Chapter 26: Ruthie's Only Choice

Throughout April, Mike quietly continued driving Sam's truck around campus and collecting money from meters. It was a routine that he started to enjoy, apart from the extra income that he was taking in. He spent his afternoons listening to news on the radio, took breaks when he wanted, and spent most of his time working alone. He could certainly see why Sam had no ambition to do anything else, because it was not a high-pressure life.

Nevertheless, Mike realized that he would need to start taking a ticketing machine with him, because the freeloaders of Lot Econ-A had noticed that he no longer was out there to harass them. Meter collections began to drop as students returned to the lot and found their cars had been parked all day and were not ticketed. No, that wouldn't do. Those meters were Mike's main source of personal income and those little bastards had no right to just sit there and not pay. Starting on the fifth week of Sam's vacation, Mike always took a ticketing machine with him when he worked the meters and spent as much time writing tickets as he spent emptying canisters. He started working hard again, not because of his old determination to persecute the rich crowd, but because he wanted to make sure the meters (especially the ones that were jammed) always got paid.

During the sixth week of Sam's absence, Mike accelerated both his ticketing and his collections. He figured out how to jam meters himself without making it look suspicious, and in doing so took in an extra couple hundred dollars per day. He assumed that Sam would be back next week and with his co-worker's return, his "perk" would come to an end.

It turned out Sam wasn't coming back. The department director took advantage of his absence to force him into retirement. Over the next several weeks Mike would hear enough rumors and gossip to figure out that Sam was forced out because of his health insurance premiums, which had been set up decades before during a time there still was money in personnel budgets for that type of thing. It was ironic that had Sam known about the health insurance issue, he easily could have paid the premiums from the money he was taking out of the meters. However, because the manager considered Sam an honest and loyal employee, he assumed that there was no way Sam had the extra income needed to pay those high premiums. It was easier to push him into retirement.

Mike was aghast when he realized what the department had done to his mentor. He also felt very guilty about his role in facilitating Sam's removal, because it was obvious that he had been selected not to assist Sam, but to replace him. Neither Mike nor Sam had any clue that was what had been plotted in the front office. When he found out the full story, he wanted to call Sam and apologize, but ... apologize for what? That he had been the pawn that was used by the director to make sure Sam could be pushed out the door?

Mike knew that the department, on paper at least, would save a bundle by replacing Sam with a student employee. Mike's pay went up only slightly and he was not eligible for any benefits. Also, Mike would be even easier to replace than Sam if he ever ended up costing the department too much in wages.

Throughout the final weeks of the semester Mike noticed that two other older employees of the parking department had disappeared, also forced into retirement, no doubt. By the beginning of May noticed that the dispatcher was not her usual smirky sarcastic self. At the end of the semester, she too would be gone.

Because Mike was more observant than most of the other student employees, he could understand how truly corrupt the parking department was. The department was a money-making machine, and yet it did not share any of its income with the rest of the university. Obviously a huge amount of money had been spent to build the parking garage, but a lot of that expense had been funded with credit and not paid up front. As for everything else ... the parking trucks were old and in poor condition, the meters were all older (which was part of the reason some of them were always jammed), and the parking lots received only minimal maintenance. So where was all the money going? Not to the employees, that was for sure, because the students were earning barely more than minimum wage and had no benefits. Well, conditions in the main office totally contrasted with what was outside. The secretaries had the newest computers and office furniture and the director had an oak desk. Mike started noticing what the office staff was driving to work. All of them had very nice cars. So ... that was what the efforts of Mike and his co-workers were paying for: a fancy office and fancy cars for the director and his favorite staff members. As Sam had said:

"Ain't spending it on us, that's for sure."

So ... at the beginning of the seventh week of Sam's absence, Officer #36's temporary assignment became permanent. Permanent, in a manner of speaking, because he could be dismissed at any moment. But, as long as he could hold onto his job, Mike would grab as much money as he could and pad his savings. He wouldn't think about the future, because the future would come soon enough. He would concentrate on the money, because to have money was to have power and control over one's own fate.

As he stared at the growing stacks of rolled quarters hidden in the wardrobe of his dorm room, a thought crossed his mind: the possibility of helping his dad make mortgage payments. Why not? If he continued with his new gig into the foreseeable future, why couldn't he use some of those quarters to give back to his dad?

Mike pondered what to do. The problem with helping his parents was that Mr. Sinclair would want to know where he was getting the money. If he suspected that Mike was obtaining his money from doing something illegal, he would angrily refuse it. Mr. Sinclair always had been scrupulously honest and would berate his son for touching "dirty money". There was some hypocrisy in his attitude, because of what he was planning to do to his lender when they foreclosed. However, he considered his slight-of-hand with the "underwater mortgage" payback to an economic system that had betrayed him, and thus different from what his son was doing: stealing money outright.

Still, it was a relief for Mike to think that he no longer was worried about his own finances and instead had enough money to start worrying about those around him. Another pleasant thought occurred to him: he now was in a position to help his girlfriend. If she wanted to, Ruthie could tell Jake Burns to go fuck himself. At the rate he was bringing in money, Mike would have enough to pay her tuition as well as his own and still have plenty to spare. As for living in the dorm next year, there would be no need for that. He'd get an apartment and simply have her move in with him.

Ruthie did notice the ongoing change in her boyfriend's fortunes. Now, if he wanted something, he bought it. If she wanted something, he bought it. That became especially apparent when Mike and Ruthie went to his parents' house to celebrate Easter and Mike treated his entire family to a catered Easter dinner. The food was the best food anyone sitting at the table had eaten for a long time and must have cost Mike a small fortune. Ruthie noticed that her boyfriend's parents were grateful for their son's generosity. However, they also appeared bewildered concerning where he could have earned the money. Mike sensed his father's unease, so he talked about the change of assignment at his job as though it were a major promotion and told them that he had received a big raise.

Ruthie wondered what really was going on at Mike's job, because back in January Mike had mentioned that he was working with one of the older employees and it did not seem like his meter job was that big of a deal. Now all of a sudden it was a big deal, and there was no further mention of that older co-worker. She knew that something was going on.

However, she decided not to confront him about it. It was nice to see him not so bitter about his life, and even nicer to be dating a person that had some money and was willing to spend it on her. There was one favor in particular that convinced her to not ask questions. A few days after Easter, she had a bad toothache. Two mornings later he drove her to Santa Cruz and took her to his dentist. It turned out she needed two fillings. Ruthie objected, knowing that there was no way she could afford two fillings and X-rays. The hygienist gave her a strange look.

"Ms. Burns, it's been taken care of. Your boyfriend just paid."

"He did? How much was it?"

The hygienist looked at her clipboard. "Looks like it was $537 dollars."

" ... and he paid it? All of it? Just like that?"

"Yes. Paid in cash. Why? Is there a problem?"

Ruthie shook her head. Bewildered by her boyfriend's generosity, she lay back in the chair and winced as the Novocain was injected into her jaw.

As April progressed and the end of the semester loomed ever closer, Ruthie understood how totally dependent she had become on Mike. There was no way she had wanted that to happen, but it seemed that her life had not given her any choice. All of her attempts to reach out to anyone other than her boyfriend were rebuffed. Most people were not nearly as rude to her as Shannon had been, but it was clear that everyone Ruthie talked to, especially other college students, simply were not interested in getting to know her.

She knew that there were guys who would have been interested in her, but only for the same reason that piece of shit at Junior Prom had been interested in her. She knew that she was physically attractive and that there were guys who would have brushed aside her creepy personality if they could use her for their own sexual relief. She wanted no part of that. The squalid experience on that dirt road two years before was a sufficiently painful lesson for her. There was no way she'd want to risk going through that again.