. The only thing that would be on my mind was the thought of her reporting me for being inappropriate. I wouldn't put anything past her.

The peachy stool scraped loudly against the dark wooden floor as she leaned her body against the island and slapped one of her palms against the marble counter. Letting out a huff she said, “Dammit. That was the only thing I was counting on to be the highlight of my day.”

Before I could even comment, the door opens to reveal Sage with four fabric bags filled with groceries.

I pounced from my decently comfortable spot and swooped two bags with my hands and sat them on the counter.

“How was the drive back? Oh! I got your favorite conchas.” Sage sweetly said, dangling my favorite Mexican sweet bread in the air.

The wind whooshed past me as I side-stepped a box of recycled cans and drove my hand into the plastic bag containing my delicious treat.

My dad and I always used to wake up early and head to the Mexican bakery to get conchas and other pastries, and by far it was the highlight of my weeks. The owners were the friendliest people I knew and I always got to practice my mediocre Spanish.

My hands moved to protectively hold my treat as I said, “Pretty heavy traffic. Thank you so much, Sagey.” I made a heart shape with both my hands, tucking the bag in the crook of my arm.

“Don’t mention it. I got you your cookie dough too, Addy.”

Addy climbs up the stool by putting both her feet on it and crouching on it. “Ou, toss it over.” She clapped her hands eagerly while her auburn curls bounced over her shoulder.

A chuckle slipped through my lips and I glanced over at Sage.

“I think she's already had too much sugar.”

“Agreed,” Sage said as she put the cookie dough in the fridge with a couple of other things.

I set the bread on the island as I started to help her. A huff from Addy formed as she climbed off the stool and walked around to start helping as well.

The next ten minutes we unloaded groceries and chit-chatted about how our weeks were.

I spent the whole week up till Friday back in Chicago, while both the girls have been staying here for at least two weeks. Since they both go back to their out-of-state hometowns for summer, they wanted to come back earlier to get used to living in this apartment before the fall semester started in September.

Which was all coming too soon, especially since I’m going to be drowning up to my elbows in work at The Koss, our school newspaper. I needed to show our editor-in-chief that I was able to take over her spot after she graduated.

I just really wanted to dig my own grave.