Chapter Six

Mary and Jim sat on boxes in their new living room. Mary wondered how much she could do with this place. Not that they really had the resources to do much, but any effort to make the house seem not bland seemed like it might be futile. She decided to take her mind off it, turning to Jim.

“So, are you excited about the new job?”

Jim chuckled.

“What?”

Shaking his head, Jim said, “No, it’s just Abby asked me the exact same thing in the car.”

“Oh.” Mary was always perplexed at how Jim and Abilene got along. It was almost like they had two distinct relationships. They could go from incredibly civil, showing real concern for each other, to unbelievably cruel – violent, even – in a split second. The violence had ceded greatly since the two finished schooling. But Mary could hardly believe that such a gentle question had passed between them, envisioning Jim’s bloody noses and Abilene’s broken toes. Well, she thought, they had put the two in the same car partly in the hope that they could mend whatever the deal with them was. Maybe it worked.

“What was your answer, then?”

Jim leaned back against the wall. “I mean, yeah, I guess I’m excited. It seems pretty cool. I just wish I knew more about what I’d be doing. Like, will I be cleaning toilets, or on some assassination squad, or what?”

Mary laughed. “You wish, I bet. I know it’s all been really vague. But you’ll be in an office, not on the factory floor with your dad, or in any kind of…covert ops situation. It’ll probably be all the standard stuff. Copying, filing, you know.”

Jim stood up and stretched. “Yeah. Well, then I guess I’m really excited.”

Mary followed his lead, cracking her neck. “Hey, it’s a good paying job. Nothing else, it can look good on a college application.”

Jim smirked.

“Hey, drop the attitude. The whole reason we came here is to try and get our stuff together so we can put you two into college.”

Jim nodded, “Fine,” and headed out the front door.