Chapter 53: New Trouble

On Monday morning I met Stephanie, the accounts payable clerk whose cubicle I had been occupying while she was on vacation. Miss McGomery introduced us. "Stephanie, this is Sammy. He's helping us out this summer. Sammy, we'll have to move you to the office next to Rose Ann but it will only be temporary. You can use her cubicle when she takes her vacation."

Stephanie squinted at me and wrinkled her nose before exclaiming, "What happened to Mister Oslo?"

I didn't know who Mister Oslo was but I was soon to find out. Mister Oslo was one of the many furry animals that occupied every spare shelf in Stephanie's cubicle. The thing that I noticed about Stephanie, even in her panic state of despair over the disappearance of Mister Oslo, was her ass. From the way it stuck out behind her I was sure that someone with a giant cock had jammed it in her so far that her ass had no place to go but backwards. I was admiring her ass when she caught me staring at it. "What did you do with Mister Oslo?" She demanded to know.

"Was that the one sitting on top of the monitor? I put it in a cabinet because it kept falling off," I said, opening the cabinet door and showing her that Mister Oslo was safely tucked inside.

Showing alarm that Mister Oslo had been confined to darkness for the past two weeks, Stephanie retrieved the little dog and spoke to it in a little girl voice that made me cringe. "Did the mean boy make you stay in the dark, Mister Oslo?"

What Miss McGomery had described as the office next to Rose Ann's cube was really a makeshift table that had been set up in the aisle. I worked there, listening to the three A/P clerks talk amongst them selves and on the telephone. Miss McGomery was the supervisor but she deferred disputes with vendors to Rose Ann for settlement and disputes within the company to Stephanie. When a question arose, I relied upon Rose Ann to guide me. Miss McGomery was too busy to be interrupted. Stephanie was too aggravated with me for what I had done to Mister Oslo to be bothered.

That afternoon Josh and I played tennis with the Baldwin sisters. Jeanie and I beat all takers. I noticed that the sisters were not mentioning their boyfriends, not as often as before anyway. While taking a break I noticed Paula talking to Orville. Jessica noticed it too. "You should warn him about her," she said to me, in a low voice that could not be overheard by her sisters or Josh. She reminded me about Paula at four o'clock when I left to work out with Orville. "Make sure you tell him," she said.

But telling Orville that Paula would fuck him and then make his life miserable was not as easy as it sounded. It wasn't like we were buddies; I hardly knew him. What if there was no attraction between him and Paula? My warning would have been for naught. I decided to wait and see.

That night I entertained myself with Francis Bacon essays, setting Shakespeare and Montaigne aside. I was rereading Of Envy when there was a knock on my door. Thinking it might be Mr. Oldham; I hid the Bacon book and picked up Montaigne before stepping to the door and opening it, the book in hand. What would it have mattered if he had seen the Bacon book?

He stood there, meeting my eyes with his and for a second I thought I saw what Ned had warned me about. It was a vacant look. Should I invite him into my room? It was his house. If he wanted to come in he would. He had never been to my room before. All of this ran through my mind as I looked into his eyes, searching for I knew not what.

"This one will break the monotony of Montaigne," Mr. Oldham said, handing me a book. "Don't tell Suz I loaned it to you. Her appreciation of fine literature is limited," he said as he turned to leave.

"Thank you, Sir," I called after him.

I looked at the cover of the book, Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck, and wondered what Suzanne could find objectionable about me reading the Steinbeck book.

Stephanie was still cool towards me on Tuesday. She told Miss McGomery and Rose Ann little tidbits about what she had done on vacation. It sounded like ten percent beaches and ninety percent nightlife to me. She gave me a scornful look when she caught me checking out her legs. Well, I didn't look up but I caught the look out of the corner of my eye.

"How old are you?" She confronted me the next time she caught me. I was looking directly into her eyes with a sidelong glance at her breasts. Well, her eyes were not that interesting.

"Sixteen," I answered her. Our exchange caught the attention of Miss McGomery, who shushed us.

Everyone in the vicinity heard Suzanne exclaim about my working conditions. "They have you in the hallway. This is deplorable," she said, speaking to me, making two heads appear from their cubicle openings. Stephanie was tall enough to see over the walls of her cube.

Miss McGomery was the first to speak. "It's only temporary, Miss Cummings."

"Sammy can use my cubicle. I'll be on vacation next week anyway," Rose Ann chimed in. Stephanie's eyes disappeared behind the walls of her cubicle.

"Are you ready to go, Honey?" Suzanne said to me, dismissing Miss McGomery's explanation and Rose Ann's offer.

It was ten minutes until twelve but I cleared off my workspace and said goodbye to my workmates. All heads were down as we left the department but I was sure we were being watched. Suzanne was wearing a black dress that I liked, with dark stockings and her hair arranged loosely, down over her forehead and in back of her ears. I didn't tell her how sexy she looked.

"Do you think these stockings are becoming on me?" Suzanne asked, holding the back of her dress up so I could see the seams of the stockings. We were at her apartment where she was going to change clothes.

"Yes, I do," I said.

"Do you think I should wear them more often?"

"Yes, ma'am," I said.

"Do you think they should turn on your uncle?"

"Yes, ma'am," I said and she left me, seemingly satisfied with my answers.

There was something about the approach to the eighth green that gave Suzanne the urge to converse. "Have you given more consideration to the adoption, Sammy?"

I was taken back. "Gee, I didn't know I was supposed to give it consideration," I said.

"All that remains to be done is for you to tell John that you agree for him to adopt you and for your mother to give her consent. Otherwise, everyone has signed off and it will become official in a month or six weeks."

I didn't dare take my shot, not in my condition, shaking as I was. I walked around, stared at the green, surveyed the distance to the sand trap and looked behind us to see if other golfers were waiting for me to do something. "What do I have to do?" I asked, hoping Suzanne would speak clearly.

"Repeat after me, 'Uncle John, it would be an honor if you would adopt me.'"

"Is that all there is to it?"

"Say it," Suzanne said.

"Uncle John, it would be an honor if you would adopt me."

"Now all we have to do is to get your mother to agree to let John adopt you."

"I'll take care of that," I volunteered. I didn't want anyone else contacting her, not Priscilla Baker nor Judge Clausen. If she said no I wanted to be the one who heard her say it. If she cried I wanted to be the one she cried to. Suzanne nodded, telling me that she understood my reasons for being the one to contact my mother.

We played the rest of the round, poorly.

I wanted to put my small part in the adoption process behind me. I practiced my speech a few times, silently at first and then out loud. I wanted to say my speech with Suzanne present, preferably in public. Dinner at the club was the perfect place.

"Uncle John, it would be an honor if you would adopt me," I said as soon as we were seated. Mr. Oldham put his menu down and looked at me. As it turned out, he had a speech prepared for me too.

"This will never be a father and son relationship, Sammy. We're both way past that. I'm not going to replace your father and you won't take the place of my son. I won't take you fishing. But I will love you and provide for you. In return, I expect you to accept my guidance and always do your best. Are those terms agreeable to you?"

"Yes, Sir," I said and that would have concluded our business if it had not been for Suzanne. "Sammy wants to be the one who tells his mother about this," she said.

Mr. Oldham's face took on a sour expression, like the subject was distasteful to him. "Are you sure you want to undertake that task, Sammy?"

"Yes, Sir. I want her to hear it from me. I can convince her that it is something I want," I said.

He nodded to signal that the conversation was concluded.

Every so often I had to stop and think how lucky I was to be Sammy Oldham, nephew of John Oldham. Wednesday morning was one of those times. When I walked into the accounting department I had three accounts payable clerks vying for my attention. All three females offered me a place to sit in their cubicle. I couldn't choose one over the other two so I said I would spread my visits among them, starting with Miss McGomery because she was the supervisor. This solution seemed to satisfy them although Stephanie expressed discontent when she learned that I did not work on Friday and she would have to wait until Monday to share her workspace with me. The fact that my computer would need to be moved each morning didn't faze my three coworkers.

Miss McGomery and I chatted amiably as we confirmed the legitimacy of each claim for payment, double-checked the account to be charged and entered the amounts owed into the file for the next check run. Miss McGomery leaned close to me and spoke in whispers so as not to disturb the other two clerks. I spoke in my normal voice; sure that what I had to say about any number of topics was being filed to memory for future use by Rose Ann and Stephanie. I was careful to answer Miss McGomery's questions with simple answers that would not trip me up if the same question was posed by one of the other clerks. "Do you have a girlfriend, Sammy?" "Yes." "What is her name?" "Becky." "How long have you known her?" "Two years." "Will you tell Miss Cummings that we have rectified your workspace conditions?" "Yes," I lied.

Josh broke the bad news as soon as he saw me that afternoon. Our Saturday night chess match would have to be cancelled that week because he was spending the weekend with his grandparents. He said that he had tried to get out of going but his mother said it would mean a lot to her parents if he let them take him to his favorite restaurant and buy him things he needed for school. He told me how much he was going to miss spending the evening with me. I told him to have a good time with his grandparents. We would play chess another time.

On Thursday morning I moved my computer into Rose Ann's cubicle and she devoted most of her morning to furthering my accounts payable education. Stephanie interrupted us to ask me to check the cabling in her cubicle to make sure that I would be able to connect my computer on Monday. "I'm sorry about accusing you of taking Mister Oslo," she said. "That's all right," I said, adding, "I'm sorry that I let you catch me staring at your ass." She laughed. Later, she startled us. "Rose Ann, why don't you sit in his lap?" Stephanie said, making Rose Ann move her chair two inches away from mine.

The job was boring but my coworkers were doing their best to make it interesting for me. Being Mr. Oldham's nephew had its advantages. If it were not for the fresh air in the park calling I would have volunteered to hang around the office.

It was nearing five o'clock when I spotted Colleen walking toward us. Josh saw her too and looked at me, probably to find out if he should make himself scarce. "Stick around," I said to him, thinking that I knew what she wanted. "You may learn something." He seemed pleased that I was not sending him away.

"Sammy, you're filthy again," Colleen said, looking at Josh and then back to me. She was wearing another maternity smock, much like the one she had worn to my room on Sunday afternoon.

I laughed. "Do you want to give me a bath, Colleen?"

She reddened. "I would like to give you more than a bath," she said, surprising me.

"Did you hear that, Josh? Colleen has the hots for me," I said, making both of them blush but it did nothing to deter them from wanting to see where our little exchange would lead.