July 18, 2019 - Behind Door No. 1 -

This is the results of a writing prompt for my once a month Writer's Class.

A while back, while I was waiting in the parking lot behind Smith's Drug Store while my husband was getting a prescription, I happened to notice the back of a building.  It caught my attention, my writer's imagination.  I took a snap of it thinking it would be great inspiration for my super sleuth to break into the WAGY office at night for something needed to crack a case. 

I added it to the "idea" folder and moved on until I got the email prompt for my July writer's class.  Pick a photo and write.

This is what I wrote - it is fiction - mostly.  The location is spot-on.  Those who live in Forest City will tell me one day how close I got to capturing Forest City.

Of course it is way over the 500 words that the writer's group prefers, but then, I never do like to write short.

I've honed it and honed it, but I simply have not figured out how to get the "I" out of it.  Writing backward sentences doesn't seem to help me.  If anyone has any tips on how that is done - let me know - I need a lesson in first person without all the "I"s popping up like danger flags.

The picture:

 

Behind Door No. 1 - Chapter 1

I turned left off the quaint town’s main street.  Little had changed to the buildings since the 1920s when Forest City, North Carolina was in its heyday. I glanced at my dashboard clock, fifteen minutes to six.  I’d made perfect travel time on my commute home.

I darted into a diagonal parking place in front of Daylight Donut Shop.  In the wee hours of the morning, they made their fresh donuts.  Each day within a few hours of their 5:30 a.m. opening time and no specific closing time, they  sold out.  I’d been unsuccessful on three occasions to buy their celebrated donuts.  After 20 years in this town, their donuts remained beyond my grasp. I’d only heard of their legendary deliciousness.

In the early darkness of daylight savings of mid-November, the streetlights illuminated the Town Hall’s huge iron planters still spilling flowers that had miraculously escaped the late frosts.  Across the street, my destination was the unadorned two story square brick building [circa 1930] that housed a telecommunications call center and WAGY 1320 A.M. and F. M. radio station on the upper floor and unknown to me occupants or businesses on the ground floor.

         An alley ran along the building to Smith’s Drug Store drive-up window and then opened up to a sloping public parking lot that serviced the downtown shopping district.

The building showed battle scares where drivers had poorly gauged the turn into the alley over the decades.  There were visible chunks of brick missing on the corner and spiraling cracks between the bricks highlighted by mismatched mortar repair work.

I remembered the uneven doorstop where the metal and glass door met the sloping sidewalk as I once applied for to a job at the telecommunications center a few years back.  I jerked the door ajar and had to use my entire body weight to open it enough to slip in. The door’s strong return mechanism almost knocked me off my feet, typical old building - hard to open, and too quick to close doors.  I stood in the dimly lit lobby assessing the eight-foot wide metal staircase interrupted by a landing midway to the second story offices.

Step-by-step I rose in the center of the building. I noted years of accumulated grime never swept from the far corners of the treads.  I felt the unevenness of the well-worn olive green linoleum treads under my feet.  I wouldn’t need to work out on my stair stepper anymore if I got this job.

I paused at the landing to catch my breath.  Gosh I was out of shape. I don’t want to walk gasping into this interview.  I needed this job.  The increased gas prices for my lengthy commute were just about bankrupting me.

I paused again a few steps below the top landing to catch my breath.  It had to be nerves. The landing above had a grouping of four 1960’s orange chairs as a make shift waiting area, in the corner a fake philodendron tree layered with years of dust. I chose the door with the radio station call letters painted on the frosted glass.

I pressed on my winning smile, adjusted my shoulder bag and knocked on the door and turned the handle calling out cheerfully,

“Hello, it’s me, Misty Green.”  I opened the door as if I’d already landed the job.

My sweeping gaze took in two battleship grey desks and a couple of half glass cubicles along one wall.

An older man in a brown wool vest and Tattersall shirt rose to meet me. Surprisingly he looked at this watch.  From my calculation, it was probably seven minutes before my 6:00 p.m. appointment time.

“Good, you are punctual.”

“Nice to meet you.”

We shook hands briefly.  He waved to a chair in the lighted glass cubicle and I eased into it.  He didn’t walk behind the desk, he took the chair beside me and crossed his legs leaning back casually.  I tucked one foot behind my ankle and folded my hands in my lap.

“I imagine your current commute is a drag on your finances,” he opened the conversation.

“Exactly,” I nodded with a soft smile.

He pulled a manila folder from across the desk closer to him, opened it, and picked up my resume.

“You’ve varied skills.  I like across the spectrum job experience.”  He looked up and waited for an answer.

“Having worked in large as well as small entities, I’ve learned how to roll up my sleeves and get the work done.”

“We run a small concern here.  We are one of six stations in the county, devoted to true Oldies Rock & Roll broadcasting, 1000 watts days and 500 watts nights, 24/7.  We just lost Fred Hamrick; he died two weeks ago.  He did the weather, farm report and swap and shop.

Also, Janet Hodges is on temporary leave caring for her aging mother.”

He put the folder down and continued, “We are pressed rather thin right now, I’ll l need you to fill some air time. I don’t happen to see that you’ve been on the air, only note you’ve generated advertising copy.  How do you feel about air time?”

I smiled trying to think of something to say then I blurted out,

“WOW, what a great opportunity,” I said buying time to squeeze something out of my racing mind that gave me an inkling of “on-air” experience.  I took a breath and launched into a reply.

“At one of my first jobs, I was a receptionist in a large manufacturing plant.  The building was sprawling with different wings like an octopus. We had an old fashioned intercom system that blasted throughout the complex and I used to page staff.”  I paused.

He waited for more.  I launched into my paging mode and said,

“Doug Lloyd please dial 44, Doug Lloyd, please dial 44.  Sam Perkins please report to the loading dock, Sam Perkins, please report to the loading dock.”

He leaned back and a genuine smile opened on his face.

“We are a hometown entity.  You will do just fine.”

He offered me the job, we set a start date and then he said, “I need you to fill out these papers for the gal who handles the personnel stuff.”

I leaned forward, pulled a blue pilot pen out of my shoulder bag.  I noticed my hand suddenly covered with blue ink.  I quickly filled out the two sheets of paper work and declared,

“I’ve an exploded pen,” holding up my hand for him to see.

“We’ve a wash room – that door there – end of hall.”  He said.

I handed him the paper work covered in blue smudge marks.

We both stood, he said, “I’ll see you on the eighth at 8 a.m.  Just let yourself out. There is a door from the hall into the staircase.  My wife is been holding dinner for me.”

“Thank you for this opportunity,”  I said motioning to shake his hand but then raised my blue stained hand and waved instead. 

We both chuckled.

I stepped through the frosted door into the hall.  Within a few steps, I noticed he already shut the office lights out. As I walked toward the end of the dingy hall, I heard him close the office suite door, his jaunty steps receding down the central staircase.

I found the washroom at the end of the hall; propped open the door with my foot locating the light switch.  The half-century old chunky sink was a clean as possible considering its age.  No soap dispenser.  Under running water, I rubbed my palms together which did nothing except smear the blue ink from one palm to another.  I turned off the faucet and found no paper towels in the dispenser.  I gingerly lifted up my suit skirt and was about to pat my wet hands on my white slip, but then I lifted my slip and patted my wet hands on my panty-hosed thighs instead.

I shut out the light, and walked down the hall picking a frosted window door midway along the hall.  I turned the handle, another heavy door.  I braced my shoulder against it for leverage and stepped over the threshold.  My shoulder bag dislodged and fell to my forearm. I paused to pull it up to my shoulder as the heavy door nudged me in the butt and slammed shut.

It was dark, I felt a cold breeze air on my face. I looked around. 

I was outside the building standing on a 3 foot x 4 foot ledge surrounded by a rusty railing.  I turned and tried the door, locked. I turned back looking down into the dank parking lot at the back of the building across from Smith’s Drug store drive-through window, now closed.  I looked over the edge, it had to be at least 25 feet to the pavement and mechanical equipment below. A rusty escape ladder was affixed to the building beside the door from the railed ledge to the ground.

Not a person in sight, no visible traffic.

The corner security light spread its conical beam straight down away from the building’s corner, away from illuminating me on a threshold to nowhere, standing in my suit and best high heels.