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Finding Beauty
Times Square was just as busy and hectic as it always was on Friday mornings. There was the all too familiar smell of garbage and sewer from the dirty streets, this morning it was extra potent and made me no longer hungry for my cinnamon raisin bagel with cream cheese and small coffee.
Every morning since I moved to New York City, I’ve been working at Joe’s Bakery. I love helping him with his first batch of fresh bagels and other bakery items.
This morning, though, I woke up earlier than usual and rushed through my routine so that I could make it to my job interview. The job opening came about within the last couple of weeks, but I just saw it in the newspaper yesterday. Looking at the qualifications, I saw that it required someone who was skilled in the fields of marketing and also had knowledge of the always changing trends.
I was never the popular girl in high school and it only got worse during college. Since a very young age, I wanted to get out of my small town and out of the grasp of the small minds that trapped me there. Throughout college I secluded myself in my dorm room and never attended any kind of parties. I think it was the thought of having to interact with new people that dazed me and made me the way I still am today.
The abrupt stop of the person in front of me made me spill a little of my coffee down onto the legs of my pants.There is not enough time for me to go home and grab a change of pants. Great. My first real interview and I would have to go in soiled clothes. The man in front of me slowly started walking again and I sped past him annoyed as ever.
Before I knew it the huge building that housed many different companies and stretched to the sky was directly in front of me. Craning my neck backwards, I looked to the very top floor. It was so tall that it stretched far into the clouds. Standing there I can’t help but imagine flying so high that no one could touch me except those exact clouds.
A kind gentleman holds the door open for me and I walk inside the skyscraper before me. As soon as I am through the door, it is a hectic mess of people. But not nearly the same feeling of hectic as the streets of New York. It’s such a different vibe. There are people completely absorbed into their cellular devices and others that are completely oblivious to the world around them.
There is a directory in the center of the base floor and I slowly make my way over to it. So many different names of businesses and companies. Finding the name i needed quickly I make my way to the elevator. Pressing the key for the 78th floor the elevator doors start to close and prepare to take me to the interview that would determine my career as a writer.
I caught the elevator door just in time before it closed completely. There is a girl with red hair. I can not even describe it as red though, it is more like a fiery orange. Without even knowing who she is, I can assume that she has a temper.
I reach over and press the elevator button for the 83rd floor and settle back against the wall where I can keep a good eye on her. She is so intriguing and I want to examine her for longer.
As the doors close and the elevator begins to move vertically climbing floor by floor, the girl says nothing to me. Going out on a whim I offered her up my name saying,
“Hello my name is Salem”, to which I get no response or even a single sign that she heard me.
Clearing my throat I cough quite loudly and then proceed to repeat my statement.
“Hello my name is Salem.”
Again, nothing.
I look up at the dial telling us what floor we are on and it reads 56. I have to know her name before she gets off at the 78th floor.
All of the sudden she speaks!
“I can hear you but I am choosing not to respond.” Shocked. “I have to focus,” she says.
I am stunned into a silence that makes the small cubed room moving up the pulleys shrink into a tight space, smaller than it already was.
Floor 68, my time is quickly running out.
As I look down at her small freckled fingers, I can see they are shaking with nervousness and I am filled with the strong urge to comfort her.
With one quick movement I reached out a touch her hand.
As soon as our bare skin makes contact with each other, there is a sensation unlike anything I’ve ever felt before. It’s like the feeling of testing the strength of D10 batteries on the tip of your tongue. A thousand little sparks and I can feel every one of them. Looking into her bright green eyes and knowing that we have some kind of connection fills me with a joy that I haven’t felt in many years.
The elevator doors open and the floor bell rings.
She whispers “Everleigh. My name is Everleigh.” And then walks out onto the 78th floor.
“Everleigh” I whisper back to myself, “what a bewitching name.”
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