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  I heard a loud thud on Ann’s end, like a stapler being hurled against the wall. Then she cussed so loud I thought she was coming through the telephone. “Put him through!” she yelled.

  Twenty minutes later Pam, Wendy, and Ann were all still on the same calls. I had no interest in Pam’s and Wendy’s conversations, but I was itching with curiosity to know what Ann and the mean man with the accent were talking about. I gently lifted the line Ann was on, covering the mouthpiece with my hand. The telephone was hot against my skin as I listened.

  “. . . and how long have we been acquainted?” the man asked Ann. I was not good with accents. But when he mumbled something about a party in Montego Bay and then something about Kingston, I assumed he was Jamaican and that he was calling from the islands.

  “Don’t change the subject. You know you can trust me. I’ve never lied to you,” Ann insisted.

  “If you were here, I’d have you kiss me and kiss me hard,” the man told her. “When I am being fucked, I liked to be kissed.”

  Both of my eyebrows shot up and I shuddered. I held the telephone away from my face and fanned myself with a travel brochure. It wasn’t long before the conversation got even more personal.

  “Ann, what color are the knickers you have on now?” the man asked, breathing loud and hard.

  Ann took her time responding. “I’m not wearing any,” she cooed.

  My eyes got wide. I knew that in Britain they called panties knickers. Since Jamaica and England were so closely related, I figured it meant the same thing. I couldn’t see myself leaving my house with no panties on! I felt naked enough when I wore my thong panties. Even the hookers I knew always had something covering their private parts, except when they were doing their business. “Ow! Aaaah . . . I could sop up your juices with my tongue! Just wait until I get my hands on you again! Aiyeeee, woman! Aaaaan!” The man was out of control.

  “Is your dick in your hand?” Ann asked calmly. With all her prim and prissy behavior, she was just as straight-up nasty as me and Freddie, after all. Up until now, I could only picture Ann having sex by herself.

  Not only was I excited, I was amused.

  “Oh, yes! Oh, Ann . . . please be kind to me!” the man shrieked.

  “Then you know what I want you to do, and I want you to do it right now. Do you understand? Pretend it’s my mouth and not your hand on your dick.” There was a long pause. For about a minute all I could hear was loud breathing and loud moans coming from the man. Then he yelled some gibberish so loud Pam heard him through the telephone, all the way across the room! She ended her call and trotted over to my desk.

  “What the hell—who is that?” Pam asked, looking at the telephone with her eyes bugged out and her mouth hanging open. I was glad that my hand was still covering the receiver. All I needed was for Ann and her caller to hear Pam and me talking. “Is that your fiancé?” Pam wanted to know, a grin forming on her nosy face.

  “Uh-huh,” I said sharply, gently hanging up the telephone. I glanced over my shoulder to make sure that Wendy hadn’t snuck up on me, too.

  “You just hang up on him like that?” Pam waved her arm and nodded toward the telephone, her tongue sliding across her bottom lip. “He didn’t sound like he was ready to get off the telephone,” she said with a twinkle in her eye. “Shit, I was getting turned on,” Pam admitted, blinking hard and rubbing the side of her hip.

  I rolled my eyes. “You know how men are. He was feeling kind of horny. I’m on my period, so sometimes we get a little loose on the telephone.”

  “But I didn’t hear you say a thing to him. At least not in the last five minutes.” Pam gave me a suspicious look.

  “He’s the kind of man who likes to hear himself talk,” I explained.

  “Oh. Sounds like somebody I used to know.” Pam sighed and cocked her head to the side, a bored look now on her face. “Men like that are usually selfish in bed,” Pam suggested, returning to her desk. “It sure sounds like you’re doing a good job on him. Phone sex is the next best thing if it’s done right. I hope he keeps you satisfied,” she added, shaking her head and staring at me with eager anticipation. It was obvious that she wanted to hear more about my sex life, but I didn’t want her or Wendy to know any more about me than they already knew. With tongues as long as theirs, they’d have my business all over San Jose.

  “Oh, he takes real good care of me,” I said with a wink.

  Pam wasn’t the only one turned on. After hearing the man on the telephone reach such an intense climax, I had to stand up and compose myself. I was glad I did have on panties because I could feel myself getting moist between my legs. I practically ran to the ladies’ room.

  When I got there Ann was already leaning over a sink, wiping her face with a wet paper towel. I cleared my throat, unable to keep my eyes from staring at her butt. I didn’t know what to think of her standing there in her expensive outfit with no panties on! I had to press my lips together to keep from laughing.

  Ann turned around, looking me up and down like I was a tree. Then she left without even acknowledging my presence.

  CHAPTER 15

  Since the bank where Freddie worked was so close to Bon Voyage, we often had lunch together. We usually met at a halfway mark like Bobby’s Bowl, a fast food joint tucked away in an alley next door to a shoe shop. The food was greasy, but it was cheap and tasty. And it was unlikely that we would run into any of the snobs we worked with in such a tacky place.

  Our arrangement was that the one who made it to the restaurant first ordered for us both, which was easy because we always ordered the same thing every time. I had two cheeseburgers and two Cokes sitting in front of me on a small round table by the door when Freddie arrived.

  Like me, Freddie shopped at discount stores. Even though she shared an apartment with her man, she had three kids so she had to watch how she spent her money, too. She wore a plaid jacket over a black jumpsuit, which looked good on her because she was tall and slim enough to get away with a jumpsuit. Her shiny black braided hair, wrapped around her head like a basket, made her look younger than twenty-eight. Unfortunately, Freddie’s look had not improved over the years. But her real mystique was her high level of confidence, which had increased over the years. This woman had enough self-love and charm for five women.

  I didn’t reveal all of the details when I told Freddie about Ann’s telephone conversation with the man with the accent. Mainly because after the first few sentences, Freddie rolled her eyes and gave me a bored look. But she was appalled when I told her about Wendy spitting in Ann’s coffee.

  “You would have to tell me some shit like that while I’m eating,” she complained, dropping her fork onto her plate. “That’s nasty.” Chewing so hard her big ears wiggled, Freddie kicked my foot under the table.

  “Tell me about it. I don’t care for Ann, but I would never do something as low down and funky to her as what Wendy did. Even though I know she doesn’t like me.” I paused and let out a deep breath, wondering if there was anything I could do to improve my relationship with Ann Oliver. “I got this feeling that Ann’s trying to come up with a way to make them get rid of me. She’s already pushed me to the point where I came close to slapping her,” I mused. I was not a violent person. I would walk away in shame before I hit another person. Unless somebody forced me to defend myself.

  “The utility company is hiring,” Freddie quipped, her mouth full of burger meat. She’d never cared that much for bread. But that didn’t stop her from ordering burgers with all the trimmings. She just stripped them and ate everything but the bread. How she could still be so slim after having three kids and eating like a mule was beyond me. I loved to eat but I had to watch what I ate to remain a size eight.

  “And who would hire me when I tell them that I quit one job after only a month?” I stared at Freddie out of the corner of my eye, as she shrugged and snapped off another piece of her naked burger. “Besides, we both know that it’s the same all over. Compared to some people, my job is a
cakewalk.” I sniffed and finished my drink. More than half of my cheeseburger was still on my plate.

  “That’s for sure,” Freddie muttered, giving me a thoughtful look. “I know I work with some sick puppies, but the clowns you work with sound like they are a laugh a minute. I’d come apply for a job at that travel agency myself, if they got rid of Miss Thing.”

  Without asking, Freddie snatched the rest of my burger off my plate, wrapped it in a napkin, and stuffed it into her purse. She was the only person I knew who actually took a doggie bag home to a dog. Her man had a lazy, overweight, aging basset hound that would eat a rock if you put it in his bowl.

  “You mean Ann?”

  Freddie nodded and gave me a critical look. “I don’t know how you can put up with all of the shit you put up with when it comes to that heifer. Back in school, you didn’t even put up with that much mess from some of the kids from the projects.”

  “But I never physically fought anybody,” I reminded her.

  “You didn’t have to. You ran before it got to that,” Freddie said with an amused look on her face. “Or you tattled to the principal or somebody.”

  “Well, we are not in school anymore. And tattling is not an option. Our boss, Mr. Rydell, I think he’s afraid of Ann. Wendy told me the other day that she walked past Mr. Rydell’s office and heard Ann call him a motherfucker.”

  Freddie gasped. “Holy shit!”

  “Freddie, she is one of a kind. I have never met a woman, Black or White, like Ann Oliver. Every compliment she gives, if you want to call it that, she follows it up with a slight insult.” I laughed. “I hope I last long enough to see her fall off that high horse of hers.”

  “And you don’t want to leave that job now?”

  “No. I am going to stick around to see what happens next,” I insisted. The whole situation with Ann Oliver gave me an odd thrill and some curious energy. I had come to look upon it as a project that I could not put aside until I’d completed it.

  Before I’d left for lunch, Wendy informed me that during a ladies’ room stakeout, she’d overheard an interesting conversation between Ann and Lupe. Ann had told Lupe that some big shot from the Japanese consulate had just invited her and Dennis Klein to spend a couple of days in Tokyo. And, the plump, wussy Mr. Rydell was leaving tonight to take his wife to Vegas for a few days. Joy was so quiet and meek; she was never a problem on a supervisory level. Lupe wasn’t either, for that matter. She was always too busy trying to come up with ways to improve her looks. The fact that Pam, Wendy, and I often were the only ones in the office made the job that much more interesting.

  It was payday. I had not cashed my check, but it didn’t matter because Freddie was treating. I was in for a big surprise when it came time to pay the tab, which was just a little over ten dollars. Freddie’s credit card got declined for a ten dollar charge!

  “Girl, this is so embarrassing,” she squealed. “Can you handle this?”

  I pulled out my wallet, praying I had enough cash to cover the tab. I didn’t. Without thinking, I whipped out Ann’s credit card and handed it to the red-faced waiter.

  As soon as he disappeared, Freddie whispered. “What’s up with that? I thought you filed bankruptcy and that cancelled all your credit cards.”

  “That’s right,” I said with a pout. “That’s a corporate credit card,” I added, sounding smug on purpose.

  Freddie’s mouth dropped open as she stared at me. “Hold on, now. What are you doing with a corporate credit card? You have only been at that job for a minute. And, you are just a secretary.”

  I let out a disgusted breath. If one more person reminded me that I was just a secretary I was going to scream. “The company has cards in the reps’ names for us to use to buy office supplies and other shit.” I rolled my eyes at Freddie and added, “Even though I am just a secretary, I am authorized to use the company credit cards.” I let out a smug sigh and leaned back in my seat, enjoying Freddie’s stunned reaction.

  “To pay for your lunch, too?” she stammered with wide eyes and a rotating neck. “Girl, I am scared of you!”

  “Uh-huh,” I replied, nodding. I didn’t like the hard, suspicious way Freddie was looking at me. Her eyes didn’t move or blink. “Don’t look at me like that!” I hissed. “You make me nervous.”

  “Couldn’t you get in trouble using a company credit card for personal use? Whose name is on it?”

  “Ann’s.”

  “Shit. This is worse than I thought. What would she do if she knew you were charging your lunch, and mine, to her credit card, girl? That is fraud, you know.”

  “Only if they catch me,” I said.

  “And you’re not worried about that?”

  I shook my head and slid a stick of Carefree gum into my mouth, wishing that I had not requested extra onions on my burger. “Part of my job is to pay the credit card bills. Nobody except me will see the statements when they come in. All of the payments will be made online . . . by me.”

  “Don’t the folks at your job keep files and shit? What if somebody needs to dispute a credit card charge six or seven months later? What will you say if they see something on a statement that shouldn’t be there? Like this lunch.”

  “Didn’t I just tell you that I’ll be in charge of this credit card? I am the only one at the company who will be using it. It’s just for office supplies and shit. If those reps never use it to buy anything, why would they ever dispute a charge?”

  “What if they took a client out to lunch or something and wanted to charge it?”

  “They have other credit cards for that. I could see Ann, with her stuck-up self, using the same card to pay for lunch with one of the CEOs at one of the big companies they work with that I use to pay for the Wite-Out and glue sticks.” I had to pause and laugh because the thought was so far-fetched. “I swear to God, those people are from another planet. Flying from here to there, cruising all over every ocean in the world, they don’t have time for anything petty. Shit.”

  Freddie nodded. “I know what you mean. Some of the folks I work for are pretty far off the radar, too.”

  I leaned across the table and whispered. “Then why are you still looking so nervous?” I asked, looking around to make sure that nobody from my office had wandered in. As predictable as those people were, they still surprised me from time to time. Just the other day at lunchtime I’d spotted Mr. Rydell himself ahead of me in a line at one of those “roach coach” taco trucks parked on the side of a street.

  “Trudy, I just hope you know what you’re doing. I would hate to have to visit you in jail,” Freddie said with a worried look on her face. “You know how my father is. He still won’t speak to my man unless he has to, just because he’s got family members in jail. If you get arrested, our relationship would never be the same again.”

  I dismissed Freddie’s concerns with a wave of my hand. “I got everything under control,” I insisted, feeling so empowered I let out a deep sigh and stuck out my chest.

  Just then the waiter returned with the credit card. “Thank you, Miss Oliver,” he said, smiling as he stood there waiting for me to total the payment and sign the credit card receipt. He smiled even more because I added a twenty percent tip to the bill.

  “Is there anything else you want before we leave?” I asked Freddie with a grin.

  “No, thanks,” she mumbled, blinking at me like she was seeing me for the first time. As soon as the waiter left, Freddie looked at me and sighed. “I’ll have to remember to call you Ann Oliver when you use that thing.”

  “Who said I was going to use it again?” I asked with a sly grin, sliding the card and the receipt into my wallet.

  Freddie shrugged. “Well, after what you just told me, I would. And I can’t think of a better way for you to get back at Ann.” Those few words out of Freddie’s mouth made my mind light up like a burning bush.

  “You know,” I started, giving Freddie a thoughtful look, “I can’t either.”

  CHAPTER 16

&nb
sp; I had spent the rest of the afternoon after my lunch with Freddie thinking about what we had discussed. It had been so easy for me to use Ann’s credit card to pay for our lunch! Because of the way Ann had decided to treat me I felt she owed me more sops than a greasy hamburger.

  After the commute bus arrived at the bus stop where Freddie and I exited each day, Freddie and I had made a detour into Preston’s Bar. It was a dark little hole in the wall where people went when they wanted to do nothing but chat and have a few drinks. We crawled into a booth near the ladies’ room where we had three piña coladas each and some buffalo wings. Over the next three hours our discussion covered everything from our jobs to entertainment. The subject of the credit card didn’t come up until the waiter had dropped our bill on the table. I whipped out my wallet and fished out the credit card again.

  “You’re really getting off on that shit, huh?” Freddie asked with an amused look. “I was just bullshitting you about it at lunch today.”

  I tilted my head and propped my arm up on the table, waving the card in Freddie’s face. “I hope you have some cash on you in case . . . in case something happens,” I said, beckoning the waiter with one hand, waving the credit card and bill in the other. “I’m fucked if he asks to see some ID,” I mouthed.

  Freddie tapped her fingers on the top of the table until the waiter returned. I held my breath until he handed the card back to me and waited for me to sign the bill, and I did so with a flourish.

  “Mmph! I’ll say . . .” the waiter said with a sharp smirk. “You ladies have a nice evenin’ !” he snapped. He rolled his eyes at me as he marched off muttering. Freddie and I looked at one another and shrugged, puzzled by the waiter’s curious behavior.

  “Shit! I was so nervous I forgot to add in a tip,” I boomed, rising from the table, fumbling with my purse and jacket.

  “I got it,” Freddie said. She chased after the waiter and handed him a couple of bills. He grinned and invited us to come again.