Yes master, p.24
Yes, Master, page 24
“The messenger department?” he asked, exasperated. “I am a software programmer. What do I know about being a messenger boy?”
“Probably about the same thing I did when I was demoted to messenger boy while you plagiarized my software,” I replied calmly but with a hint of ‘fuck you’ in my voice. Tommy opened his mouth to say something but closed it again. He stood there staring at me, looking like he may start crying. I saw him take a deep breath and try to compose himself.
“I’ll take the job,” he said. “I can't be completely without work.”
“I was hoping you would say that,” I told him. “I am also hoping that while you are in that position, you learn a few things about being proud of what you earn, instead of stealing what somebody else could have earned from.”
Tommy stared at me for a moment before looking back down at the ground. “I know it doesn't mean anything now, but I never set out to plagiarize your work.”
“Tommy,” I replied, walking over to him and putting my hand on his shoulder. I turned him to walk him out the door. “Look, you are finally right about something! It doesn’t mean anything now.”
I put enough pressure on his shoulder to keep him walking through the doorway. He turned around to protest, and I closed the door in his face. I returned to my desk and sat down for a moment. The conversation had gone a bit better than I had expected it to. Also, contrary to a lot of other confrontational experiences I'd had with Tommy, I felt fine. I was not nervous, my heart wasn't racing, my hands weren't clammy, and I was not stressed out, which always used to happen. I felt as if I truly had had a conversation that I just didn't care about. One of the things I did care about, however, was the enjoyment I was going to get out of setting up my new office.
It was time to go get my things and begin a whole new career adventure!
27
My excitement had continued to grow throughout the day as I set up my office and got a better idea of exactly what I would be doing in my new job. However, by the time I was in the car with Glen, headed home, I was ready for a little relaxation.
“It looks like it might have been a big day for you?” Glen asked me, reading my face.
“That is an understatement,” I answered him, laughing. I gave him a quick synopsis of the new job and the new office.
“Now it makes sense why you're so wiped! That's fantastic! Congratulations!” he said as he weaved through traffic.
“Thanks, man. I appreciate that,” I replied. “Hey, I have a question for you.”
“Shoot,” he said.
“Is there any way you would ever consider a job change?” I asked.
“How do you mean?” he asked for clarification. I had wanted to try to feel him out before actually asking him to be my full-time driver, but I couldn't think of a way to beat around the bush.
“One of the perks of my new position Is having a full-time personal driver. They are allowing me to hire my own. I would like to offer you the job if you're open to it,” I said bluntly. I mentally crossed my fingers and hoped that he would at least consider it.
“You want me to be your full-time driver? As in you would be the only person I'm driving around?” he asked. I couldn't tell if he sounded offended or curious.
“For the most part, yes. There would be occasions that you would need to pick up others from the airport, for example. Or, from hotels to bring them to the office. That type of thing. I appreciate how fantastic you are at your job, but I also understand that your job involves meeting and interacting with a lot of different people. I don't want to take you away from that if it is part of what you love about your job,” I explained to him. He looked at me in the rearview mirror and started nodding his head slowly. He put his eyes back on the road and cleared his throat.
“I do love the people, for the most part. Sometimes they can get pretty trying, though. What kind of hours would we be looking at?” His voice sounded clearly curious now.
“Mostly within the confines of a typical forty-hour workweek. If I need a car outside of that, I can arrange it through the company if you are unavailable,” I told him. I had a feeling he was working a lot more hours than that currently.
“Only forty hours?” He sounded a little concerned. “How is the pay structured? Mileage? Number of trips?”
“Oh, no. It would be a salaried position,” I replied. I pulled my money clip out of my pocket. I had his business card tucked inside it. I took a pen out of my suit jacket pocket, pulled his card out of my money clip, and wrote the salary amount I was authorized to offer him. I handed it forward to him over the seat just as we pulled up to a red light. He took the card from me and looked at it. He stared at it for a good thirty seconds before raising his eyes to the rearview mirror to look at me.
“This for real?” he asked.
“Yes,” I told him.
“And only forty hours a week?” he asked again.
“Yes,” I assured him. I watched him closely in the mirror as he drove. There was a full minute of silence before he spoke again.
“If this is legit what you are offering, I’m all in!” he finally said, nearly yelling with excitement. I hadn't realized that I was holding my breath until he agreed to take the job, and I suddenly let it out.
“Hell yeah!” I yelled, matching his volume. “Do you need time to give notice?”
“We are all privately contracted, I'll give him a few days, but I won't need much longer than that. I could start at the beginning of next week. Does that work for you?” he clarified.
“That works the best I could have possibly hoped for! I can't tell you how grateful I am that you said yes!” I told him. The two of us laughed at my sudden release of tension.
“I have a feeling we're going to have a lot of fun together!” Glen speculated. I silently agreed with him. We chatted about some more details of the job for the rest of my ride home. When he pulled into my complex and stopped the car, I reached my hand into the front seat to shake his.
“You have a great night, man!” he said.
“You too! See you in the a.m.!” I replied and closed the door.
As he drove away, I saw him pick up his cell phone and call somebody. He had a smile on his face, and so did I. After watching him exit the complex, I walked up the path toward the stairs leading to my apartment. Just before I got to the stairs, however, someone called my name from behind me. I turned and looked around. I spotted a young man standing off to the side of the path, but it was getting dark out, and I could not see him clearly.
“Yes?” I called out. “Who’s there?” The young man took a few steps toward me. As he stepped into a pool of light from the streetlamp above him, I recognized him. It was Clarence from the gas station.
“It’s me, Clarence. I don't know if you remember me or not, but I need to talk to you!” he blurted out.
“Of course, I remember you, Clarence,” I greeted him as I took a few steps in his direction. “Is everything alright?”
“You could say so,” he chuckled. “Do you remember the lottery ticket that you bought for me?”
“Yeah, I remember,” I answered him. He seemed both nervous and excited at the same time.
“Well, it was a winner!” he said quietly.
“That’s great! You called it! You said it was your lucky day!” I replied. I found it odd that he would come to where I lived to tell me that. As far as that goes, how did he find out where I lived?
“I don't think you understand,” Clarence moved a few steps closer to me. “It was a BIG winner.” My confusion mounted.
“Congratulations, man! Now you can go get yourself something nice! Or, take your girl out to dinner!” I was trying to remain upbeat but was running out of congratulations ideas.
“Bennett!” he said loudly as though trying to get my attention, which he already had. “It was a sixty-million-dollar winner!” As my jaw dropped to the ground, he shrunk back and started looking around him as though he was nervous.
“Sixty--”
“Shhh!” he cut me off with a harsh whisper. “I don't think that just anybody should know about our sixty-million-dollars!” I wasn't sure I heard him correctly.
“Sixty-million? OUR sixty-million? What do you mean OUR sixty-million-dollars?” I yelled in a whisper.
“You are the one that bought the ticket, so you get half,” Clarence said to me very seriously. Then he grinned a little. I was at a loss for words. “Now, I know this is going to take you a bit of time to even start believing. So, why don't you give me your phone number? I will call you tomorrow so we can discuss how to get you your money!” He sounded excited now and happy that he was finally able to share his news.
“You are right about that! Are you sure? I mean, don't mistakes happen with these kinds of things pretty often?” I tried to reason my way out of a sixty-million-dollar winning ticket for some insane reason.
Clarence just laughed. “I am positive. Don't worry. It took me a while to believe, as well. What's your phone number?” he asked as he pulled out his phone to add it to my contacts.
I gave him my number and stood there looking at him before my manners kicked in. “Do you want to come inside?” I invited him.
“Oh, no, thank you,” he replied. “I appreciate the offer, but I need to be getting back home. I’ll call you tomorrow!”
“Oh, hey, how did you know where I live?” I asked him as an afterthought.
“I didn’t, really. I figured you must have lived kind of close to the gas station, so I have been canvassing the neighborhoods today, asking people if they recognized a man of your description and if they would know where to find you,” he explained.
“Wow, that's dedication to a goal,” I complimented him. He chuckled back.
“Hey, you deserve this just as much, if not a whole lot more than I do. I wouldn't have it if it wasn't for you! Gotta go, though. I live with my mom, and she's going to start worrying about me any minute,” he replied.
“Alright, then, have a safe trip home. We'll chat tomorrow!” I told him as he turned and walked to a cab parked down the block.
My trip up the stairs to my apartment was slow and surreal. I kept asking myself if I was possibly delusional and had imagined Clarence. Then I remembered that I had questioned my sanity at least twenty times in the last week, and each time, I came up sane. I opened the door to the apartment and stepped inside. I closed the door behind me and went straight to my lounger, plunking down. Andi and Vila came running to me from the bedroom.
“Oh my god! I can’t believe that!” Andi said, bouncing up and down.
“Thirty-million-dollars is yours!” Vila added. I looked up at the two of them.
“How did you know about that? Clarence just met me outside two minutes ago!” I asked, thoroughly confused.
“Oh, honey, we heard everything!” Vila answered.
“You can hear that far through walls?” I asked, getting off-topic.
“Yep!” Andi piped up. I continued to stare at the both of them. I had no words left for how shocked, stunned, and disbelieving I was feeling. The girls noticed that I was not functioning quite properly and calmed down a little. They kneeled on the floor beside my lounger.
“You do realize that your wish is the reason that all this is happening for you, don’t you?” Vila asked softly.
“It is?” I asked her, a little more alert now that we were talking about something concrete.
“Absolutely, it is,” Andi chimed in.
“How so?” I asked.
Each of them took hold of one of my hands and squeezed slightly. There was a sudden flash of events in front of my eyes. I saw myself presenting my software in the investor’s meeting and chatting with Glen like a friend instead of an invisible cabby. Next, I saw myself talking to Clarence and buying him the lottery ticket to help him feel better. Then I saw myself dropping an envelope off at the district attorney's office. As quickly as the images had come, they faded away. I was left blinking at the girls.
“What was that?” I wanted to know. It was a pretty cool experience, but I wasn't sure what they'd given it to me for.
“All the things that you just saw were acts of kindness and service that you did for other people that have led to all of the positive things happening to you lately,” Vila tried to explain.
“It is basically the Law of Attraction hard at work for you,” Andi added. “Simply put, you are putting positivity out into the world, and you are being rewarded for it. It is coming back to you.” I had heard of the Law of Attraction before but never studied it. It was considered a pseudoscience, just like the Law of Diminishing Intent. Could it really be the reason that in one day I had scored my dream job, my dream office, my favorite driver, and thirty million dollars?
“It is just so hard to believe! Money, luxury upgrades at the office... those were two of the wish previews you showed me. Now I have both of those things without making those wishes,” I realized aloud.
“You made the right wish. You made the wish that wasn't based on greed or the desire for instant gratification. These are your results!” Vila said happily.
What the girls were saying kept making more sense the longer I thought about it. Had I made those other wishes, I would have been taking from others. Instead, because I decided to use my wish to help other people, I was receiving everything I wanted. Well, almost everything. Lottie’s face flashed before my eyes. I imagined that love was on a different scale, even for the Law of Attraction. I felt an electricity-type feeling bubbling up inside me.
“This is all just so crazy!” I called out, a sudden burst of new energy coursing through my body. “And believe me when I tell you girls, I owe all of this to you!”
Both girls blushed at my praise, but at least that time, they didn't disagree with me. I was buzzing with excitement as the reality of how my life had changed suddenly sunk in. Just then, my phone rang. I dug it out of my pocket and looked to see who was calling. My heart started fluttering when I saw Lottie’s name on the screen. I slid my finger across the phone and held it to my ear.
“Hello!” I answered overzealously. I heard Lottie laugh a little on the other end of the line.
“Hi, Bennett, sorry to call you so late,” Lottie answered.
“It's not too late by any means, how are you?” I asked her. I was pleased to find that I was breathing normally while speaking with her, even though I could hear the blood rushing in my ears from my heart pounding out of my chest. I was thrilled that she'd called.
“I'm happy to say that I am doing really great!” she reported. “Hey, I have a question for you real quick. Do you have a minute?”
“Absolutely! What's your question?” I urged her to ask.
“Would you consider going out to dinner with me? Perhaps this Friday? I know a great little restaurant off the beaten path,” she asked. I was seduced by the confidence in her voice. Somehow, it made me feel more confident too.
“I've considered it,” I replied calmly.
“You have?” she sounded utterly surprised.
“Yes, I have,” I said.
“And after your consideration, what did you conclude?” Lottie asked, catching on to the game I was playing.
“I concluded that I would like to consider it done!” I told her teasingly. I heard her giggle on the other end of the line, and her voice made me smile.
“I've come to a very similar conclusion,” she said. “I'll see you on Friday!”
“I've never been one to wish time away by looking forward to the weekend too strongly. However, I can honestly tell you that this Friday just became the day I'd like to fast forward to!” I replied. “I’ll see you Friday!” I delighted in her giggling as I disconnected the call. I threw my phone over onto the couch and turned back to the girls. I shot up out of my lounger and threw my arms in the air.
“YES!” I shouted, just as I had on the day I crashed my bike in the alley and found the glowing old box with the watch inside. I had always been one to celebrate my wins, and I’d just scored a hat trick! I’d scored THE hat trick! Money, luxury, and love!
And to think… I still had two wishes left.
Author’s Note
Hey, if you got here, I just want you to know that you’re awesome! I wrote this book just for someone like you, and if you want another one, it is super important that you leave a review.
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Simon Archer, Yes, Master
