Interesting title

Chapter 1

" Go to dinner. I give ten minutes," says Mrs. Gloria, putting three crumpled dollars on a glass display case. She always looks straight into the soul with her charcoal black eyes, just like now, which causes a chill on my back. Sometimes it seems to me that she sees through and feels my fear.

When I got this job, on the second day I wanted to run away. Anywhere and whatever. Given that the payment here is the same as everywhere else, and the requirements are too high. But you guessed it, I did not succeed. Wherever I get settled, they don't want to let me go. No, I have not scored advances and I want to blame, no, I just do my job well (I won't praise myself, nobody will praise).

I don't know how everyone does, but at our place of work this is the order - either eat fast or do not eat at all. At first it was difficult, but a person learns everything. Even chew and sell the product at the same time. "I assure you, this cover for your phone with a picture incomprehensible to anyone is all you need at the moment! Having bought it you will become happier at times! "I had to lie often, but you can get used to it. Not immediately, but possible. And I also had to listen to from the boss and eat for one and a half dollars a day.

"What should you take?" I ask Ivory and nod toward my jacket on the chair. "Can you give it to me?"

"I don't know, take the same thing as yourself," she reaches out wearily for a lump of my gray jacket and hands it to me. My mother could not teach me how to relate to things, not to scatter them, but to hang me. Years of practice have not made themselves felt, so now a wad of things is normal.

I answer "Yeah, okay," and with a quick step I go through the rows of departments directly to the exit. If you find yourself here, then it is very likely that you get lost. And more than once. It seems to me even more confusing than in the maze from the movie "The Maze Runner". In most cases, customers are not looking for a product, but a way out. I hear the phrase so often: "It's so hot, stuffy and so complicated here!" I want to answer: "Yes, just like in hell, without the opportunity to get out," but not many people perceive my humor well.

On the way to the exit, I notice a couple of acquaintances, and waving everyone as a greeting, I squeeze through the crowd to the exit. Once in the fresh air, I catch the favorite aroma of coffee from the "Nathan's" and go to the smell. Suddenly, someone behind me is pulling my hood. I look around with displeasure, but when I see a familiar face that spreads out in a smile, I calm down.

"Hey, petty," Alex reaches out to me, I barely smile and give him five, "how are you?"

"As always," I draw out, to which he, as usual, begins to ruffle my hair. Stupid, it's a habit, but I like it. I deftly dodge another portion of hair fraying. "I have to go. We cross each other somehow", after taking I do a couple of steps, I wink at which he skillfully builds a sad face.

Have you met guys who dry on absolutely all the girls, but at the same time tell them all that they are the only ones in his life? Naturally. And one of them is Alex himself. Although, probably, on the one hand, it is useful to have a womanizer in friends. What do you think?

On the first day of our acquaintance, he invited me to meet. And to the question: "You don't know me at all, suddenly, I am a serial killer ?!" - he only burst out laughing and said that I had a wild fantasy. Yes, yes, there are guys who swear eternal love on the first day, and on the second they have a new eternal love. I remember when he walked me home, we said goodbye and I said: "I'm sorry, but I have two children, we can't be together," he distorted for a moment, and then he laughed for a long time.

I order two cheeseburgers without tomatoes, take a check and sit down to wait for my order. Ten minutes later, a cute girl in a green uniform hands me a white paper bag that smells deliciously. I thank her and return to my workplace.

"Your grandmother called you," Mrs. Gloria says when I come to my department. "You can call back," she holds out her phone to me.

I don't know how, but I've been without a phone for the third month and I think this is a very good achievement. I didn't lose my phone, they didn't steal it from me. I just made the wrong contribution to the wrong business for me. How could you buy women's junk for two hundred dollars, hoping to quickly sell it all through online platforms? And it turned out to be simple. You just go into the market of all kinds of things and pick up a small bag, and then they give you a check, well, for such a significant amount. Then you just have nothing to live on, and you have to say goodbye to some property. But my cell phone replaced books. See how it went well, huh? And it's useful, and there is something to occupy yourself with, and you look smart.

I take the phone that was handed to me and dial the last number. A pair of beeps and the receiver picks up a familiar elderly voice.

"Hello?" I say.

"Come! Come as soon as possible!" my grandmother almost screams into the phone, from which my heart begins to beat very quickly.

"What? What happened?!" I am perplexed. What could have happened that in broad daylight I was asked to come to the other end of the country.

"There is no time to explain! Your mother is bad! COME!" in her voice a mixture of crying and screaming, and I do not know which of this is the worst.