Run Away Baby

Beth got a job at a catalog company call center. A fulltime, bill-paying, set-the-alarm-clock-for-six-a.m. job.

On one of her first days handling calls on her own, she was stalling. Doing whatever she could to keep from Going Live, as they called it. She had used a rubbing alcohol pad to clean the headset she shared. Then she had adjusted the headset to fit just right, spending several minutes on that step. Her spiel was written out on an index card in front of her, propped up on her keyboard, so she could read it into the phone. When there was nothing left to adjust or tweak, she hit the green button on her phone that said Ready.

After a few nerve-wracking seconds of silence, there was a little click indicating she had a caller.

She cleared her throat and launched into it: “Thank you for calling Sun and Sand, your source for quality clothing at a great value, with something for everyone in your family. This is Beth. How may I help you today?”

“Hi Beth,” said a familiar voice.

“Hi,” she said brightly.

“Shit, you sound like someone I used to know,” the caller continued. “I need to buy some adjustable waist pants. Can you help me out with that?”

What was happening still hadn’t registered. She was too busy reading the back of her index card to the caller. “I sure can! Could you please read me the ten-digit number on the back of your catalog so I can pull up your account?”

“I don’t have a fucking catalog. Can’t you look me up by my phone number? I call here every fucking week. Why does everyone there always make me jump through hoops?”

“Um, I’m sorry but we don’t have caller ID…” she began in the cheerful work voice that three weeks of training had taught her was the most important attribute she could bring to this job. And then she knew who it was. Before he even started spit-spelling his name. She pressed the Release button on her phone to end the call and the Away button to keep more calls from coming. She took off her headset and went into the restroom. She locked herself in a stall and bawled until her team leader came in and found her.

“Don’t get nervous,” the team leader told her. “You’re doing a great job. And don’t worry about dropped calls. The caller was probably on a cell phone and driving through some place with bad reception. You can have a few of those each month before they count against you.”

“That’s a relief,” said Beth. She went back to her desk and somehow carried on.

Months later, in a moment of weakness, Beth googled Randall Greer. Instead of a news story about some business award he’d won, or some golfing competition he’d been in, his obituary came up.

Maybe he faked his death too, she thought for a minute, afraid it was part of some plan to mislead her. He seemed too big and powerful to ever die. But that was crazy. He was a psycho, but he wasn’t desperate. Not like she had been.

The obituary was full of flowery language depicting him as a wonderful man. It mentioned her, and painted him as the savior of a young girl in need of rescuing. She couldn’t help wondering who wrote the obituary. Danna-Dee Lorbmeer was a likely bet. It had a woman’s touch.

In it she discovered that Randall had “never recovered from the tragic disappearance and untimely death of his beloved Abby.” However, his obituary noted, he was survived by his “special friend” Esmeralda Rios.

The irony of having once pitied for the housekeeper for having to drive a Honda Civic that was one year newer than the one she now drove made Beth a little sick to her stomach. Esmeralda was probably wearing her old bikini, sipping champagne while she floated on the inflatable rafts she used to have to patch on outside chore day.

Beth considered resurfacing with amnesia and collecting her due. She imagined herself showing up, shocking them all, and regaining the title she’d spent all those years earning. But in the end she decided to leave well enough alone.

There were mornings when she awoke and expected to be in her old bedroom, in her old life. When she opened her eyes and saw her own tiny home, free of Randall and fear, it was always a relief. She was still occasionally shocked that she had been able to do it. Despite the heaviness of trading in yachts and trips around the world for a little Midwestern house with wood paneling in the kitchen, this was undoubtedly a lighter, better life. A life for a woman who was almost thirty (despite that her driver’s license said twenty-five), after having been caught somewhere between being a girl and a rich old woman for her whole life.

She felt just about ready to start dating again. This wholesome little town gave her a brand new well of hope. She pictured meeting someone her age. Someone fun, who would run with her through the Wisconsin night, and sing and laugh. Maybe some guy who made his own furniture. They could get chickens like all the other cool people in town.

Going to concerts in the park, walking to the farmers’ market on a Saturday, doing a crossword puzzle at a coffee shop; those were the type of things Beth Walters enjoyed. She had simple tastes but great expectations: She wanted to have a family, and a little dog, and all the things that made life happy and rich.

But first, it was back to the call center. Because there were people out there who needed someone to help them shop, and to Beth Walters’ own surprise, she was incredibly good at it. In fact, she had just won the customer service provider of the month award and her own semi-enclosed cubicle. In her cubicle, alongside charts of the season’s new clothing colors and a list of polite ways to upsell products, were two photographs: One of her hydrangeas in bloom, the other of the stubby tailed squirrel that had taken up residence in her birdfeeder. She called him Fred, for the simple reason that she’d never met anyone named Fred in her life.

Beth didn’t bother with photos of herself; in fact, none existed. She was fine with that. She really wasn’t one to brag, despite that she was turning out to be kind of a success.

Seriously, you wouldn’t even recognize her.

Free sample:

Chapter 1 of Surviving Valencia © 2012 All rights reserved.

Part One ~ Chapter 1

I woke up this morning and thought that winter had returned. Yesterday was nearly sixty degrees. Still, anything can happen in March. When I pulled back the curtains I saw that it wasn’t snow, but a low, blizzard-white hovering of fog, weighty as souls, settling on the city. Adrian was still fast asleep beside me. “I thought it was sno

w,” I whispered. He didn’t move.

We were in his sister Alexa’s guestroom, clean blonde Scandinavian furniture with pale blue everything else. We switch houses with her for a few weeks whenever she and Adrian get restless, which is at least a few times each year and for longer stays each time. At this point we leave our shampoo and soap in the bathroom here since we know its next visitors will probably be us. I hate to sleep in when we’re in Madison. It feels like I am wasting precious time.