Bad Choices

by Rob Harasymchuk

CHAPTER THREE

At the corner of Blakeny and 7th Avenue, instead of turning towards Dover Glen and home, I kept on straight until the highway junction. From there I took a wide grid road north and settled in for the short ride out to the Dunns. Bits of gravel and tiny stones pinged against the underside of the truck.

The open bottle between my legs was cold next to my thighs. I’d picked up two beer in a bag when I stopped in at Trippers to tell Carl that I’d be later than I thought. My delay didn’t seem to bother him much. He was sitting at a table with a couple other guys from work. I didn’t need to do a count to know that Carl had already spent the majority of his lottery ticket winnings. His eyes were glassy and the edges of his words were rounded and a bit slurred.

I didn’t know for sure what time it was, but only a third of the sun could be seen above the horizon. My jaw popped and cracked when I yawned. I rubbed my aching knee and could feel the thick ridges of scar through my pants. I wondered how much longer the damaged joint of mine could stand this kind of pace before it seized up and quit working altogether.

The longer I drove, the more my mood soured. I was tired and pissed off, yet in a few minutes I was expected to become Quentin’s answer to Dr. Phil. I wanted to be with Carl, get drunk, and forget about everything for a little while. After the day I had, if anyone needed the bald doctor’s belligerent advice it was me.

I tipped back the bottle and emptied it in three swallows. I rolled down the window, took aim and tossed it. End over end it cartwheeled until smashing against the face of a road sign. It exploded into a shower of brown glass. Satisfied with my toss, I reached across the seat, into the paper bag, and pulled out the other. I lit a cigarette and opened the second bottle, but neither helped soothe my foul temper.

Whoever was in charge of running the universe, I wanted to ask them why they refused to cut me any slack. Maybe the Almighty was testing me to see if I had what it took to be one of His team. Or it could have been that He just had an odd sense of humour. Whatever the reason, after my encounter with Todd, my day kept on with its rapid descent down hill. Had there been a white flag handy, I would have gladly given it a wave and surrendered.

Throughout the day, the hard hours continued to grind on and the more I did, the further behind I seemed to get. There were more angry phone calls, snafus by the bushel, and a series of ill tempered truck drivers. But what had me gnashing my teeth now was something that happened near the end of my shift. Wait. That’s not right. It wasn’t a something that happened, but a someone. Marina Stanley.

It was a custom at Rollins Tool & Die to take on extra staff during the peak seasons and, this may surprise some, it wasn’t uncommon to have women apply for the jobs. I’ve seen them work as welders, painters, equipment assemblers, and one year, my dad worked side by side with a cold-eyed, huge-hootered machinist named Betty.
I admit to having some suggestive posters taped to the inside of my locker, but I don’t have a chauvinistic bone in my body. Equal pay for equal work is my motto, and I don’t care which way someone prefers the toilet seat flipped.

To help out on the loading dock, every spring one of the new hands was given to me. Usually it was some young guy, complete with pimples, an attitude and, I don’t know why I always got them, but they tended to be about as bright as a sack of wet mice. This season, though, was different.

Marina Stanley was still closer to twenty than thirty, but she was, by far, the best assistant I ever had. She worked hard, never complained and she could be trusted to get a job done without me standing over her shoulder watching.

She was from Quentin, too, but I didn’t really know her at all. I was older than Marina, not by a whole lot, but enough that we never traveled it the same circles. I’d heard that she moved away right after graduating from Quentin High to go to university somewhere, but I didn’t know if that was true or not. If it was, I guess she didn’t study hard enough to find herself working at Rollins Tool & Die.
Once they get to know me, most people don’t find me all that offensive. Some even come to like me. This wasn’t the case with Marina. Because someone else made a mistake, Marine came to the conclusion that I was a bit of a jerk off.

One of my responsibilities at the factory was to get the sizes from all the new hires and order them coveralls. I don’t care what she told anyone, but it wasn’t my fault that Marina’s came back from the supplier two sizes too small.

I don’t know what the big deal was anyway. Granted, when Marina had a pair of those coveralls on, it seemed she might spill out of them at any second, but I thought they made her look really hot, especially when she put her hair up into a thick, blonde pony tail. A lot of the other fellas thought so too.