4th & Girl

“This is where you’ll be doing most of your work,” she said, pointing toward the table that, after closer inspection, I realized was littered with packages and bubble wrap. “I hope you’re a fast learner because I’m behind on about three hundred orders, and there’s more coming through every day.”

Three hundred orders? Jesus Christ.

“What is it you sell, exactly?”

“Alma’s Secrets specializes in pleasure. Toys, lingerie, you name it, and we’ve got it.”

“Toys?” I asked around a choked swallow. “As in sex toys?”

“You got it,” she said matter-of-factly. Like it was the most normal thing in the world for a lady of her age to be selling sex goodies online. “I have a main site of my own, but I also sell through Etsy and eBay.”

Alma chatted on about sex toys as she rifled through a big cardboard box and started pulling out some of her inventory while I stood silent. Overwhelmed.

Dildos.

Vibrators.

Lacy lingerie.

Bottles of numbing lube.

She was literally in the business of pleasure.

She’d run through at least six products and her likes and dislikes about each by the time she noticed I’d clammed up like a mobster in an interrogation room.

“Oh God, don’t tell me you’re like that last chickadee Mable sent over,” she muttered and set a package with the words “The Motherfluffer” written across it onto the dining room table. It took everything I had to form words, and I hadn’t understood the question.

“I’m sorry…what did you say?”

Luckily, or very unluckily, depending on how you looked at it, she repeated the question in her blunt version of layman’s terms.

“Are you a virgin?”

“Excuse me?” My eyes widened, and my pulse sped up at her audaciousness. “Are you really asking me if I’m a virgin?”

“Well, I kind of have to after the last incident that got me blackballed from Mable’s list,” she said without any ounce of shame written on her face. “It wasn’t my fault she sent the twenty-year-old version of the Virgin Mary to my house to do inventory. How the hell was I supposed to know a simple vibrator would have her praying to Jesus?”

“I’m not a virgin, even though that’s definitely not any of your business. But, uh, how long have you been in the…pleasure business?”

“Let’s see,” she mused, taking a minute to think back through her memories. “I started this up about a year after my Donnie passed away. Actually, it was me and my best friend Rosie’s little company, but then she died about a year ago, and now it’s just me running the show.”

Instantly, my heart clenched in discomfort for her.

“I’m really sorry for your losses.”

She waved a hand in the air. “Don’t fret on it, honey. When you get to my age, everyone around you starts croaking. I’m just glad it wasn’t me.”

I wasn’t sure whether to laugh at her sarcasm or cry over the loss of her loved ones.

All I could do was nod. One hour with Alma had proved to be one hell of a ride, and for the first time in my life, I actually understood the saying “full of piss and vinegar.”

We both stood there for an awkward moment staring down at the dining room table filled with plastic debauchery, waiting for me to make a decision. She could tell I wasn’t sold, but she’d done all she planned in the way of convincing. I had to come to the conclusion on my own.

“So…are you staying or going?” she eventually asked as I met her eyes again.

“Well…” I paused for a brief moment as I tried to wrap my brain around what had to be one of the weirdest situations I’d ever found myself in.

Between the fact that she’d been blackballed from the temp agency I worked for, had tricked my boss with a fake store address, and sold a plethora of sex toys online, I wasn’t sure what to do.

Hell, I’d pay a lot of money to meet someone who would know what to do.

“I’ll be honest, Alma, I’m not quite sure—”

“How much did Mable say I’d pay you?” she asked suddenly, determination shaping her thinning brow.

“Thirty bucks an hour.” At the reminder of that, my resolve for my morals got a little bit thinner. But she spoke before I got the chance to.

“How about this… I’ll have Marty call Mable and tell her she has to pull the job opportunity because of financial reasons, and then you can come work for me and I’ll pay you thirty-five bucks an hour under the table?”

Well, shit. How in the hell was I supposed to say no to that?

Not only was it a five-dollar hourly increase, but she was pretty much giving me the option not to claim it on my taxes.

IRS, if you’re reading this, obviously, I’m just kidding.

I claim everything on my taxes.

Please don’t audit me.

“Okay.” I held out my hand to shake hers. “You’ve got a deal, Alma.”