poemtry and prose

The raccoon darted out in front of Kaylee's car just as she rounded the corner of Southwest Stark. Its sleek gray body slipped out from a bush on the her side of the road. But, all she saw were the wide, black rings crawling up the tail as it rushed out to greet her car.

She closed her eyes and prayed to whatever gods listening out there that it got safely to the other side, "Oh gawd, oh gawd, oh please let it not get hurt tonight." It was her mantra, she always said those words when she saw an animal, be it a squirrel or a dog or a cat rush out from the bramble along the road and hit the pavement. She was already late to work, the late night shift and really did not want to afford to be late again.

Her right hand shifted the gears down a bit. Partially attempting to calm her rapid heart beat and also to slow down in case more beasties were out and wandering about. The sun was dipping down beneath the mountains, painting a trail of vibrant and pale pinks and purples and oranges across the canvas sky. She loved dusk, it always conjured images of secret meetings and warm dinner events gathered around a roaring fireplace. And home. But she always thought about other, more exotic places than home first.

kaylee shoved the thoughts about her past deep back into the recesses of her mind. "I really do not wanna go there again tonight. Not now," she said out loud while turning on the stereo system. The dial was set to National Public Radio and they were playing their nightly mix of worldly songs. Hauntingly beautiful notes waied through the air and danced behind the brown car as it strolled down the street.

Fifteen minutes later, kaylee put her car into the parked position and grabbed her Tom Bihn sligbag and threw it over her shoulder. She pushed the alarm button on her keyfob and did not look over her shoulder as the car made the metallic beep sound warning others that it was now armed and potentially noisy.

She inhaled a lungfull of deep, cool, city air and put on her game face. She dropped her keys into the right pocket of her black leather jacket, dropping them into the hole with an unceremonious thunk, swapping them with the corporate owned identification badge. She ran her fingers over the cold, slick plastic and wondered who in their right mind would acutally return the badge if lost. She thought it was a waste of space to include the name of the corporation as well as the address on the backside of a badge that only got seen once a day before beings stuck deep, down in the back of her pocket where she could hide the horrid picture the camera captured of her.

kaylee dispised cameras. She always felt that no matter how good they were or what was caught on film, or in this day and age the small memory chips, they never captured her true self. She flipped the badge over and realized just what a mess her hair had gotten over the years. Long black hair hung to her chest, flecks of red shimmering in the light of the camera's flash. It was always straight, a curse she had always felt. The curse of being indian. Her face and eyes seemed hollow and uncaring and as black as her hair. The camera always seemed to age herself by a good five or ten years more, yet making her look a lot younger than she actualy was. While in reality she was going on thirty and very much alive and vigorous. She ran her left hand through her hair and tucked a portion of it behind her ear. A single silver hoop danged around her ear and caught the tip of her sleeve just gently enough not to stick.

She rushed past row after row of parked cars in the long and narrow parking lots of the corporation, hoping to make up some lost time from the drive. She had a few minutes before her shift began, before her boss would leave her with the night crew and head home to his family.

"Here is hoping that I do not have to deal with that many calls," she thought to herself, while sliding the key down the metallic grey card reader. A dull green light appeared on the display and the door gave a friendly unclicking sound. Swiftly, she yanked the door open and made her way past the various cube farms to her desk. Occasionally she nodded to people she vaguely knew.

She passed her boss on the way over to her desk, "Good evening Mark," kaylee said forcing her best plastic smile. Mark was a nice guy but he was way too gung ho about the whole promptness of work and attitudes. "Attitudes are key," he was fond of saying and it usually made her a little sick to the stomach.

"Good morning Miss Morgan," he joked, shifting his weight from one foot too the other.

"Heh, good one sir," kaylee said, smiling even bigger as she silently slipped into her desk and reached for her black matte ear piece. "Has it been busy today?"

Mark shifted again and looked at the call board as if he was tallying up calls and messages, "A bit, yeah. Sizue had one this one caller who refused to take policy for an answer. He got a bit loud and I had to step in and reiterate that our little call center could only do so much. But other than that, it has been pretty calm the past hour or so. So I think you and the boys will be just fine tonight on your own. Of course, if you have any issues or questions, you can always leave a message on my Blackberry and I will attempt to get back to you As Soon As Possible." He punched and pucked his lips as he said those last four words making kaylee cringe.

"Um, sure thing bossman," she said. "If we need anything, I will have them call you on that thing." kaylee was not the most technologically oriented person. While she loved playing on her PC and chatting to her friends and writing the occasional blog post, she really did not have a desire to own or succumb to the latest gadgetry like her boss seemed to. Of course, the fact that Mark constantly yelled at his techno gadgets when they refused to connect to his home system and work laptop or whatever else he needed to be wired into, did not install confidence kaylee that she needed to really own and use the latest and greatest items.

Mark waved and left her sitting at her call desk alone. She was working on her third month aniversary at the company. Not that she liked hopping from job to job, it was just how her industry went. She never thought to go to college, even with all the indian scholarships they offered people in her situation. She just did not feel that sitting in classes for two to four or more years would do her any good. She preferred to learn lessons as life taught her, one day at a time. She had her fair share of good and bad positions, day and night, but seemed to prefer the swing and night shifts over a more traditional nine to five lifestyle. Maybe it was the solitude, or maybe it was the fact that she got paid to baby sit phones into the late hour and read when they were silent.

She pulled out the latest novel she checked out from the library. The title "One Flew Over the Cookoo's Nest" glowed in large, friendly, white letters. It was something new for her, something she always wanted to read but never got around to doingIt was a relatively thick book, "I hope this one lasts a bit longer for me than that other book I borrowed last month. Man what a waste of time," she thought as she cracked open the musty cover and flipped to the first page.

A half hour of digesting the words on the page passed before she got her first call. "My name is kaylee, thanks for calling DigiTek. How may I help you this fine evening?"

"Hello kaylee," a man's voice shot back. She could not tell if he was annoyed or just having a rough evening. "And yeah, I am hoping you can help me. It seems that my internet is out."

"Oh joy," she thought, "it's going to be one of those nights." Kayline sighed silently and leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. "Sure thing. Before we can proceed I need your name, address and the last four digits of your account number to verify your identity. Then we can start working on your issues."

And that was how her night got started. Just as normally as anything else considering her position as one of a few hundred people working at DigiTek as a lowly Call Support Representative. It was decent pay and she did enjoy the quiet, even if the calls occasionally broke through the imaginative world the books called her deep down into.

Thankfully it also helped pass the hours by. She spent most of the call time of her shift helping customers with their various connectivity problems. The first call of the evening took her a half hour to sort out, apparently the cable jerks hooked up his router wrong and she had to walk the fifty year old man through unplugging one cable and putting it into another port. It was no small chore. The other calls, fortunatly, were self explainatory. Many wanted to know their account balances, whether or not there was an outage of service in their area or how to configure their pc to accept their new service. Most of the calls kaylee was greatful to be able to read from a canned script. She was learing a lot about the telecom world at her position but most of it did not really interest her. She treated the job just as any other job, a way to get by without having to hit the streets.

"Hey girly," a voice called over her cube wall, fifteen minutes before her shift ended. "Want to go out after this and get some drinks? I hear the Copper is still offering drinks and food at happy hour prices that late at night. It will be fun, we can let off some steam, talk about the loosers on the phone and destress. What do you say?"

kaylee looked up from her book and into the deep blue eyes of her favorite co-worker Michael. He leaned over and was smiling at her, hoping to con her into another late night of debauchery.

"Hmm," she started, a sly mischevious smile creeped over her face. She flicked a strand of her hair back, out of her face and asked, "You buying?"

Michael laughed, "I might be able to treat a pretty little indian girl out to one drink. But you are getting the rest of your own. Oh, hang on... I got a call."

He darted behind the partition and kaylee shook her head as he started reciting the same candid script that all the call center representatives used to initiate their calls. Twenty minutes past her shift and they were off.

"Ugh, I am so ready to head out and have one or two drinks. Especially after THAT call. I am really very sorry it took so long for us to get out of here. You still game?"

"If you are still buying, of course I am game for a stiff drink. I mean, what else am I going to do at one in the morning."

They laughed as they got into kaylee's car and headed to the Copper. It was almost last call when they arrived but they were able to squeek in a few drinks under the careful eye of the waitress who they gave a a big tip to. kaylee tried to keep the conversation light and non-trival. She was getting tired and wanted to just go home and take a nice long, hot bath before taking one of her two naps.

"You ever wish you had done something else with your life?" Michael suddenly said as they were sitting on the bar stools watching people around them yell and giggle and have a good time.

"What," kaylee said, leaning in closer, "I did not hear you. Please repeat it."

"I said," Michael began again, a bit louder, "You ever think about where your life would have gone had you stayed where you grew up? Do you ever wish you had done anything else with your life?"

kaylee nodded and smirked, her face calm and even. She hated questions like these. Questions that opened her mind to another time and place, the place where she grew up. She did not like remembering the reservation.