(Pov Jason)

  Time crawled; the second hand on the classroom clock seemed to move with deliberate slowness. As if the very mechanisms that measured time were conspiring to make English class dreadfully slow, more so than Jason normally thought it was anyways.

  Jason let out a quiet sigh as he looked back at the clock, 10 minutes left. After which he would head to the bar and grill, talk to old lady jannet and hopefully get his first job. If God's willing.

  The pit in his stomach had grown far larger as the week progressed, and yet so did the number of butterflies flying above that pit also seemed to increase in number.

  Jason looked back at the clock on the wall, 8 minutes. Jason's eye twitched as he thought about how the infernal demon machine hanging on the wall must have been mocking him.

  Looking back at his notebook, he re-read the list of the talking points he hoped would come up during his job interview. The list was long, and he hoped he had covered enough of it.

  The voice of Mrs Butcher that had been buzzing in the background was suddenly cut short. Jason started at the sound of the bell, which was sharper than normal. Looking up at the clock, Jason saw that class was finally done, the arms of the hateful thing hanging on the wall showing that the time was three pm.

  Packing up his things as quickly as he could, Jason hurried out towards his car. All he had to do was reach the bar and grill, preferably before the rush started. Old lady Jannet had said he just needed to show up after school, but he figured his chances were better if she didn't have to take time out of coordinating the dinner rush.

  The hallway over to the main entrance was crowded, and Jason could feel himself being slightly tossed around by the crowd. As he passed through the main entrance towards the parking lot, the oppressive drone of voices lifted as the sky above opened up.

  Walking up to the rusty pickup, he unlocked the door and got in. The signature smell of the car made the pit in his stomach feel slightly smaller. Turning the key, Jason started the car and said a silent thanks to anything that would listen for the car starting on the first try.

  Driving through town, Jason could help but tap his fingers rapidly on the steering wheel. Traffic was mostly light, and the trip took far too little time. Jason felt like he arrived at the parking lot far too quickly.

  The pit in Jason's stomach got larger, and it felt like it had consumed all the butterflies that had been flying above it. His heart was racing. Resting his forehead on the steering wheel, Jason drew a beep breath through his nose, held it for a few seconds before letting it out through his mouth.

  “Ok, Jason. You got this. You know your strengths, you know your weaknesses. Just be honest and be polite. It's not the end of the world if this doesn't work out.” He said to himself.

  Taking another breath, he stepped out of the car and started walking towards the entrance. The street seemed to stretch, as if the ground was conspiring against him.

  Jason clenched and unclenched his hands as he approached the entrance. Taking another breath, he pushed open the door. He flinched as he prepared for the door to come crashing into the wall, and yet no sound followed. No heads turned in his direction as he stepped through the door, his entrance gaining no reaction from the other present.

  The sound of his shoes squeaking on the linoleum floors grated against Jason's ears as he approached the counter. The red-haired man currently standing there, going over some of the glasses, a man named Conor, if Jason remembered correctly. Though Jason could forgive himself for not being certain he had never spoken to Conor, he had seen him and heard talk about him from classmates and some of the proper adults around town.

  Conor turned around as Jason reached the counter. “You the Smallers boy?” Connor's man bun bobbed up and down as he spoke, and Jason was briefly fascinated by how the snake bites didn't catch on something such as the man's gums as he spoke. He found himself briefly wondering if speaking might be painful with those particular body modifications.

  “Yeah, that's me. I am here to talk to Jannet.” Jason let out a silent breath.

  “She mentioned that. She's in the back. Just go in through the kitchen, take a left down the hall, then you get to her office as the second door on your right.” Connor nodded towards the double doors next to the bar.

  Following the path Connor had described, he reached a plain wooden door with only a name tag placed front and center. Yet despite this seemingly normal door, Jason couldn't help but feel like the shadows of the door frame were larger than they should be.

  Jason lifted his hand and knocked on the door. His heart raced as he waited for an answer.

  “Come in.”

  Jason reached for the door handle and pushed the door open. It felt heavier than he would have expected. Sitting at a desk in the middle of the room was a grey-haired woman with small, round glasses. Age had clearly not been kind to her; the hump on the woman's back gave Jason flashbacks to the Humpback of Notre Dame. Though, to be fair, it was not quite that bad. Yet the woman's eyes were focused, going over the paper in front of her in a clearly systematic fashion before she looked up.

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  “Ahhh, Jason. Good to see you again. How have you been?” The old woman gave him a small smile.

  “Hello Mrs Smith. I have been good, ma'am. How have you been?” Jason's voice was shaking nearly imperceptibly.

  “All is like it always is, you get used to it at my age.” Jannet threw a dismissive wave. “Anyways, I heard from your father that you're looking for a job. I need a server. So I figure we can help one another. Have you ever had a proper job before?” Her eyebrow arched far higher than Jason thought would be possible.

  “Well, I…. N….. No ma'am, I haven't had a job before. But I promise I am hard working and...”

  “Pfft.” Jannet threw another dismissive wave. “I know that boy, I know your father. I have no question about you being a hard worker. But jobs vary, and one working well might not mean another will. However, I am more than willing to give you a chance. So you can have the job for a trial period of lets say, oh a month. One day a week, and I or whoever is in charge will give you a call if we need help on other days. How does that sound?”

  Jason's heart was racing. He got the job, HE got the job. I got the job. He let out a deep breath he didn't know he had been holding. Jason laughed a bit; it was a light and relieved sound which caused a small smile to play at old lady Janet's lips.

  “Yes, ma'am. That sounds great.”

  Old lady Jannet's eyebrows creased in thought. “Actually, Thursday night is rarely that busy. Can you start today with just a short shift? Then we can get you trained at least a little before we throw you to the wolves.”

  “That sounds great. I just gotta tell my parents that I won't be home for dinner.”

  “Great, then let me just get...” old lady Jannet got up and walked over to the door. “Mari!!! Get in here!” Jason winced. The shout let out by the diminutive woman was powerful enough that Jason was sure it was seen on earthquake sensors in the next county over.

  Turning around and giving him a smile, old lady Jannet said. “Mari is a nice girl; she's been here for a while. She can show you the ropes.”

  Suddenly, without a sound being made, a woman in her mid 20s appeared in the doorframe. “What you need, Jannet.” she said while chewing on what Jason suspected was double gum.

  “Ahh, Mari, I need you to show young Jason here the ropes. He will be here for the rest of your shift, so about the next three hours.”

  The girl's beady eyes turned to look at Jason for a second, seeming slightly unfocused, before returning to old lady Jannet. “Shhure. Come on boyo, let's go.” She said tossing her head in a come here motion before walking away.

  Jason had to scramble to catch up with her. She was deceptively fast, and somehow the most silent walker Jason had ever met. By the time she addressed him again, they were already in the kitchen.

  “Sooooo, we will be waiting tables. Just follow me and watch for a bit, then you can do a few with me watching, and then you will be on your own. You get what I am saying?" Throughout her entire set of instructions, Jason had not been able to determine what the girl was looking at. Though the instructions themselves were simple enough.

  “Yeah, that makes sense.”

  Three hours. That's how long Jason had been running around the restaurant like a headless chicken. Jason felt an icy chill run down his spine at how bad the proper rushes had to be if this was a calm day. Of course, it probably won't normally be this bad if there were two people working, or so he believed. Mostly a belief driven by the fact that at the two-hour mark, he had found Mari out back smoking some odd-smelling cigarette. It smelled similarly to the ones he had caught his granddad smoking behind the barn when he was five. The ones he wasn't supposed to talk to his parents about.

  As he walked towards the exit, Jason felt as if he was walking on needles. His feet were screaming out in agony in response to the day thus far. He had of course had longer walks and been on his legs for longer. But all of that was in uneven terrain where the same places didn't receive the same pressure time and time again, and it was with far better shoes.

  Pushing open the front door and walking out, Jason noticed a pair of women heading towards the entrance. Though he felt slightly relieved, he didn't have to interact with more strangers as he turned in the opposite direction and walked towards his car.

  Out of nowhere, Jason slipped. He tried to put up his hands to protect the back of his head, but he knew he couldn't reach in time. However, before the back of his head hit the ground, he felt a pair of very strong hands on his back, one very low on his back. It took him a few heartbeats before he fully accepted that no pain was coming, and he opened his eyes. Seeing only a sharp face, in a surrounding of blond hair that looked almost like a golden curtain as light shone through it. Jason's heart started to speed up.

  “Whoa there handsome, I got you. You ok?” The woman said with a small playful smile on her face. Did she just wink at me?

  “i…..I ... .Yeah, I am, or I think so. Thanks for catching me?” Jason could feel heat rising quickly up his neck and onto his cheeks and ears. For a split second, he almost saw something that resembled hunger in the woman's gaze, but it was gone too quickly.

  Gathering all that was left of his courage, he said, “mmmm…. I am kinda in a weird position here. Could you….. Could you please help me up?” Jason could hear the nervousness in his own voice, and the slight voice crack he for gods sake hope she didnt hear.

  “ohh right, yeah, of course.” the woman said before lifting him to his feet like he weighed less than 50 pounds. Jason knew he wasn't the biggest of guys nor the heaviest, but no person should be able to lift him that easily while having no visible bulk at all.

  His heart was racing, and Jason was fairly sure it might be breaking the speed limit on multiple major highways, while the sound of it was probably breaking multiple county ordinances.

  “Tha… Thank you for catching me. I really appreciate it.” Jason said and walked as quickly as he could without literally running away. He had never felt like this before. And he was fairly certain it was supposed to be the other way around.

  When he finally reached the car, he slumped down in the driver's seat and covered his face with his hands as he leaned back. He could feel the heat from his face on his hands, and as he replayed the scene in his head one more time, he squawked. It was a masculine and dignified squawk, or so he tried to convince himself.

  It took nearly a full minute before he was not so distracted that driving would have been unsafe. He then decided to head home for the day to finally be over.