Awake in Hell by Helen Downing Read Free Book Online Page A

way, shape, or form French.
It’s Middle English in origin, originally ‘ fucken ’
which means to strike, move quickly, or penetrate. How it became the most
popular verb, adjective, noun, AND insult in the English language is beyond me.
However, it’ll cost you a quarter.” He seems bemused, but he’s still holding
out the jar. He’s expecting me to put 25 cents in there.
    “Are
you serious? Or are you fucking with me?” I ask, truly bewildered.
    “See?
Since you’ve entered my office you used it as a complimentary adjective and a
derogatory verb, neither of which would indicate striking, moving fast, or
penetrating. There are now 1,009,614 words in your native tongue. Why do you
make that word work so hard? Nor is it, for your information and edification,
normal conversation fodder at a job interview. And now, it’s 50 cents.”
    Okay,
so now I’m vacillating between feeling bad, because he’s right... It’s awful to
walk into a stranger’s office trying to pretend to be any kind of professional
and start talking like a sailor on leave... But there’s also the principal of
the thing, which is that a curse jar is stupid and I’m not giving him 50 cents.
So, I react the way I always react when I’m not sure if I’m right but I’m bound
and determined to convince someone else that I am. In other words I over-react.
    “Mr. Deedy , I apologize for coming here and offending you.
As you can tell by my apparent resume, that is and will be forever a mystery to
me, I am not well-educated or well-versed in these kinds of proceedings.
Obviously, I am highly unqualified for whatever it is I’m here to interview
for, and so I’ll go. I promise to put the job notice back where I found it and
I can only hope that this simple act will encourage you to take out that weird
phone that showed up in my apartment and also forgive my overwhelming debt!
Having said all that, I just want you to know that I do not appreciate your
condescending manner of pointing out my uneducated speech or your feeble
attempts at embarrassing me or making me feel like a giant shitbird .
I cannot abide that kind of treatment. Good day, Mr. Deedy !”
I say all this with an increasing frenzy. By the time I’m done, I’ve risen from
my seat and I’m practically in tears. Oscar goes to... me.
    Mr. Deedy looks at me with a half-smile and one eyebrow
raised up higher than the other. It’s not threatening, or apologetic, or even
amused. It’s just a simple look, yet I feel like I’ve been struck, hit with
some invisible force that takes my breath away. Not to mention it’s like he’s
gazing into my soul with those penetrating brown eyes and scanning all my
bullshit in a millisecond. He glances at the chair and then back to me, and as
I sink into it I reach into my pocket and pull out 75 cents and drop it into
the jar.
    He
then returns to the resume and continues as though nothing has happened. “So,
I’d like you to tell me exactly what you remember about the years approaching
your demise. I assume your memory is somewhat blotchy, correct? And I’ll also
need to know precisely what a shitbird is, and why,
not to mention where, they seemingly carry change?”
    Yep,
I think to myself, I have just been ‘ fuckened ’.
    Deedy was equivalent to my afterlife, as
meeting Linda in life. Not that we milkshaked all
over each other, but that his impact was instant and measurable. He had put me
in my place, but also at ease simultaneously. He is not like any man I’ve ever
remembered meeting. To my amazement (since I only heard of these men in fairy
tales, he’s no bull-shitter and won’t try to con me. He can be frustrating,
sometimes a little condescending, and seems to be amused by me but he’s never
even tried to use manipulation, mind-games, or his own ego against me. I would
not call him nice, or sweet, or polite; yet he made me feel comfortable, even
as he was chastising me for my potty mouth. I would say it’s like meeting a
member of