This dramatic short story collection contains eight stories based on a figurative, or literal, interpretation of wet, nasty weather. At turns spooky, frightening or funny, these tales are guaranteed not to disappoint.
Ice : "Vernon Wilson" (Paranor...
It started with rumours blowing from office to office, like brittle scratchy fronds ripped from the crowns of the palm trees that lined the busy street outside.
The company was downsizing. Jobs were to be drastically cut. Last in, first out. It was going to be every man and his windowsill plant for himself, just you wait and see.
The official memo fluttered into Eden's inbox one Monday afternoon. It was much more carefully phrased than what she'd heard in the cramped staff kitchen and in the ladies room, but the message was the same. She'd been prepared for something similar, but seeing it in print was still a shock.
All positions are to undergo an efficiency review and departments rearranged as necessary, she read, and felt her heart leap up into her throat.
She'd been an employee there for just over five years, but had been stalled in the same place for four of them.
Networking, attending company picnics and following the advice of articles and blogs on how to climb the career ladder hadn't gotten her much past entry level in all that time. No matter what strategy she tried, it never got her even one step closer to a promotion out of her open cubicle, and into somewhere with its own door.
And now this. A company-wide cull.
Eden saw herself sweeping the contents of her desk into a cardboard box and slinging it into the back of her second hand Mazda before the month was out. Panic tingled her calves, the first place it always made itself noticeable. She closed her eyes and recited the mantra pinned to the grey, fuzzy cubicle wall.
I am safe.
I am a success.
My future is bright and welcoming.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Amy, the last good friend from college she'd managed to hold on to, wasn't a help. She had other things on her mind. China for one. Her company was sending her there for three years to do much the same job she already did, except at higher pay and with a fancy new title.
"You have no idea how complicated an international move is, Eden. It's not like packing up and moving to Cleveland or something," Amy moaned over the phone, her voice echoing oddly in the increasingly empty space of her apartment. Eden could even hear the sound of Amy's slippers as they scuffed over the rugless floors.
Her old friend brushed aside her fears about losing her job as if it were nothing more than indecision over which outfits to wear to a team-building weekend.
"Stay positive. If one door closes, another always opens. Don't give up and show them you're valuable. Okay, now which box did I put the blender in? This is so annoying, I've got like thirty boxes here and they're all labelled and I still can't find anything."
She was staying positive, Eden said. She just hadn't counted on having to plunge back into an uncertain job market after so long, was all. The work she could do, she knew that, but she had never been good at selling herself to potential employers like she was a frosted cupcake. Getting her current job had been anxiety-inducing enough and that was when she was fresh out of her gap year and full of energy, not worn down with job stagnation and like she was now.
