2011

I was often described as quiet, good with manners and polite. But I still had trouble speaking up for me needs like needing to go in class. I would feel intimidated when being asked to wait or "hold it". 

Today its been 25 years since the attack on 9/11. let's all take a moment and remember all those who lost their lives on that horrific day.

I have both Subscribestar and a Ream account now if subscribestar isn't to someone's liking.  I have no idea how "safe" it is. As a creator I gave it my personal information and nothing bad has happened.  

I got off the bus and stumbled groggily into the mall for my 9am shift. Rosa Tacos had been my workplace for the last three years. As assistant manager I often did more work than the big boss himself.    I walked in and started the warm up for all the appliances. I began chopping the veg for the salad bar as one by one my coworkers stumbled in.    “Good morning everyone.” John, the manager said, sounding happier than usual.    I continued to work while he talked.    “As you know I'll be retiring soon and I’d like to announce who I'll be promoting to be the new manager of Rosa's while I'm down in The Bahamas.”    My face lit up. John and I had been discussing this for years. “Boy am I gonna make some changes when he's gone.” I thought, fluttering with excitement.    “The new manager will be… My Son, Jacob.” John said with a proud smile.    Jacob stepped forward as the other two employees clapped. “Thank you, thank you everyone.”    My heart sank. I felt nauseous. “Jacob's 18.” I thought, “He was 17 three months ago. I'm literally 10 years older than him. Which means he's 10 years younger than me and he's gonna be… my boss.” I had to lean on something.    Jacob gave a speech then him and John had a laugh. Not soon after John left and I got back to work.    “Kayla. I'd like to talk in private.” Jacob mumbled as he walked past me and to the back.    I followed along and walked all the way to the break room. John turned around and towered over me while I looked at him expectantly until he talked. “I think we both know I've been waiting a long time to do this. You and I haven't liked eachother since day one. Unfortunately my dad made me promise not to fire you, but I don't want you as my second in command either. Starting tomorrow you'll be coming in with the new hires and you'll start training for your new role.”    “New role?” I asked, my heart pounding.    “As a trainee. Starting at the bottom.”    I got dizzy for a moment and fell over, leaning heavily on a table. “Three years of hard work. Of picking up John's slack. Of working my way up the ladder. All of it gone, to be on equal footing with the 16 year olds Jacob's hiring for the summer.    “What about. Will I keep my seniority and my accrued vacation time?”    “You won't have any vacation time. You're a trainee. You need to work here for 6 months to start accruing vacation time. You won't have your medical benefits either. Starting next schedule you'll be a part timer. I'm cutting you down to 20 hours a week.”    “But I need to pay rent. My apartment is just me and my boyfriend. We have three cats.”    “I don't care.” He said smugly, “It'll be quite a pay cut too. As assistant manager you made $22 an hour. Now you'll be making half of minimum wage until you complete your training.”    “Well what if I quit? What will you do without me? I basically run this place.”    “You run this place like a dictator. I can't believe my dad let you away with it so long. So no, I don't need you. If you quit that's a weight off my back. At least I didn't fire you.” He smirked.    I sauntered out to the kitchen and got back to work, trying to hold back tears as my career had been dashed. All I had worked for. All I had earned, destroyed by a pimple faced 18 year old. It made me wanna curl up on the floor and die like a cicada.    In some time Jacob came out to talk to me again. “By the way, I'll need your name tag.”    I looked at him with sickness on my face.    “Hand it over.” He said.    I unpinned my nametag that read “Kayla assistant manager” and handed it to him. In turn he handed me a basic nametag that simply read “Trainee”    I pinned it on. “It looks perfect on you.” He said as he patted my head. “I can't wait to teach you how to do the job tomorrow.”    I finished out the days with shocks of deep pain, every time one of my co-workers saw my new pin. I had to explain to each person, “Jacob demoted me. I'm starting over from the bottom.” Over and over and over again.    Jacob went around making sure I couldn't tell anyone what to do. “Hey just wanted to make sure you know, Kayla isn't your boss anymore, you're actually Kayla's boss now.” He would say to each person.    The teens would laugh and make a little joke. “Go fetch me a milkshake.” One of them snapped his fingers. He laughed, but I didn't. I felt like throwing up.    When it was time to go home I took off my apron and hung it up. Then I walked back to the bus stop and went home.    When I got there I saw I had an email from Rosa’s Taco's. “Employment Skills Course, Required Learning, Due Tomorrow.”   “Shit!” I almost threw my phone. “Not this again.” I groaned, “I already did this when I got hired three years ago.”    I clicked on the link and did as I was told. I watched all the way through 30 10 minute videos. Each one with a quiz after. Of course I got them all right. They were such simple questions as. “How do you hold a knife properly?” “What qualifies as sexual harassment?” “Should food ever touch the floor and still be served?”    All together it took me until midnight to do it all. I grabbed some wine from the fridge to make it more interesting and to ensure I could get a good night's sleep when midnight came around.    I woke up in the morning with immediate dread in my heart. “Dear god. My first day of training.” I groaned.    I kissed my boyfriend on the cheek and rolled out of bed. I suddenly realized how hungover I was, but I stumbled to the kitchen and poured myself a bowl of cheerios. I sat in front of the TV watching just a little bit and mulling it over in my head whether I really want to go in.    “It won't be worth the money. It's a lot of work and humiliation. It's really just a horrifying situation. If I quit I can't go on unemployment Insurance. So what would I do for money? My boyfriend's logging job only goes on during the summer, so he's broke right now and we need to make rent.”    I took out my phone and quickly applied for about 17 jobs on indeed. I was so depressed I didn't even bother showering. I just put on my uniform and left.    I walked to the bus stop and slammed my head on the plastic window until it showed up. I rode the bus to the mall and didn't smile as I walked in and turned on the appliances. I did my usual prep, chopping up the veg as one by one employees filed in, I only recognized one face though.    Katrina, a 19 year old who had started working here around a year ago, stood glaring angrily at me. “Would all TRAINEES stop doing unauthorized work and come join the learning party.”    I glared at her and set down my knife, before walking over.    “Nice of you to join us Kayla.” She said snarkily, then she put her hand on my shoulder and turned to face the others, “Everybody, Kayla here used to be the assistant manager, but she was too bad at her job, so now she'll be retaking beginner training with the rest of you and starting from the bottom.”    All the other trainees cringed and winced at hearing what had happened. I tried to hold back from screaming down Katrina's throat.    “Don't listen to anything she tells you. It'll all be wrong. She's a total and complete failure.”    Katrina walked over to the station I was at and waved for us to follow. We gathered around her. “Alright everybody. Our morning duties everyday will be initiation and prep. Unfortunately Little Miss Know-it-all came in outside of her scheduled hours and turned on the machines, so you won't be learning that today.”   Everybody glared at me.    “But I'll show you how to chop the veg.” She lifted up my bucket of diced green peppers and showed everyone. “See all these. These were all cut wrong and left unlabeled by a slacking trainee. So they go in the garbage.” She dumped the entire container in the trash.    “What the fuck!” I squeaked.    “No swearing in the kitchen, Kayla. I'll have to write you up after I get everyone on tasks.”    I was steaming mad. All these fucking kids swore like sailors all day. No swearing was never a rule before and I hardly ever did it anyway.    “This is how you do it.” Katrina started chopping the green pepper in the exact same way. Then she poured it into my bucket. She got out the label maker and printed it with a date, sticking it to the container.    “Actually we're supposed to put them on with scotch tape.” I said, “Standards and practices doesn't like when there's sticky residue left on the containers for. The labels.”    Katrina looked smug as she patted me on the head. “That's why we clean the buckets after we use them. Don't speak over me, ok? You're were demoted for a reason. Put on your listening ears and learn.”   My face was turning red and my clenched fists were turning white.    “So next we need to assign roles. Ideally we want everyone to be able to do every job eventually, but for now we'll train each of you to do one role for the first few weeks, until you get comfortable. Who wants to do cash register?” She asked.    One girl raised her hand.    “Ok, you.” She said. “And who wants to do prep.”    I rolled my eyes and raised my hand, but a boy raised his hand too.    “Well seeing as we all know Kayla's bad at prep we'll have you do it, Ben.”    “Yes!” Ben fist pumped.    “Now I need someone to assemble the meals and box them.”    I raised my hand again but another boy raised his. “Yes. We'll get you on that, Tourique.” Katrina said.    “And Kayla, I guess that leaves dishes, garbage and cleaning for you.”    “But I never do garbage!” I whined, “You know I have arthritis in my shoulders. I can't lift heavy.”    “I don't care.” She laughed, “It's about time you made up for all the turns you missed. So head on back.”    I walked to the back of the restaurant and stood at the sink. I waited for dishes to come through and as they did I started cleaning.    In time Katrina came back and looked aghast, “What's this? There’s no dishes left to clean.” She was pretending to be shocked.    “Well yeah. I cleaned them as they came. It's the easiest job in the place.” I said.    “Well Kayla, I'm supposed to train you on washing dishes today. I'm supposed to teach you how we do it here. For those standards and practices you love so much.”    I rolled my eyes.    “Go gather up all the dishes you cleaned and we'll rewash them. I can't guarantee you did them right.”    “Ugh.” I groaned and walked around to the front, grabbing each dish I cleaned. It was hard to hold them in my hands and they fell out of my arms just as I was approaching the counter. Nothing broke and it all landed on the counter itself, but it made a very loud bang.”    “Careful Kayla!” Katrina scolded me, “Stuff here is valuable and anything broken has to be rebought. Set it down gently.” She said in a condescending tone.    She started by draining the still nice looking sinks, then she plugged them back up. “Right, so over here we have soap and over here we have sanitizer. In the middle is where we spray things off” She demonstrated on a plastic container, “This one has no food on it. So first we dip it in the soap, then we scrub it, then we leave it in the sanitizer for one full minute. Then once the minute is done you'll stack it in the drying rack. Please show me what you just saw.” She said.    I raised my lip at her in almost a snarl as I picked up a clean dish and dipped it in the soapy water.    “Ope, you forgot to spray it.” Katrina said.    “It doesn't have any food on it.” I whined.    “It's a demonstration, Kayla. You gotta do the whole thing.”    “But you didn't do the whole thing.” I whined.    “Well I'm a full employee so I don't need to. Please hurry up. I do have other beginners to teach.”   I rolled my eyes and sprayed out the container, then I dipped it in the soap and scrubbed it. I sprayed the suds off before I finally placed it in the sanitizer.”    “It's been a minute.” Katrina said, “Put up the other container.”    I grabbed the other container and placed it on the drying wrack.    “Ok! Very good! Now you do the rest of these and I'll be back to check on you in a little bit!” With that Katrina left and I got to work cleaning everything over again.    I scrubbed and scrubbed for quite a while as more dishes came in. I did one thing after another for hours until I heard Jacob arrive.    “Hello again!” He said. “So happy to see you all. Staff meeting!” He yelled and we all left our stations to listen to him talk. “So you all have one thing in common. You're each starting out at the bottom ring of this company. But as kayla will tell you we have fantastic upward mobility even for the very incompetent.” He said as he patted me on the head.    I grabbed his wrist and twisted it in an arm breaker hold. “Ouch, Fuck fuck fuck!” He whined.     “SHUT THE FUCK UP!” I shouted, “I WAS THE HARDEST GOD DAMN WORKER IN THIS PLACE AND YOU'RE PUTTING THIS BULLSHIT ON MY NAME!! BECAUSE OF SOME PERSONAL VENDETTA I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW ABOUT UNTIL YESTERDAY!! FUCK YOU AND FUCK THIS! I'M OUTTA HERE AND I'M TELLING YOUR FATHER!” I kicked him in the back of the leg and he fell to the floor.    “Whatever bitch.” Jacob said smugly, “Good luck getting hired anywhere else with this demotion on your permanent record. And my lawyer will be contacting you about the ASSAULT you just did on me.”    I grabbed a bucket of green pepper and whipped it at his head. He fell down and was out cold.    In the following months we did sue each other. Him for assault and me for wrongful termination + slander. It was deemed that he put his hands on me first, so my action was justified. Rosa's Taco's had to pay me a $50,000 settlement to make up for what Jacob did and Jacob was fired soon after. I was able to take a year off and visit the Bahamas.   

I think that's why it's such a good story though. It's easy to get emotionally attached to the characters and feel Liam's plight. I too would love to see a win for Liam and also see him regain some independence and agency. However, he doesn't have strong masculine emotional intelligence modeled. As much a Liam is now diapered I don't really think James wears the pants in their family either and he just goes along with whatever Grace decides. Subsequently, James is also beta to Rob and Claire. I could see Liam appealing to James conscious and Rob shutting James down on treating Liam differently.  On another note I can see Millie introducing a nap or quiet time and Grace getting him tucked in earlier. Or him getting some more infantile pajamas and  getting exposed to their friend group in them by Sophie and him getting sent to bed in front of the group trying to fight bedtime but everyone agreeing it's for his best. Maybe as much as Liam fights everything it could be his internal system regulating with the regression and as much as he fought the diaper and Millie in the day he did get a win in staying dry but still being able to ski and have fun and actually was able to hit the jump and impress Sophie.  Perhaps as much as Sophie develops feelings for the other boy, he might not be everything she assumes him to be and she might reveal Liam's secret to him in an attempt to free herself and distance herself from him only to then be jealous of the closeness Millie and Liam develop and then actually want Liam again after all.  It's exciting to think about the possibilities. It's one of my favorite stories and I can't wait for the next chapter. Hopefully we'll get lots more maybe even a sequel for the changes and new routines at home. Maybe as grace sees how motherly and gentle Millie and Claire baby Liam and she let's them lead more she'll get jealous and more motherly and develop a long to mother Liam more. I love how the choices are presented to Liam to always be forced to choose the more babyish choice that's pre decided for him by everyone lol.