Alicia's Comeuppance

This story is the property of the author. You may keep a copy on your computer for personal enjoyment, however if you wish to publish or distribute the story then you must get the permission of the author.

Alicia's Comeuppance By Chris

Alicia pulled into her driveway after a long week of work, first stopping in front of her garage to take in the moment. She looked out the windshield of her leased new Ford Mustang looking over the house that she had bought over a year ago that was much more that she could afford but she felt like she deserved it with all the work that she put in. She just knew that she was on the cusp of bigger and better things that were to come. The housing market was booming and after another year or so with her current employer, she would have her picks of jobs which would double or even triple her current salary.

She had a degree in process engineering and she was damn good at it, she had her hand in almost everything that the company she worked for manufactured. So she wasn't worried that she lived paycheck to paycheck to pay off her car, house, and all the furniture that she bought to furnish her house. The company needed her more than any other employee in the firm and she made sure that they knew it. She figured that when it came time to go to another job for more money, she would be able sell her house at a nice little profit. Then she would get out of this dinky little town and into the big city where the real money was made. She smiled to herself as she pulled into her garage, she was definitely on her way... or so she thought.

When she got inside of her house, she placed her case with her laptop into the den which she had made into her office. She got her laptop out getting it going so that she could check for any emails from work. There wasn't any but then it had been only about thirty minutes since she left and there wasn't anyone working. But she figured that this was a good habit to get into for when her next job came. From there she went up to her bedroom, getting some of her comfortable clothes out before heading to the bathroom. While she took her shower, she thought about the things that she was working on at work. She had four projects going at once and they could all make the company lots of money if she could find an easy and inexpensive way to manufacture them. That was her job to do and she was determined to get the projects going. She knew that with each project completed successfully, it would only make her resume look that much better. She was stuck in this small city just north of Atlanta, Georgia and she wanted to get into a multinational company that she could make some real money, then and only then would she allow herself to look for a real relationship and stop depending on her fingers to relieve the pressures that built up inside of her.

After making herself a salad, she went back into the den working on the project that was giving her the most trouble. She had talked one of the IT guys into loading all of the companies engineering programs onto her laptop. She really wasn't supposed to have those programs on her personal laptop but since she was the best engineer in the company, no one ever said anything. So she worked for a couple of hours getting lost in her work as she always did. It was only when her back and fingers began to protest did she save all of her work and shut down for the night. She then turned off the lights in the big house and went to bed. There she quickly fell asleep as she always did at night as she was worn out from her mind working all day long.

The next morning, she did as she always did on her days off. She first went to the gym to work out for a couple of hours. Since she spent most of her time at her desk working on her computer, she knew that she needed to get her body some exercise. So she worked her body as hard as she did everything else in her life. She worked until her muscles screamed at her to quit, only then would she stop. Once back home, it was a quick shower then back to work on that tough project which she was getting ever closer to solving. Sunday she replaced the workout with grocery shopping and laundry and then it was back to work.

Monday morning she was back at work feeling good as she had gotten a bunch of work done and thus her projects would be completed well ahead of time which didn't make her very popular with the other two engineers in the company who had families and thus couldn't devote the time away from home on work as she could. She didn't try to show them up but with the way she worked, it made them think that was what she was doing.

If she had paid more attention to what was going around her then she would have seen what she was doing to her fellow engineers. She would also have noticed the owner of the company going around the plant with two well dressed men who had legal pads in their hands filling page after page with notes that morning. This had been going on for the past six months, people coming in and looking around and taking notes, lots of notes. When she went out on the production floor later that day, some of the manufacturing people asked her who these strange men were; she could only shrug her shoulders as she had never seen them, even though they had been in the engineering office for more than an hour that morning.

So the next several weeks went along the same for her, work and more work as that was what she enjoyed the most. She loved figuring out how to make something work and how to get it out the door. So as the workers wondered and worried about all the visitors that the plant was receiving, she went on with her work.

And since she never watched the news, she never heard about how the prices of houses had suddenly started to drop. The price of gasoline had shot through the roof but since she only drove to work and back during the week, then to the gym and grocery store on the weekends, that didn't really affect her either. She was happy in her cocoon and saw the world through rose colored glasses.

So after another weekend spent buried deep in her work, she got up on Monday morning feeling great. She had just finished the last adjustment to a project that she knew would put the company she worked for on the map and just as importantly would put her in a position to do what she had spent the last several years yearning to do, move on to a big engineering firm where she could make the big bucks and maybe even find a nice woman to spend some time with when she wasn't working. She got into her Mustang and headed for work. Her mind was on how she was going to present her project to manufacturing, marketing, and the owner at the design control meeting at ten that morning. She drove around the plant never noticing all the people that were crowded around the back entrance to the plant. She went on to the front, parking in her usual place at the back of the front lot so no one would put a dent into her precious car. She got out of her car getting her bag containing her laptop before heading toward the main entrance to the plant.

It was only then did she see all the office workers standing at the entrance. She hesitated for a moment as she wondered why no one was entering the plant. She first checked her watch to make sure that she wasn't early thus getting there before the foreman of the plant had opened the doors but she saw that it was a quarter to eight, the same time she arrived every morning. She started to walk toward the entrance and the closer she got, she began to hear angry voices, for some reason she felt something begin to eat at her stomach. She looked at the faces and she saw anger on some of them but what scared her was the fear she saw in most of the faces. When she got close enough to hear what was being said, she first heard, "How can he do that." Then she heard, "I can't lose my job, my husband needs the insurance."

Alicia hurried her pace wanting to know what was going on. Her stomach was now working overtime as she felt the acid begin to churn. She tried to find someone that she knew as even though she had been with the company for over five years now, she knew relatively few of the people that worked there. Unless she worked directly with someone, she had never bothered to learn their names. She finally saw Penny who was the engineering department's clerk, she headed in her direction and when she got to her she saw the tears running down her face.

"What is going on Penny? Why isn't the plant open yet? What are they waiting for; I got a busy day ahead of me." Alicia asked and only then did she see that Penny had this look of absolute fear.

Penny just stood there looking at her yet she could see that Penny wasn't seeing her at all. "Penny, tell me what is going on." Alicia asked her again this time using a stronger and demanding voice.

She could see Penny's eyes finally focus in on her then she just pointed to a paper on the glass doors before walking back toward the parking lot.

Alicia went over to the door as a man and woman turned away from it, Alicia heard the women say, "I guess all the rumors were right after all. What are we going to do now Joe?" She asked of the man.

"I guess we start looking for a job just like the rest of the plant, that's all we can do." Alicia heard the man say but she could hear the defeat in his voice like he knew there were no other jobs out there to get.

She turned her attention to the paper taped to the inside of the door. She read the single sentence that was written there then she had to read it again as she didn't believe what she read the first time. The second time she read the sentence, she found that the words hadn't changed but the meaning became clear. She forced herself to read the sentence one more time, this time aloud so that she could see and hear the words.

"The company has been sold, all positions have been terminated." Alicia read aloud then she said to no one in particular, "But I have the product that will put this company on the map."

"No Alicia, the new owners have a product that will put their company on the map; you have what the rest of us has, nothing but unemployment checks for as long as they last." Willie, one of the other engineers, said to her.

"Not me, I'll have a new job by the end of the week. I know that I can find any number of companies that will hire me in a flash." Alicia said as she convinced herself that was the case.

"Alicia, haven't you been watching what is going on. The economy is in the tank, no one is hiring, they are laying off or firing people left and right, including engineers, and even engineers as good as you are being let go." Willie told her.

"That may be but just you watch I'll have a job by the end of the week!" She said as she turned on her heels stomping past the other people standing there crying and bemoaning their fate. She gave them a compendious look as she went by them. "Let them feel sorry for themselves, I'm going to get my ass out of this damn town." She thought to herself.

As she started her car, she looked once more at the plant that she had cut her teeth learning the in and outs of process engineering. "This isn't a big deal, I was planning on leaving this company soon anyway, this just bumps up the schedule. They can have their unemployment checks, I won't need them." She jerked the car into reverse and backed out of her parking space. She peeled out of the parking lot wanting to hurry home to put the final touches on her resume so that she could get it out there for her new employer to see, whoever that may be.

She entered her house in a rush going straight to the den to start her new life. She opened her laptop, inserting her internet card as she turned it on. As it got started, she went to the kitchen to get herself a coke to drink as she knew that she would be on the net for most of the day. She first jazzed up her resume making sure that she listed all the projects that she had worked on and how well they sold, thus showing just how great an engineer that she was. Once that was done, she went out to all the job sites posting her resume and checking for any engineering openings. She was surprised how few there were for engineers in general and fewer still for process engineers. The last time she had looked for jobs in her fields, about a year ago, there were hundreds of companies looking for engineers just like her. The few that she did find didn't sound all that great so she passed them by looking for something better. She then went to some of the bigger engineering companies and she submitted her resume there even though none of them were hiring. That didn't deter her as she just knew that once they saw her resume, then they would come calling. She spent most of the day on her computer just going from one place to another trying to find the best companies to submit her resume.

She didn't stop until a little before six, when she got up to fix herself some dinner as she was getting hungry since she had worked through lunch wanting to make sure she had her name out there for her future employer to see and then give her a call. She fixed herself a salad before returning to the den where she turned on the TV. She found that the news was coming on so she decided to watch it for a few minutes before going back to her computer. It had been months since she had last watched the news and she wanted to see if they would mention the closing of her company. She figured that it would be the lead story on the local news but it wasn't. The lead story was about one of the local banks being taken over by the FDIC as it had gone under due to the bad loans and even worse investment that they had made. The name sounded somewhat familiar to Alicia so as they talked about it on the news, she went pulled out her checkbook and found that was the bank that she banked at.

It was also the bank that she had originally gotten her house loan from but the loan had since been sold to some holding company that had a weird name. She began to pay more attention to the news as they went from there to a big company in Atlanta that was laying off half of its work force. It was only then that they mentioned her company that had been sold and the new owners had shut down the plant putting over three hundred people out of work. Alicia began to get a bad feeling about things and when the national news came on a few minutes later, she became really concerned. They first talked about the eight hundred point drop in the Dow. From there the news was about the number of people who had lost their jobs since the first of the year and how everyone said that the nation was entering a recession if it wasn't already in one. They interviewed one man who had been out of work for a year and still he couldn't find anything in his field of work. He was about to tell what field that was when she turned off the TV as she was afraid that it would be hers.

She got back on her computer so that she could put her resume out to every company that she could find. She was determined to not leave one rock unturned. And so that was how her week was spent, if she wasn't on the computer, then she was out in her car going to every factory in the surrounding area. No one was hiring and most wouldn't even take her resume as they had no plans to hire in the future no matter how good she was.

When the following Monday came around, Alicia found herself looking at her bills and wondering how she was going to pay them. As much as she hated the thought, she knew she needed some money coming in so she did what she said she wasn't going to do and that was to apply for unemployment. The money would help but not save her. She needed a job that paid at least as much as her old job. She was already living paycheck to paycheck and now that paycheck was no more. So she first paid for her cell phone and her internet card as she needed to have those to keep looking for a job. She reduced the amount that she paid on her car lease and her mortgage. The credit cards were last and they only got the minimum payment which she knew she was going to get killed with the interest rate but that was the price she was going to have to pay.

She kept an eye on the news and that only brought more bad news. The Dow was dropping eight hundred points one day then gave five hundred back the next only to lose seven hundred the following day. More and more companies were laying off and that meant that there was that much more competition for jobs that were available. Alicia felt her spirits begin to sag but then she would pump herself back up with the knowledge that she was the best engineer in her field and that would be her salivation. She just had to find her way through this tight spot.

About a month and half into her unemployment, she was no closer to finding a job and she had long since run out of cash to buy food so she knew she needed to bring in more money to buy some food and try and keep the utilities from being turned off. One way she could add to her income was to start selling some things inside of her home. So she went to the paper taking out an advertisement for a yard sale for that coming weekend. Then that Friday, she got a couple of the neighbor boys to help her move everything that she could do without to the garage and some to the front yard. This included some of her furniture that was more for show and she didn't use. The only TV that she kept was the small twenty inch that she kept in the bedroom. The other TV's went on sale, even the big screen TV that she never had time to watch but she thought that she just had to have.

So that Friday morning, she opened the garage door to find people waiting to buy and they all wanted to chew down the prices more than she already had. She wanted to get as much out of the things but she quickly learned that if she was going to get anyone to buy anything was to mark the items way down. Most went for about a third of what she paid for it but she was becoming desperate for money. She was out of cash and the food in her pantry was down to just a couple items that she didn't like. All of her unemployment checks were going to pay what she could on her bills. By the end of the day she had sold most of her items, so that evening she worked to bring some more down to sell. It was killing her to do this but at least she was making enough money to continue a little further.

Saturday she got more people coming and they started to ask about any clothes items she may have. So she went back into her house, pulling out anything she thought would sell. She would have been able to sell more of her things if she was a little bigger but she had always stayed in shape so most of her clothes wouldn't fit the women wanting or needing clothes. But then she got lucky when an older woman came who had a granddaughter who was Alicia's size. So she took the women up to her bedroom letting her pick out what she wanted. Alicia about cried when the women picked out most of her favorite things and she wanted to say no, but money was talking and she was listening. So the woman got almost everything that she picked out at bargain prices.

All the money she made, she hid away. She knew that she should put it to her bills but she was coming to the realization that she might be out of work for a while and that money would come in handy. Plus she didn't make enough on the yard sale to catch up with her bills so it made no sense to put everything on her bills when the next payment would have even less to send as she would have to use some of her unemployment check to buy food.

The next thing that she had to do and she hated doing it was to make a trip down to the reality company to put her beautiful home up for sale. She told them the amount of money that she needed to pay off the house but the man there told her that is was a buyer's market so she would be lucky to get even close to what she owed. As much as Alicia wanted to tell him to forget it then but she couldn't, instead she said to list it for her asking price and she would lower the price if need be. She hated to have to do these things but she was against the wall so she had to do something until she could find a new job that she still felt was just around the corner.

So the next month the companies that she owed money to got more partial payments some getting even less than they had the previous month and that started the phone calls. She got calls several times a day and into the evening from the companies that she owed money to and from bill collectors telling her that she had to make full payments or risk losing her home and car. The only bill she paid in full was her cell phone and internet card as those was the things that she had to have. She also started to look for a job that would pay more than her unemployment check. But even that proved harder than she thought it would be. No one was hiring engineers and they weren't hiring anyone else. She changed her resume for some of the places she applied to going for an entry level position figuring that she could get into a company and then into the engineering department. She told the companies that she would take anything but they told her that they just weren't hiring.

It was three months to the day from when she had lost her job that she woke up hearing noises outside. She got up putting on her jeans and tee shirt to see what was going on. She looked outside of her front door and saw a tow truck backed up to her car which she had left out in the driveway instead of putting it in the garage the day before as she was in a hurry to see if she had gotten a email about a job. Even though it had turned cold that morning she rushed outside without a jacket.

"Just what the hell do you think you're doing?" Alicia demanded of the big burly man that was hooking her car to his tow truck.

"Reprocessing your car ma'am, if you would be so kind as to get me the keys I would appreciate it." He said to her.

"You're crazy if you think I'm going to help you reprocess my car. I need it to find another job." Alicia told him as he crawled from under her car.

"The keys ma'am," He just said and Alicia could see his name on the patch on his shirt.

"Earl I need that car. I can't find a job without it and if I don't find a job then I can't pay the lease payments. Just give me a little more time. You see the company I worked for shut down and with the way the economy is, I'm having trouble finding another one." She told him trying anything to keep her car.

"I'm sorry about you losing your job but this isn't up to me. I'm just doing my job and if I don't then someone else will come and get it. I need to make a living just as much as you do. I'm really am sorry for all your troubles but you'll need to talk to the dealer about getting your car back. The keys please so I can get on my way." He said as he hit the lever that lifted the front of her car up.

"Please don't do this..." Alicia said trying not to cry in front of the man.

"I have to." He told her and she could see that she wasn't going to win here. He was holding all the cards and he had her car ready to be towed.

"I'll get the keys." Alicia said as she turned to go back to her house. She had to bite her lip to keep from crying as she was seeing all her dreams going down the drain. Her hands were shaking as she pulled the keys from her purse. She had to stop and will them to stop shaking as she made her way back outside. Once there, she saw several of her neighbors looking out their doors at the scene and she didn't want to give them any more of a show. She just asked Earl if she could get her stuff out and he allowed her to do so. Then he took off with her car and she saw her livelihood going with him. She grabbed the stuff that she had gotten from her car, taking it inside and it was only then that she let the tears begin to fall. She was leaning up against the door and she just slid down to the floor with her head in her hands crying for all she was worth.

She stayed by the door for the longest time before getting up and going back to her bed. There she curled up under the covers trying to make all the bad things go away but she knew that they wouldn't. She was in real trouble now and the next thing that they would be taking away from her would be her house. The next morning she hit the computer harder, sending her resume to every company that she found a listing for. She didn't leave one untouched. She just keeping doing a search for different types of companies and she sent them a resume, no matter where they were located. She didn't know how she was going to get to them if she got a response but she figured that she would figure that out when the time came. She did get a response from time to time but most of what she got was an email telling her that they weren't hiring. Others that showed some interest were for things that she had no experience in. She told them that she was a quick learner and she could take classes to become the engineer that they needed but they wanted someone experienced in what they manufactured and she had only worked in a medical manufacturing firm.

It was another two months when money ran out and her unemployment checks ended. Then she was forced to get a job, any job and it had to be close as she had no car. The only place that she knew that was within walking distance was an Independent Dollar Store that sold about anything and everything and it was only about a mile and half away.

So the next morning, she got dressed choosing a dress that wouldn't look too expensive but still nice, not that she had much left to chose from. She put on a pair of flats grabbing her coat as she went out the door. It was a short walk to the main highway and there she turned right walking on the sidewalk for about a mile until she came to the store. She had started doing some of her shopping there since they had cheap stuff and this store also sold food items that the big chain stores couldn't sell because the cans were dented or the boxes was crushed. These were the types of items that she had been living on for the past couple of months. She had noticed that there had been a help wanted sign for a stocking clerk on the front window and she was relieved to see that it was still there. She took a deep breath hating to what she knew she had to do. She put a smile on her face as she entered the store.

She asked the first employee that she saw about applying for the job and was directed to the office in the back. So there she went trying to keep the smile on her face and hating the thought of having to work someplace like this. She had an engineering degree and here she was about to beg for a job that only required a high school degree if that. But it was a job and that just might help her to keep her home but that was a big might. She knocked and she heard a voice that had a deep country Georgian accent telling her to come in.

She opened the door and she saw this young woman sitting at the desk. The woman looked to be her age, in her late twenties, and she was simply dressed. She had this pleasant smile on her face and as she stood up, Alicia could see that she was pretty in a plain way but nice all the same. She had nice breasts and Alicia could see that if she could lose about fifteen pounds, she would have a very nice looking body. Alicia had always been slim and never had to worry about those extra pounds that some women did and sometimes she wondered why those women couldn't lose those pounds. Alicia never saw the way that the woman was giving her a quick once over before she introduced herself.

"I'm Kellie Jo Manning, I'm the assistant Manager. How can I help you this morning?" Kellie Jo asked.

"I'm Alicia Hanes and I want to apply for the position that you have open." She said as she reached out her hand to shake Kellie Jo's hand.

"Have a seat and let's talk then." Kellie Jo said as she sat down reaching into one of the desk drawers to pull some papers out.

"Have you ever worked retail before?" she asked Alicia.

"No I'm afraid not. I'm actually a process engineer by trade but I haven't been able to find a job." She replied seeing the frown come across Kellie Jo's face. Alicia knew she was going to have to do some quick talking or she would be out the door before she knew it.

"I'm sorry about you losing your job. Everyone is having a hard time nowadays but I don't think this is something for you. I mean you are so over qualified for something like this." Kellie Jo told her.

"I know I'm over qualified but I need this job and I will work hard for you. I'm going to lose my house and I have already lost my car. I just need something to keep me going until I can get back on my feet." Alicia told her.

"And what will I do when you do find that job and leave me without anyone. I'll be back where I am now looking for a good employee who will stick around. You see where I'm coming from don't you. I'm sorry that I can't help you." Kellie Jo said as she stood up thus ending the interview.

"Please give me a chance, I need a job. I promise that I will work so hard for you. Whatever you ask of me I'll do. I understand your fear of me up and leaving but I don't think that will be anything soon with the way the job market is right now." Alicia said hoping that she was wrong but she was desperate at this point and was willing to say anything to get the job. "Take a chance on me and I'll show you that you what I can do, you won't regret it."

Alicia looked her over and Alicia could see that she had made some inroads thus making Kellie Jo at least reconsider her decision. "We work weird hours and I may have to call you in on your day off, will you turn me down or come running?"

"I'll come running. I won't ever turn you down if you need me." Alicia said as she gave Kellie Jo her most confident smile.

Kellie Jo looked her over again and her eyes seemed to bore into Alicia. She felt those eyes going into her soul and she could see that Kellie Jo wasn't someone that you could bullshit. Alicia began to wonder if it was such a good idea to want this job and having to work under this young woman. When she first saw her, she thought that she could talk her way into this job and then out work her like she did at her old job. But seeing the determination and experience in the eyes of Kellie Jo, she wondered if anyone could out work her or get anything past her. Just when she thought Kellie Jo had decided to turn her down, she saw Kellie Jo's face soften and Alicia knew she had a job, a terrible job but a job all the same.

"I need someone to restock the shelves, come on and I'll show you what to do." Kellie Jo said as she came from behind her desk.

"You won't regret this." Alicia said feeling relieved and worried at the same time.

"I had better not." Kellie Jo warned her and Alicia felt a chill go through her body.

Kellie Jo took her back to the stock room which was stacked high with boxes and was much cooler than the store. Kellie Jo showed her the things that needed to be put out and then she showed her where they were to go. She then told her to get at it as it should have been put out by the previous stock clerk but she had to let her go for not getting things stocked well or quick enough. She then returned to her office leaving Alicia standing there in the middle of the store with the cashiers staring at her.

Alicia knew that Kellie Jo was testing her figuring that she wouldn't last the day and Alicia so wanted to prove her right as this was the last place she wanted to be and the last thing that she wanted to do as she was better than a damn stock clerk. However she knew that she needed the money so she swallowed her pride and got to work. Plus there was something about Kellie Jo that got to her. It was like she could see the soft part of her and that part she liked but there was a harder core there that she almost feared.

When she got home late that evening, she was tired, dirty, and almost defeated by the demeaning work that she was forced to do. She hated having to swallow her pride and appear to be happy even as the other girls in the store seemed to look down on her. Even Kellie Jo seemed to look down on her and that bothered her the most. In any other situation, Alicia knew she would ignore such people and would put them in their place in a second but now the roles were reversed and everyone knew it including herself. She was in their world now and that changed the dynamics of her world.

She had gotten the mail on her way in so she began to go through it. Most she could tell were from bill collectors and those she put to the side, then she got to the last envelope and it was a thick one. She looked at the return address and found that it was from the company that held her mortgage. Her heart stopped for a second as she knew what was inside. She wanted to not open it but that wouldn't change anything so she tore the envelope open and there was what she had most feared, which was a foreclosure notice. She had thirty days to catch up with her mortgage or they would take her house. She knew that she was up shits creek now. The company had wasted no time in foreclosing on her home. She had only been late for a few months but yet here they wanted their money, money that she didn't have to give them.

Alicia wanted to scream at the injustice of it all and she wanted to fight the company. She went to the den sitting down trying to figure out a way to do just that. She got on the internet looking for places that she could go to for help. She found several places that could help her reduce her payment if she had gotten caught up with those varying rates but she had a fixed rate so that didn't apply. Plus it wasn't that the interest rate had risen thus increasing her house payment that put her in this situation, she just couldn't make any payment. She thought about hiring a lawyer to fight it but she didn't have the money to do so. She then thought about filing for bankruptcy but then she thought about how it would ruin her credit and still not save her home. She slowly realized that with the late and partial payments that she had been making, her credit was probably already ruined. In the end she knew that she could probably fight it for a while but in the end she was going to lose the house. No one had even looked at her house since she put it on the market so she wasn't going to get it sold in thirty days. So she did the only thing that she could do at this point which was to go up to her bedroom, lie on the bed, and cry herself to sleep.

Kellie Jo had told her to be at the store at six AM the next day and seeing that there wasn't anything else she could do, she got up, showered, and went to the store. When she got there, there was only one car and it was an old white VW Van. There were several rust spots and she could see where someone had used some primer to try and cover them up. Alicia couldn't believe that anyone would be caught dead in such a car. Then her feet reminded her that they had just walked a mile and half to get here so maybe such a bad looking car wasn't the worse thing in the world. As her mind was thinking about her old car which was now back at the car lot and this old van which was obviously getting Kellie Jo where she needed to go, she heard keys turning the lock in the front door opening. She turned to see Kellie Jo opening the door to let her in.

"I see that you came back." Kellie Jo said as a greeting.

"I told you that I would and that I'd work hard for you." Alicia replied making sure that she showed Kellie Jo her displeasure in having her word questioned.

"Yes you did and you did a good job yesterday." Kellie Jo told her as she led her to the back of the store. We got a truck coming in this morning and we need to make room to put what they're bringing. So we need to put as much stuff out on the shelves. I got to finish going over this week's totals and I'll be in to give you a hand."

"Okay," Alicia said when she wanted to say "Yea right." Alicia just knew that would be the last she saw of Kellie Jo that morning so she put her stuff away and started to work. She had put up three boxes of food items when she met Kellie Jo coming out of the stock room carrying two boxes.

""I bet she will just do a couple of boxes and then disappear on me." Alicia thought to herself as she went for more food items to put up. However she had to eat those words as Kellie Jo stayed with her until the truck arrived at nine. Then she surprised her further by getting up in the truck helping the truck driver get the boxes from the truck to the storeroom.

Alicia was worn out by the time the store opened at ten, yet Kellie Jo was still going strong. Alicia just wasn't used to doing so much physical labor as Kellie Jo, as it was a normal part of her day. Kellie Jo kept her there until the store closed at nine that evening. Alicia didn't want any of the other employee's to know that she had no vehicle so she made sure she was one of the first out the door so that she could hide behind the store until everyone left except Kellie Jo who stayed on to lock everything up. By the time that Alicia got home she was worn out. Every muscle in her body hurt and she headed for the shower to let the hot water loosen her muscles. However she couldn't stay under the water long as Kellie Jo was having her come in early again, but at seven this time so that she could straighten up the storeroom and make it so that they could find things when they needed them.

Alicia worked for seven days straight before she got a day off and at first she was glad to have the day off until she checked out her email and found that she had no responses to any of her resumes and that only made her sad. She got up from her computer to find something to do only there wasn't anything. She had always worked when she was home and since she had lost her job, she had been on the computer all day long. But now she didn't see any reason to keep looking as no one was responding. So she was left alone in an empty house. She felt her spirits sag and she began to feel depressed and that made her feel tired so she went up to her bed and laid down. So that ended up being the way she spent the day off, sleeping or trying to go back to sleep.

The next day she was actually happy to go back to work at the stupid store. At least it gave her something to do even if it was a suck ass job. Her body began to grow stronger and the work didn't bother her as much physically, or at least not until she got off and the feeling of depression came on as she had nothing to go home to. At night she began to think about what to do about her house. She still had no real offers on the house and her time was running out. The thought of just walking away from it just depressed her all the more so she eventually she just stopped thinking about it at all. She just went to work and when she wasn't working she would sleep.

Alicia never noticed that she was scheduled to work only on the days that Kellie Jo was working as the assistant manager. The other assistant manager was part time and only worked a one or two days a week. All the other clerks worked split shifts either the morning or evening however Alicia was always scheduled for the twelve hours that the store was open just as Kellie Jo did. Since work was the only thing she had going for her and she needed the money, she didn't complain.

Kellie Jo had also warmed up to her a little more and she stopped making comments about her coming back to work. This helped but the rest of the women there still treated her as an outsider and Alicia didn't go out of her way to be overly social. She just never was that way. Work was all she knew so when she was at work, she concentrated on her job. While she would have liked to be more a part of the group, she didn't know how. As a child she had been pushed to do her best and show just how smart she was. That was the way her parents had raised her and they were never an affectionate family. About the only one she found that she could talk to was Kellie Jo and she was her boss. Kellie Jo did make an effort to befriend her and Alicia did respond some. While she had told Kellie Jo about how she needed a job, she never told her that she was on the verge of being homeless. She couldn't ever get herself to think about that much less talk to anyone else about it.

Finally the day arrived when the holding company was going to foreclose. Alicia woke up that morning and she knew the time had come to face the inevitable. She could stay there until the holding company had the cops haul her ass out of the house but she couldn't face that. So she called the company and told them that they could have the house. She was leaving that morning and it would be theirs to worry about. The man she was talking to started to do some fast talking about how she could keep her home if she could make bigger payments and all Alicia could say was that she couldn't. She wasn't making anywhere near enough money to afford this house and maybe she should never have gone for such an expensive house. So she just told him that the keys would be on the table by the front door. She then called the electric and water companies to go ahead and cut off both. They had been threatening to do so for a couple of months now so they were free to do so as she told then that the holding company now owned the house. She then went on up to her bedroom and put as much of her clothes as she could in her suitcase and overnight bag. She dragged them downstairs where she picked up her bag that contained her laptop. She swung it over her shoulder with her purse which contained all the money she had in this world. She went out the door for the last time dragging her stuff behind of her.

It took her twice the amount of time to get to work and she used her key that Kellie Jo had trusted her with to get into the storeroom. She hid her bags behind some boxes and she went to work. She got lost in her work not wanting to think about what lay ahead of her when it came time to go home which she now didn't have and for the most part she was able to do that. But as the clock got closer and closer to nine o'clock, she began to worry. For the first time in her life, she had nowhere to go and she had no one to help her. She never had to ask for help so she didn't know how to ask. She let everyone clock out and leave before she clocked out. She put her bags out the back door, locking it back then she went out the front door saying goodnight to Kellie Jo who locked the door behind of her. She then started to walk around to the side of the building like she was going to go home. She went to the back to where she bags were sitting and she sat next to them and began to cry.

About a half hour later she heard Kellie Jo start up her VW van. Alicia dried her tears and tried to keep quiet as she heard the van backing out. Alicia heard the van start out of the parking lot then she heard it stop as the brakes squeaked. A couple of minutes later it started again and Alicia let out her breath as she didn't want anyone to know that she had nowhere to go. Then she saw some lights flash against the trees behind the store and Alicia said "Oh shit" to herself. A moment later Kellie Jo's van come around the side of the building, and then it stopped in front of her.

Kellie Jo rolled down her window, "You can stay with me until you get back on your feet."

"Oh I'm waiting for a friend; I'm staying there for a while to help her out with her new baby." Alicia said hoping that Kellie Jo would buy her lie.

"Well I can't leave you out here by yourself, who knows what weirdo might come by. How about coming home with me and you can call your friend to come there to pick you up." Kellie Jo said then she hesitated for a second. Alicia was trying to think of something to say to get Kellie Jo to go on when she started to talk again.

"I don't live far from here so let's get your stuff in the van and get out of here. I'm tired and I badly need a shower." Kellie Jo said using the same voice that she used when she was telling one of her employees to do something and she didn't want any further discussion about it. She then got out of the van coming over to where Alicia's suitcase was sitting. She picked it up taking it to the van where she opened the side door throwing it in.

Alicia saw that she had been found out, so she got up grabbing her bag with her laptop and her overnight bag putting them in the van by her suitcase. She then went to the passenger door and got in. "Thanks..." She told Kellie Jo.

"Sure, I don't have much of a place but it keeps me warm and safe." Kellie Jo told her giving her a warm smile that eased the pain that Alicia was feeling from having to accept the charity of her boss.

Kellie Jo didn't say anything more and better yet she didn't ask her any questions for which Alicia was grateful. It was embarrassing enough that she was in the van and Kellie Jo knew more than anyone else in this world about her situation. Alicia didn't want her to know any more than she did so she didn't want to have to answer any questions. When they got to the apartment building, Alicia saw that it was a very old building and all the cars parked around it didn't look much better that Kellie Jo's van did.

Kellie Jo had obviously seen her looking at the other cars and the old building when she said, "Don't worry this is a safe place. We all look out for each other here. All the people living here are just like us, working and trying to make a living on the low wages that they earn."

Alicia noticed that Kellie Jo had included her with the people of the building earning low wages and trying to survive on them. This was something that she didn't want to accept that she was like the rest of the people there but she knew in her heart that she was now considered one of the poor people she had always looked down on. She then saw that Kellie Jo was waiting for a response from her and all she could think to say was "Okay."

Kellie Jo seemed to accept this answer as she got out of the van going to the side door to get Alicia's suitcase as Alicia hurried out of the van to get her bag and her laptop. She followed Kellie Jo up some steps and then down a long walkway that lead to her apartment which was at the very end. Kellie Jo opened the door turning on the light as she entered the apartment. Alicia followed closely behind.

"Like I said, it's not much but it is home." Kellie Jo said as she swept her arm out.

Alicia looked around the medium size room that was pretty much the entire apartment. To her right as she stood near the door was a couch which faced a small TV and stereo. To her left was an old desk which to Alicia's surprise held no computer which she thought everyone nowadays owned. Against the back wall was a double bed with a nightstand to each side. She glanced at the walls and found almost no pictures, none of Kellie Jo's family or even a velvet picture of dogs playing poker which she had thought every lower class person had in their home. On the right side of the bed, there was a door and Alicia could see just enough to know that it was the bathroom. On the left side was a short hallway to what Alicia figured had to be a small kitchen and that was what it turned out to be when Kellie Jo took her in there. There was just enough room for a stove, refrigerator, a few cabinets with a sink and a small table.

"So what do you think of my humble home?" She asked once they had gotten back to the living room / den / bedroom.

"It's nice, it really is." Alicia told her trying to sound sincere as she tried to figure out how the two of them could live here even for the short time Alicia had planned on being here.

"I know it isn't what you're used to but it is all that I have to offer." Kellie Jo said not in an apologetic tone but more of a statement of fact.

"I like it, you've done it up nice." Alicia told her as she looked around the apartment as she began to see the touches that Kellie Jo had made to make the small apartment her home.

"Thanks, I like it. It's what I need at this time in my life and it's cheap!" Kellie Jo said as she let out a laugh.

"That part I can understand." She replied as she had to laugh with her.

"I think we all can now, with the economy the way that it is. I know the store has picked up a lot of business since everything we sell is cheap. But I do try to bring the best things that I can so that the customers will get a true bargain." She told her.

"I could see that as I stocked the shelves. I was expecting to see things that would fall apart at the first use but your items don't. Plus I like that you stock some food items, which helps too." Alicia said hoping that Kellie Jo hadn't ever noticed that she had shopped there before asking for a job.

"Well, I'm going to take a shower, then hit the bed, we got a long day ahead of us tomorrow and it always starts early." Kellie Jo told her as she went to the only dresser to pull out some clean panties and a nightgown.

"As I'm showering, you can put your stuff away if you like; just make room in the drawers and the closet." Kellie Jo instructed her.

"Well I'm not going to need to stay long. I'll find a place as quickly as I can so I can get out of your hair." Alicia told her.

"Sure but you're welcome to stay as long as you need to." Kellie Jo said as she headed into the bathroom.

"Thanks," she told her as the door closed.

"One night, two at the most is all I'm going to be here." Alicia thought to herself as she looked around the apartment. Alicia set her suitcase by the dresser opening it to get out a clean pair of panties and a long tee shirt that she slept in. She did hang up the few dresses that the grandmother didn't buy from her. She walked around the apartment looking things over trying to get a read on Kellie Jo. She had worked for her for a month or so now but still she didn't know just who she was, not that she had really tried. But now she was stuck with this woman so she wanted to know if she was staying with some type of serial killer or not. She didn't see any obvious signs of her being that so that gave her some matter of relief then her eyes lit upon the bed and she realized that there was only one bed in the apartment. Her eyes went to the couch and she saw that it wasn't a full couch but actually a love seat. For the first time in her life, she wasn't happy that she was five eight and not closer to five feet. She knew that she was going to be cramped on the couch but she didn't plan on being there long anyway.

A few minutes later Kellie Jo came out of the bathroom in her nightgown drying her dirty blond hair. "It's all yours."

"Cool, I need a shower." Alicia said as she hurried to the bathroom wanting to limit the talking that she would have to do with Kellie Jo.

She closed the door then the leaned back against it. "Oh god can things get any worse for me?" she asked herself before following up with "First I lose everything and now I'm living with my boss in her tiny apartment. It's hard enough to avoid her and the rest of those people there and now I am forced to see her twenty fours a day. God what have I done to deserve this." She looked to the ceiling toward a god she never had much reason to believe in and she had even less reason to do so now. She let out a load groan before pushing herself from the door to undress. Unfortunately for Alicia, she was used to living alone so everything she was saying to herself out loud, Kelly Jo was also hearing. However Kellie Jo didn't learn anything that she hadn't already figured out about her new roommate.

Alicia undressed in front of the mirror and she saw that there was darkness under her eyes and there was a smudge of dirt on her forehead, seeing that smudge just made her feel all the more frustrated. She wasn't the one who was suppose to be doing the hard labor, she was suppose to find ways to help others do it. She turned her face away for the mirror not liking what she was seeing, she finished undressing before stepping into the small tub and shower. She washed her hair first and then her body before standing under the warm water. She just wanted to stand under it all night but is seemed like just as she was beginning to relax, the water turned cold. It didn't just turned cool first then cold but cold suddenly. Alicia let out a scream as she jumped back for the spray of the water.

"Are you all right?" She heard Kellie Jo yell through the door.

"Yea, the water turned cold on me!" she yelled back.

"Sorry, I should have told you that it does that. I've got a small water heater and while it warms up quickly it also runs out quickly. I just got used to taking quick showers that I didn't think to tell you." Kellie Jo said.

"Yea right," she thought to herself before she yelled back, "No problem."

Now she had to figure out a way to turn off the water without actually having to get back under the cold water. She thought for a second before going out the back of the tub then going to the front to reach under the water to turn the knobs off. She was dripping water on the floor but she didn't care. Once she got the water off, she realized how cold she was. The cold water that clung to her body was mixing with the cool air of the bathroom and she was freezing her ass off thus losing the benefits of the refreshing shower that she had so been looking forward to. Her teeth were chattering as she dried herself off and she was now feeling worse than she did when she went into the bathroom.

She got her hair dry as best as she could with the towel then she looked for a hair dryer but she couldn't find one. She started to yell for Kellie Jo to get her dryer but then she realized that she had sold it in one of her yard sales. So she kept using the towel on her hair to get it as dry as she could but when it was done, there was still some dampness to it. She finished drying her body before stepping into a pair of panties thankful that she had not gotten one of sexier pairs. She then slipped on her tee shirt pulling it down over her breasts with her hard nipples from the cold. It was then that she realized that her tee shirt wasn't as long as she wished it was. She looked into the mirror seeing that the tee shirt went down to her to top of her legs so that any movement would cause her to show her panty covered pussy and ass. That was the last thing that she wanted to show but then she didn't figure that Kellie Jo would appreciate what she was getting a look at anyway.

She hated having to leave the bathroom but she had put it off as long as she could. She took a deep breath then she opened to door. She didn't see Kellie Jo at first then she glanced to her right and she saw that Kellie Jo had already slipped under the covers.

"If you can tell me where your extra sheets and blankets are, I'll make up the couch." Alicia said as she came on into the room.

"I don't think you'll fit on that couch. You can share the bed with me." Kellie Jo told her and before Alicia could protest, she said "I promise I don't bite."

Alicia felt like she was always a step behind Kellie Jo and she didn't like the feeling. Every turn she had made that evening, she found Kellie Jo was already in front of her leading the way. This was something she wasn't comfortable with but at the movement she couldn't figure out a way to get back in front where she belonged. She knew that it was only a matter of time before she was and that was a day that she was fast looking forward to.

"Okay," Was all Alicia could think to say as she walked around the end of the bed, slipping under the covers making sure she stuck to her side of the bed.

"Good night," Kellie Jo said to her as she turned off the light.

"Night," Alicia said as she laid her head on the pillow.

Alicia laid there for a while trying to get her mind around everything that had happened that day. She went from being homeless to sleeping in the same bed as her boss. She had come so far down in such a short time. It seemed like it was only yesterday that she was on her way up in the world and she could just see herself breaking through when the rug was jerked out from under her. She had really thought that she would get a new engineering job in a matter of days but now she was wondering if she would ever get one. "Just maybe I'm not as great an engineer as I thought I was..." She thought to herself and that was a thought that she went to sleep thinking and it was also the thought that she woke up with.

Alicia saw the clock by the bed and saw that it was six in the morning, and then she felt more than saw that Kellie Jo was already up and moving around.

"We got another truck coming in this morning?" She asked as she sat up in the bed.

"No we got something else to do before we get to the store." Kellie Jo replied.

All she wanted to do was go back to bed and stay there until she had to be at work. It felt good to just sleep and not have to think about how bad her life was now. Yet she knew that for the moment she was obligated to Kellie Jo as she had given her a job and then a place to sleep.

"What is it?" She asked wondering just what Kellie Jo was making her get up so early in the morning to do.

"Just something we need to do." Kellie Jo said as she turned on the light thus blinding Alicia for a moment. "Can't you do it yourself?" Alicia asked as she blinked trying to get her eyes adjusted to the harsh light.

"No I need you for this. Now get up and get dressed, I'll get us some coffee going and heat up a couple of biscuits for breakfast." Kellie Jo said as she headed into the kitchen and Alicia saw that she was already dressed.

She got out of the bed feeling the cool air in the apartment, it was turning to fall and the mornings were getting colder. She ran into the bathroom to pee and get dressed. She brushed her teeth and ran a brush through her dark blond hair before putting it into a pony tail as she always wore it. Then she slipped on a pair of kakis and a blue blouse that the store dress code required her to wear. She needed to do some wash as she could only afford to buy a couple of each and they both needed to be washed.

When she came out of the bathroom, she didn't see Kellie Jo so she went around the bed heading into the kitchen where she found Kellie Jo sitting at the table sipping her coffee and munching down on a biscuit.

"I got cream and sugar on the counter if you want." Kellie Jo told her,

"No I take mine black, thanks." She said as she poured herself a cup into a Georgia Bulldog cup which she hated since she had gone to Georgia Tech. She took a sip and she could tell that it was a cheap brand of coffee which was confirmed when she saw the off brand name on coffee can that was sitting on the counter. She took her coffee to the table where she picked up a biscuit tearing it in half to put another off brand of jelly on the halves. She ate silently as she thought about just what Kellie Jo had for them to do that morning then she realized that she didn't really care. It was something to do though she would have preferred to stay in bed on this cool morning.

Alicia had no more than finished her biscuit which she had to admit was good when Kellie Jo announced that it was time to get the day started. Alicia could only groan as she got up following Kellie Jo to the main room, getting their light jackets, and heading out the door.

They started out in the general direction of the store but before they got there, Kellie Jo turned off heading in the direction of Alicia's old house.

"Where are we going?" She asked feeling a bit of panic coming on.

"To your house, I know that you can't have all of your belongings in those two cases that you brought to the store. We might as well get the rest of it before the banks do." Kellie Jo told her.

"You know where I lived?" Alicia asked.

"Pretty close, I saw you walking to work several times so I know the general direction; you can tell me the streets." Kellie Jo told her.

"You saw me and never said anything, never wondered why I didn't drive to work?" Alicia asked.

"I knew you were having finical troubles, you told me that and the rest wasn't any of my business. So what street do I take?" She asked.

"Go left on Henry Street and then right on Laurel Drive." Alicia told her then she asked, "Why are you doing this?"

"Because those are your things and if we don't take them then someone else will. You paid for them so you should keep them." Kellie Jo said.

"That's just it; I owe more for them than I paid so I don't guess I don't own them." Alicia said defeated.

"Well someone is going to get them and it might as well be you. So how much is left in your house?" She asked.

"There's still quite a bit but I sold most of the best stuff. The rest I couldn't get anyone to buy." Alicia replied.

"You were just trying to sell to the wrong people. I think I can get rid of it for you plus we can get the rest of your clothes as I know that you have more than what you brought." Kellie Jo told her.

"Yea I do but I sold the best things that I had." Alicia replied.

"Well we're going to clean that house out for you today." She said as Alicia pointed to her old house which made her so sad to see.

It was once her pride and joy and now it felt like an albatross wrapped around her neck. She wanted to just get away from it and never come back no matter what was left inside. But Kellie Jo had already pulled into the driveway and she was getting out of her old van. So she was left to do the same. By the time that she was out of the van, Kellie Jo was heading toward the front door. Alicia had to run to catch up with her and she got to the front door the same time as Kellie Jo.

"It should be open." Alicia told her.

"The lights are out." Kellie Jo said as she tried the light switch.

"Figures, when the lights go out it takes them forever to get them back on. But they are quick to cut you off if they know you're not going to pay them anything." Alicia said with a sigh.

"Yep, that's pretty much the way it works. Let's take a look around and see what we need to get this shit out of here." Kellie Jo said as she headed through the house with Alicia following close behind. The last place that they got to was the bedroom where it was just as Alicia had left it the previous morning.

"I like your bed; I think we could use that in the apartment." Kellie Jo told her.

"You can have it then, but first we will have to get it there." Alicia said not really hearing the "We" part.

"That won't be a problem but you have more than I thought but I have a suggestion for you. You don't have to do it but it might be the best way to get at least some money from all this stuff."Kellie Jo told her as she looked directly into her eyes and Alicia could see that Kellie Jo did have a plan already in place. That gave her hope that at least she would have a little more money coming in and maybe she could find a place of her own.

"What do you have in mind?" She asked.

"I got a friend that makes his living from the flea market. He has a big truck that can haul this stuff to the market and he can sell it for you but he will take a percentage. But he can get more from this stuff than I could, so you might come out ahead." Kellie Jo told her.

"Call him." Alicia said.

"Your cell phone still working?" Kellie Jo asked.

"Yea, it is the only thing that I kept my payment up on. I knew I would need it and my internet card for my laptop to find a new job though neither has helped me much." Alicia said as she dug into her pocket pulling out her cell phone and handing it to Kellie Jo.

"It will, just keep paying that bill." Kellie Jo told her.

"But I need a change of address so I can keep getting my mail. I didn't have a place to tell them when I left yesterday." Alicia told her.

"Give them my address," She told her as she began to dial and Alicia couldn't tell her that she wouldn't be there that long.

"Start to gather up all your clothes and anything else you want to keep as I twist Terry's arm until he gives in to the percentage that I believe that you should get from your stuff." Kellie Jo told her as she went out the bedroom door to the hallway.

Alicia started to gather up some of the clothes that she had left behind as she didn't have any room for them when she had left. She did feel good about being able to get these things but at the same time she hated that Kellie Jo was the one that was spearheading the effort. She tried to listen to what Kellie Jo was saying but she could only catch a few words here and there as Kellie Jo walked up and down the hall passing by the bedroom every few seconds. On one pass by, Alicia heard Kellie Jo telling this Terry that he was being a big prick and on another pass she heard Kellie Jo calling him a stingy bastard. Alicia was afraid that Terry would tell Kellie Jo to stuff it but after about ten minutes Kellie Jo came back into the bedroom handing Alicia her phone back.

"Well is he going to come?" Alicia asked.

"Once I told him the stuff that you had, there was no doubt as to whether he would come; it was just a matter of getting the deal in your favor." She told her.

"And those terms are?" Alicia had to ask.

"Oh, he wanted a sixty forty split his way, I got him to change that to sixty forty your way." Kellie Jo stated looking proud of what she had accomplished.

"He gets forty percent; this is my stuff that he is selling." Alicia said not thinking that was such a great deal.

"Yea it is but he will be the one hiring people to help him haul the stuff out of here and then he has to hold on to it until he can sell it. There is also the possibility that there might be some things he can't sell and that means he will have to store it somewhere. So he is taking some risk here and we are lucky to get a sixty forty split our way." Kellie Jo pointed out and she didn't tell her that no one would ever get such a deal from terry that she had just gotten.

"I didn't think about that. I do appreciate that you are helping me." Alicia said as she conceded the point.

"No problem but let's get this bed down to the van as well as your clothes. I told Terry that he could have everything that wasn't nailed down and he is going to take me literary. So if we want to keep your clothes and your bed then we need to get it out of the house before he shows up." Kellie Jo said as she started to gather up Alicia's clothes in her arms.

"What about work?" Alicia said as she followed Kellie Jo downstairs with her hands full.

"Oh I called Joan, the other assistant manager and she's going to cover for me today and you've got everything stocked up so they can do without you too." Kellie Jo said.

"I don't think that I've ever met her, why doesn't she work much?" Alicia asked.

"That's my choice, I need the money so she lets me work as much as I want and when I need a day off then she works. So I try to work at least six out of every seven days. I usually just take a day off when I need to do laundry or have some errands to do." Kellie said as a matter of fact.

"But that's not fair, you working all the time. They should pay you enough so that you don't have to work so much. I mean you practically keep that store making money." Alicia said protesting.

"Nobody ever told me that life is fair Alicia." Kellie Jo told her as if she was educating a child about the workings of the world.

Kellie Jo's words stung but she didn't have an answer for them so she kept quiet. Once her clothes were in the van, they went back for the bed which they manhandled down the stairs and out to the van. The mattress and box springs wouldn't fit into the van so they tied them to the top. They wanted the couch but it was too big and heavy for them to get out of the house. So they went through the house and Alicia got some of the pictures that she wanted to keep and she was thankful for that too as she thought that they would be gone forever. They got a few other small things like towels and sheets that Alicia had that that they could store in Kellie Jo's small apartment. There was a real limit as to what they could take with them to the apartment. They had just finished getting what they wanted when a big man with a couple of mean looking men pulled up in a big truck. Alicia was a little intimated by these men but Kellie Jo seemed to show no fear as she went out to the truck to meet the driver who Alicia assumed was Terry. Alicia could see that Terry still wanted to negotiate the terms but Kellie Jo was holding firm. Alicia was about half afraid that Terry would punch her out but he finally gave out a hardy laugh as he picked her up giving her a big bear hug. Alicia thought that this was weird that Terry and Kellie Jo could argue like they did but then show genuine affection for each other. This was all confusing to her but then her life had become one mass of confusion lately. Once he put Kellie Jo down; Terry spat out some tobacco juice wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. These were they type of people that Alicia had always managed to avoid but Kellie Jo seems perfectly at home with them.

"I thought he was going to tear you in half there for a moment." Alicia told Kellie Jo when she came back to her.

"Oh hell, Terry looks mean but he is just a big teddy bear. And he is a great salesman. People take one look at him and figure that they can get the upper hand but then they end up paying his price and not their price. He'll have your stuff sold in a couple of weeks but watch and see if he doesn't tell us that all you have is junk and is worthless and that he'll be lucky to make enough money to pay for the gas in getting here." She was telling her. And sure enough after he had gone in to look around he came out saying almost exactly what Kellie Jo said that he would and it was all Alicia could do not to laugh at Terry's act.

So he tried again to get Kellie Jo to switch the numbers but she held fast and soon Alicia realized that it was a game that Terry liked to play and one he was great at. The more he talked the more Alicia began to feel sorry for him but then she would look at Kellie Jo who would give her a smile and she realized that she wasn't falling under Terry's spell. So she then knew that she would get top dollar for her stuff and paying Terry forty percent was probably a great deal. Plus it was great deal more than she would have gotten on her own which would have been nothing.

As Terry and his men began to load up their big truck, Kellie Jo and Alicia went back to her apartment to deposit her clothes and the bed which Alicia discovered was easier to get down the stairs of her house than up the steps going up to Kellie Jo's apartment but they got it there. Then they pulled apart Kellie Jo's double bed hauling it back down to the van so that they could let Terry sell it with the rest of Alicia's stuff. However on the way back, Kellie Jo made a detour.

"What are we doing here?" Alicia asked as Kellie Jo pulled into the post office.

"Getting your address changed so that you can start getting your mail at the apartment. That way you can keep up with your bills and keep your cell phone and internet card active." Kellie Jo said as she put the van in park and started to get out.

"I can do it." Alicia said trying to get out of the van before Kellie Jo but failing to do so as she wanted to go in and fake the change of address as she didn't want Kellie Jo to do anything more for her and thus indebt herself to Kellie Jo more.

"But you don't know my address, besides I need to get some stamps anyway." She said as she strode into the post office ahead of her.

"Damn," Alicia said to herself as she followed her inside. She was having trouble getting anything past Kellie Jo and it was frustrating her to no end. She felt like Kellie Jo was taking over her life and she wasn't doing a damn thing to stop her. She was a hundred times smarter than this woman was but yet she was always a step ahead of her and controlling everything that happened to her and all this was occurring in less than twenty four hours. She then made up her mind to tell Kellie Jo that she would just get her box to get her mail however when she caught up with Kellie Jo, the card for the address change already had Kellie Jo's address on it and Kellie Jo handed it to her.

Alicia took the card and she looked at Kellie Jo seeing this look of expectation of Alicia doing as she was told. Alicia wanted to open her mouth and say something but she lost her voice, she just couldn't muster the strength to fight her. So she took the damn card and she filled it out. Then she took the extra cards that Kellie Jo had in her hand to send to the companies that needed her new address. After they left the post office, Alicia felt even more depressed and defeated. They went back to her house where Terry and his men were filling up the truck. They dropped the old bed off then Kellie Jo had them back on the road. Alicia had hoped that they would go back to the apartment so that she could lie down as she was feeling so damn tired. However Kellie Jo had another stop for them.

Alicia didn't bother to ask what they were doing at the next stop as the name on the door told her all that she needed to know. It was a nonprofit organization that helped poor people in financial difficulties. When she was trying to figure out what to do once she realized that she was in real trouble; she didn't even give a place like this much of a thought as she didn't consider herself poor and uneducated like the people who needed such places. But obviously Kellie Jo thought that this was just the place that she needed to be. As much as Alicia hated going inside, she followed Kellie Jo. Again she took over and Alicia got the feeling that Kellie Jo had been here before as she seemed to know everyone there. Alicia figured that she wasn't the first person that Kellie Jo had brought here to get help. They didn't have to wait long before they were taken back to a small office with a small man behind a big desk that had numerous stacks of papers on it. The man whose name she found out was Eugene, talked with Kellie Jo for a few minutes before they both zeroed in on her. Alicia felt like she was a mouse cornered by a house cat. Alicia first looked over at Kellie Jo who sensing her discomfort excused herself saying that she had more errands to do and that she would be back in a couple of hours. That relieved Alicia a great deal as this was going to be hard enough admitting all her financial mistakes to a stranger and she didn't want to let Kellie Jo know more about her troubles than she already did.

So once Kellie Jo had left, Eugene turned his attention to her and Alicia began to pull all her bills that she owned from her purse. Why she had kept them there, when she had no hope of ever paying them back, she didn't know but that is where she had put them and that turned out to be a good thing. Alicia then began to tell her story not feeling any emotion as she did so. She had hit a new low point in her life and she didn't think that she could go any lower than this. But that was a false belief on her part. There were lots more valleys and very few peaks ahead for her.

Eugene, for his part, did try to make her feel better by saying that she wasn't the first person in this situation and she wouldn't be the last. He told her that he thought that he could get the bill collectors off her back but her credit rating would take years to repair if it ever could be. That didn't make her feel any better but the part of getting the bill collectors off her back did sound good. Since the bank holding company now owned her house and her car was back with the dealer, he thought he could get them to write what she owed them off or she would have to pay very little of it back as she had no hope of ever catching up with what she owed them anyway. The credit cards he could get them to let her pay off the balance without having to pay interest at the twenty to twenty five percent that they were forcing her to pay. So again he was coming to her rescue. He took down all the information and he also took the cards from her which he promptly cut up while she watched. She knew the point that he was making but it just made her feel that much worse. When he was done, she thanked him again showing no emotion, neither gratefulness nor shame. She had by that time just locked it within herself because if she didn't do this she would have to admit that she should have come to a place like this when she had started to get into trouble and not long afterwards. But at the time she just knew that a new job was just around the bend but that bend never seemed to have an ending.

When she opened the door to leave his office, she saw that Kellie Jo was there waiting for her. She knew that she had probably been sitting there the whole time and had not gone and done errands as she stated that she was going to do.

Kellie Jo didn't asked her how it went; she just said that they were going to head back to the apartment to set up the bed and then head to the laundry mat to do their laundry. They didn't have to spend much time to get the bed in place and Alicia liked that she would be further away from Kellie Jo when they went to bed that night. She hadn't planned on spending more than one night with Kellie Jo but with no money to get another apartment, she knew that she was going to have to stay here a little longer. Once the bed was put up, they both gathered up their clothes taking them down to the van. Alicia was glad that they had gone back to her house as she was able to get the detergent and other washing stuff from her house and thus she didn't have to borrow any from Kellie Jo. However she wasn't looking forward to going to the laundry mat, which was something that she had never done in her life. Even in college, she had an apartment which had its own washer and dryer.

When they entered carrying their clothes, Alicia saw all the women there doing their wash. They all looked tired and worn out and a couple of the younger women had their young children with them and those kids were running all around the washers and dryers laughing and having a good old time. Alicia couldn't help to cringe and she saw that Kellie Jo was looking at her and she didn't seem pleased but she didn't say anything. She just went to a washer to start her clothes to wash leaving Alicia standing there holding her clothes basket and looking like an idiot.

She just stood there for a few moments before she got her feet to move, going to one of the washers in the back. She wanted as far from everyone as she could get. She first looked into the washer expecting to see a dirty mess but it was clean but that didn't stop her from putting some bleach in each load, darks and whites just to make sure that she killed any germs that might be in and on the machines. She stayed close to the machines that were washing her clothes trying not to make eye contact with anyone else there. They all seemed to get the message as they stayed away from her and the young mothers kept their charges away from her. Meanwhile she saw that Kellie Jo was doing the opposite as she was talking to each of the women there laughing and talking. She even fussed over the kids that were there and they all seemed to love her. The fact that she was slipping them some candy from her pocket also endeared the children to her. Alicia tried not to look over at Kellie Jo but her eyes kept taking her there and she began to see another side of Kellie Jo. It didn't make her like her any more but it did begin to make an impression on her.

They spent about two hours at the laundry mat and Alicia was very so happy to get out of there. It just wasn't a place that she was comfortable be at but one she knew she just might have to go back to and that took away all the happiness she was feeling in getting out of the place.

"Why don't you hook up your laptop while I fix us some dinner, maybe you have gotten some responses from all your applications." Kellie Jo suggested after they had put up their clothes.

"I haven't gotten anything so far, I doubt that they will be now." Alicia said with a sigh.

"Well you never know. Besides you need to know if you can get any reception in the apartment." Kellie Jo pressed.

'"Okay..." Alicia said not wanting to argue with Kellie Jo as she was tired and had no energy left in her tank.

"Good, what do you want to eat?" she asked as she went toward the little kitchen.

"Anything is fine with me; I'm not all that hungry." Alicia said even though the opposite was the truth but for some reason she was having trouble admitting anything to Kellie Jo.

"Well I'll see if I can come up with something good." She said and Alicia just grunted.

Alicia did go over to the desk sitting down and plugging in her laptop to an outlet to charge up the battery. She did switch it on and waited for it to warm up so she could log in. Once she had done that, she put in her internet card finding that she got no reception for which she was grateful.

"Looks like I can't get a signal." Alicia called out to Kellie Jo.

"Well move around to see if you can pick up something, maybe by the window." She heard Kellie Jo call back.

Alicia groaned but she did unplug the laptop seeing that it had just enough of a charge to work for a few minutes. She carried the laptop around the apartment going into the bathroom where she knew she wouldn't get a signal which was what she wanted. She saved the window for last as she didn't want Kellie Jo's suggestion to be correct but sure enough as she approached the window she began to get a signal and by the time she got to the ledge, she was getting a full signal.

"Getting anything?" Kellie Jo called out to her.

Alicia wanted to say no but she couldn't for some reason and she said, "Yea."

"Where at?" came the next question.

Alicia groaned to herself again and she replied, "By the window."

"That's good, have you gotten any emails?" She asked.

"The battery needs to be charged, I'll check after dinner." Alicia said hoping that Kellie Jo would forget as that was her plan.

"Okay... Can you come on in and give me a hand?" Kellie Jo told her more that asked her at least that was the way Alicia's brain received the request.

"Sure," She replied as she plugged in her computer making sure that it was charging. It never occurred to her to not quiet plug in the jack so that the laptop wouldn't charge, something that she would later regret.

She ambled into the kitchen where Kellie Jo put her right to work mixing the batter for the cornbread that she was making. Alicia had never cared much for cornbread, preferring rolls instead. But Kellie Jo was raised on cornbread so that was what she fixed. Along with the cornbread, Kellie Jo was making soup beans along with sauerkraut with sausage. The sauerkraut was giving off a distinct odor that didn't make Alicia's appetite grow. She tried her best to do what Kellie Jo told her to do in the kitchen. She had never been much of a cook and it showed but Kellie Jo seemed to have a great deal of patience, more than she would have in trying to teach someone to do something that they weren't familiar doing. She would be more likely to just do it herself to get the job done faster. Kellie Jo let or made her help with every part of the dinner and Alicia did as she was instructed learning more about southern cooking than she really cared to know.

Once it was all prepared, they sat down to eat. Alicia had planned to just skip this dinner and maybe fix a sandwich later as nothing that Kellie Jo had prepared appealed to her so she just sat and watched as Kellie Jo broke up cornbread on her plate then put a bunch of beans with their juice over the cornbread. Then she scooped up relish from a jar putting that over her beans. Next came the sauerkraut that she placed on the other side of her plate. Alicia just sat there watching her not believing that she would eat such crap, and then she realized that Kellie Jo was waiting for her to fill her plate. When she didn't, Kellie Jo picked up her plate placing it in front of Alicia, and then she set about repeating the process of filling her plate that had been Alicia's empty plate.

"Eat up, we've had a busy day and tomorrow will be a full day as who knows what that store will look like." She said as she looked at Alicia waiting on her to start eating before she did.

Alicia just knew that Kellie Jo was the type to sit there all night waiting on her to start eating. Alicia wanted to make her wait but she couldn't so she picked up her fork getting a small bite of the beans and cornbread. She brought it to her mouth giving it a whiff before placing it into her mouth. She tasted the mixture and to her surprise she liked it. This tasted a lot better than any that she had before.

"How is it?" Kellie Jo asked anxiously.

"Not bad," Alicia said not wanting to say that it actually tasted great to her. But it did give her more confidence to taste the sauerkraut with the sausage. This too tasted a lot better than it smelled as it was being cooked. Now that her taste buds had gotten a taste of all the food and they liked what they tasted, her appetite came back as she had been working hard all day. So she dug in not seeing the smile that was on Kellie Jo's face. Now that she was satisfied that Alicia was going to eat, she too began to dig in eating and talking about their day and then what she thought they would have do when they got to the store in the morning. Alicia did more listening than talking but she did add things here and there.

After they had cleaned the kitchen, they returned to the living room where Kellie Jo asked Alicia how the charging on her laptop was doing and it was mostly charged. So she asked Alicia to check her email and Alicia agreed hoping to go to the window and then logging in but not checking her emails as she didn't want to know that she hadn't gotten any positive responses. However Kellie Jo stayed with her as she took the laptop over to the window. Alicia hated that Kellie Jo was standing there looking over her shoulder, though she wasn't trying to read anything on her computer but that would still make it almost impossible to fake her out. So Alicia went ahead and brought up her Outlook. She had a number of emails and she quickly read through each one and each made her feel worse as they were either saying that they weren't hiring or that she wasn't qualified for the engineering job that they did have open.

"Nothing?" Kellie Jo asked.

"Nope, just like always, I don't know why I bother anymore." Alicia said feeling so fucking depressed as she knew she would if she got nothing positive.

"I know it's hard but you got to keep trying. You never know when the right job will come along. I'm sure it is out there for you." She told her.

"That's what I thought, but I have since learned that isn't the case." Alicia said as she slammed her laptop closed not wanting to ever open it again. She couldn't take being turned down anymore. She had never failed at anything in her life and this constant failure to find an engineering job was doing her in.

"Please don't give up, okay?" Kellie Jo asked of her.

"Yea..." "Alicia said then she went to put her laptop on the desk. "I think I'll take a shower and hit the sack, I'm tired."

"Okay, I'll get the bed ready." Kellie Jo said but Alicia really didn't hear her as she was hurrying to get to the bathroom before she started to cry. She closed the door and broke out in tears feeling the frustration of not finding that dream job. She knew she was going to be stuck working in a Dollar Store for the rest of her life and that was no life for her. She sobbed out her tears not realizing that Kellie Jo was hearing her and feeling helpless to help her.

When she had cried herself out, she went to the shower turning it on as she undressed just letting her clothes fall to the floor. She stepped into the shower wanting to take a long shower but she had learned the previous night that the hot water ran out rapidly so she washed quickly then when she got out she realized she had brought nothing in to put on after her shower. That was when she noticed that her sleep shirt and a clean pair of panties were by the door. She dried off then put the things that Kellie Jo had gotten for her. She exited the door telling Kellie Jo that the bathroom was hers. As soon as Kellie Jo had closed the bathroom door, Alicia slipped under the covers of the bed wanting sleep to come quickly so that she could forget about all her problems.

Alicia felt so tired and worn out mentally and physically that she was soon asleep but not so far asleep that she didn't hear in the recesses of her brain Kellie Jo muttering something about having to pick up after some lazy assed brat. Alicia smiled to herself as she fell into a deeper sleep.

However she didn't get the last laugh as Kellie Jo had her up early and down at the store as another truck was coming in. Alicia had learned to hate the days that they got truck as that meant that she was going to be working her ass off for the whole twelve hours that she was there. And now that she was stuck living with Kellie Jo, she couldn't get away from the store or her new life. That evening after they had leftovers to eat, it was time to hit the shower.

And as Kellie Jo was entering the bathroom to take her shower, she told Alicia to check her email to see if there were any responses. She told her to do this in the same tone of voice that she used at work when she wanted her to do something. It was like this was what she was expected to do and she wanted it done right then without any questions. Alicia bristled at Kellie Jo telling her what to do when they were away from the store. At the store, she could understand it as Kellie Jo was the boss but here she wasn't her boss but at the same time she felt like that she was supposed to do it. But checking her email was the last thing she wanted to do. It only brought her bad news and she had gotten to the point that she couldn't handle any more bad news. She was at her limit and slightly beyond.

Yet she found herself going to her laptop turning it on as she took it to the window. She hated Kellie Jo more as each second passed and even more when she found that again there was nothing positive about a job. Her shoulders sagged as she looked at her email account and she wanted to cry again but she didn't, she would save those tears for when she got to take her shower. She shut her laptop down taking it over to the desk before going to the bed to sit down. She was growing to hate this world more and more and for the first time she wondered if there was anything left for her to live for. She wasn't so sure how long she had sat there before she heard the bathroom door opening.

"Did you get anything?" Kelly Jo asked.

"Hell no!" Alicia said angrily as she jumped up getting her nightwear then heading into the bathroom to have her cry and then her short shower. When she came out Kellie Jo was watching TV. Alicia ignored her, going straight to the bed and crawling under the covers. The bed had become her only escape from her troubles.

The next morning Kellie Jo let her sleep later since it was a Sunday and the store didn't open until one PM. Alicia woke up a couple of times when Kellie Jo was making some noise but she would just roll over and cover her head to keep the noise from keeping her awake. She had every intention of staying in bed for as long as she could and thus avoid having to talk to Kellie Jo or dealing with her problems. A little before noon, Alicia did finally roll out of bed and she could see that Kellie Jo was pissed at her but she didn't care. She knew that she would catch it at work that day and she did, as Kellie Jo worked her ass off but all she thought about was for the day to end so that she could get back to her security blanket which was her old bed. It was about the only thing that she had from her old life and even though she had officially given it to Kellie Jo, she was still able to sleep in it and that gave her the only pleasure.

Even after they got home that evening at seven, Alicia could tell that Kellie Jo was still pissed at her for lying in the bed all of the morning. Kellie Jo came in the door telling her that the apartment needed cleaning and after dinner they were going to clean it. Alicia didn't say anything as she was only seeing the bed and how much she wanted to be in it. However Kellie Jo seemed intent on keeping her from it. She had her help fix some dinner then she put a dust mop into her hands and ordered her to mop the floors getting all the dust up. Kellie Jo cleaned the kitchen and the bathroom as Alicia took her time cleaning the floor. This seemed to piss Kellie Jo off more which was what Alicia wanted to do for some reason. She didn't understand why but that was what she wanted. She knew that Kellie Jo would eventually kick her out but didn't faze her a bit. She felt like she was already at the bottom so going any lower wouldn't be any worse. Once Alicia was done dust moping, Kellie Jo had her clean the windows then dust what little furniture that there was in the apartment. It was only then that Kellie Jo allowed her to shower which Alicia did, then she went straight to the bed to sleep.

And so another week went by much the same way, with Alicia trying to sleep as much as she could and Kellie Jo trying hard to keep her from sleeping her life away. Kellie Jo had her check her email every night as she showered but Alicia was now just moving the laptop over to the window as Kellie Jo watched making sure she was doing as she was requested then as soon as the bathroom door shut, Alicia would just put the laptop back on the desk going to the bed to lay down as she waited for the bathroom. Then she would get up only long enough to get her things to put on after her shower then it was back to her bed and sleep.

When payday came at the end of the week as they got paid every other week, Kellie Jo got them to the store early even though they both had the day off. She ran in to get both of their checks before heading toward her bank. She asked Alicia what bank she used and she said that she didn't have any accounts anymore and just cashed her check then would get cashier checks to pay the credit card bill and cell phone bill. She had told her that the bill collectors threaten to get at her bank accounts so she had closed them all out not that there was much in them when she had any accounts. Kellie Jo just nodded her understanding of this but she didn't say anything. Once at the bank, she cashed her check then got money orders for her credit card bills and her cell phone bill. Eugene had done as he said he would, he got her on a payment plan she could afford to pay off the credit cards but this left her a little less than half of her check was left.

"Here you go." Alicia said as she turned around to face Kellie Jo who was waiting in line behind of her.

"What's that for?" Kellie Jo asked as she looked down at the rest of the money from her paycheck that Alicia had in her hand.

"For my half of the rent, food, and electricity, if I am going to stay with you then I need to pay my fair share." Alicia told her.

"You don't need to do that, save it for when you need to go for an interview." Kellie Jo said as she put her hand to Alicia's to make her keep it.

Alicia slipped the money into Kellie Jo's hand then walked away thus making her keep it. What she didn't say was that she didn't want to be beholding to Kellie Jo in any shape, form, or function. It was bad enough that she had to stay with her but being obligated to her was another matter. As she went out the door, she saw Kellie Jo talking to the cashier as she held onto the last of her money. She went out to the van trying not to think about the fact that she had just gotten paid for two weeks work and within an hour she was flat broke again. She didn't have a penny to her name and when next paycheck came along, she would have money only long enough to cash her check then give it all away. When she got to the van, she laid her head against the window and closed her eyes wanting to sleep and thus not think about her pitiful life.

She was about half asleep when she head Kellie Jo getting back into the van. She expected Kellie Jo to say something about the money but she didn't and that just served to make Alicia hate her more. She had hoped that maybe she would give at least a little of it back or try and slip it into her pocket but neither occurred. Instead all she heard was the disapproving grunt that Kellie Jo gave in her direction about her sleeping but that was almost music to her ears as she have begun to get some pleasure out of irritating Kellie Jo though she knew that she was dependant on her for a place to stay.

"You need to check your email and start sending out more of your resumes." Kellie Jo told her as they entered the apartment.

"Why should I? No one is hiring or they don't want what I have to offer." Alicia replied as her eyes lit upon the bed.

"Because there is someone is looking for someone just like you and if you're not out there looking then they will find someone else and it should be you. That is if you are as good an engineer as you say you are." Kellie Jo said as she presented the challenge to Alicia's pride.

This chaffed Alicia but she wasn't up to her challenge so she just replied, "Let them have the job."

"Just do it Alicia." Kellie Jo said as she went toward the kitchen to fix them something to eat.

Alicia gave Kellie Jo the finger after she had turned her back to her then she went to her laptop. She did open it and log in but she never checked her email nor did she send out any resumes. She just waited until she saw Kellie Jo come to check to see if she was doing as instructed. Then she shut the laptop up going to the bed to lie down for a few minutes before Kellie Jo called her to eat. She never saw Kellie Jo come back into the living area so she didn't see the disapproving expression on her face.

She did get up to eat and then Kellie Jo told her to clean up the kitchen as she needed to take some food to one of the other residents in the apartment complex who was sick. The tone that Kellie Jo used told Alicia that she was serious about her cleaning up the kitchen so Alicia did but that didn't mean that she did so without calling Kellie Jo everything in the book. But as soon as she was finished, she went to the bathroom to take her shower and then she slipped under the covers to get back to her wonderful sleep and the dreams which had her back at her old job working away and making lots of money.

The following day she was back at work stocking the same shelves with the same cheap items that seemed to be so popular now, even with the people who still had their jobs and even some with good paying jobs. Everyone wanted to save a buck where they could.

That evening when they got back home, Kellie Jo immediately hit Alicia with checking her email while she took her shower. Another bird was sent Kellie Jo's way as she went into the bathroom. Alicia went to her laptop opening it then she went to lie down on the bed until Kellie Jo emerged giving Alicia a grunt of disgust. Thereupon, Alicia got up, heading into the bathroom to take her turn. When she got out, Kellie Jo was watching the little TV and she offered Alicia a spot beside of her on the loveseat however Alicia had a much better place to be. And that is where she went, to the bed to sleep the evening and night away. Alicia didn't hear or feel Kellie Jo getting into the bed later that night nor did she feel Kellie Jo's hand on her shoulder as she asked Alicia what she needed to do to motivate her and show her that she was what she had always thought of herself as being, a great engineer.

The next morning Alicia woke up to a ruckus of noise. She opened her eyes to see the vacuum running yet Kellie Jo wasn't anywhere near it. Then she heard the blender being turned on followed by the mixer. Alicia grunted as she pulled the pillow from under her head placing it over her head to try and drown out the sound. She felt something being placed beside of her then an old country singer singing her greatest hit.

"Fuck!" Alicia screamed as she sat up in the bed then she turned off the radio that was sitting beside where her head was.

"Oh I see you're up." Kellie Jo said innocently as she turned off the vacuum. "I need you down at the store this morning. I know that I had scheduled you to be off but I have changed my mind. So get your ass out of that bed and get ready, I leaving in five minutes." then she turned to go into the kitchen.

"Bitch!" Alicia said under her breath as she rolled out of bed feeling miserable as she had planned on staying in bed for most of the day and now that was ruined. She went to the bathroom to pee and wash her face to get ready for work. She heard Kellie Jo yelling at her to hurry up as they were already late. Alicia looked at the clock by the sink and she saw that it was five in the morning.

That really pissed her off so she went to the bathroom door and yelled at Kellie Jo, "It's five in the fucking morning, the store doesn't open for another four fucking hours!"

"So that gives you four fucking hours to swap out the items on the paper and pen aisle with that on the glassware aisle." She replied.

"Why do that? There're fine where they are now." Alicia countered.

"Because I want them changed now get a move on. I want it done by the time the store opens." Came Kellie Jo's curt answer.

"Then you do it." Alicia said to herself as she went back into the bathroom cussing Kellie Jo and everything about her fat ass.

Alicia spent the next four hours moving items from one set of shelves to the other, with Kellie Jo coming out of her office every few minutes to change where she had placed one item or another. Then as the store opened, she sent Alicia home with instructions to clean the apartment and to work on sending out some resumes. She at least allowed Alicia to take the van home. When she got there, she first wanted to just crawl into the bed and forget everything else but for whatever reason she knew she had to least clean the apartment as that was something Kellie Jo could tell if she was doing or not. So she set into cleaning everything as best she could not that she was all that great at cleaning house. She had always paid someone to do that for her when she had a job.

However as soon as she was done cleaning, she did hop back into the bed and pulled the sheets up over her head blocking out he light and the world. She was soon asleep to the world forgetting all about returning to pick Kellie Jo up when the store closed down.

"Get out of that fucking bed." Alicia heard Kellie Jo holler at her as the sheets were pulled off.

Alicia looked up to see a very angry Kellie Jo looking down at her and she also saw that it was dark outside. Alicia knew she had fucked up but she wasn't going to show Kellie Jo that she was sorry though she was that too.

"You forgot to pick me up and I had to get a ride home with Cindi who kept telling me all the way home that I had really screwed up by taking you in. And I'm beginning to think that's she right." Kellie Jo sputtered up with her anger showing at every word that she said.

"Then kick me out." Alicia said defiantly.

"You would like that wouldn't you. Well I got something else planned for you my lazy friend." She said as walked to the center of the room.

"And that would be..." Alicia asked as she felt a sense of foreboding overcome her.

"First off you're going to try again at cleaning this damn apartment. You missed more dust than you got." Kellie Jo told her.

"Why should I do anything you want me to do?" Alicia asked as she gave Kellie Jo a smile that challenged her to come up with a legit and compelling reason.

"Because you are living in my apartment under my good will and because I am your boss at the only job you can get which is all that is keeping you alive right now and not out in the streets where you would probably be dead by now, not to mention raped and abused by some gang. So get your ass up out of that bed and get to work." Kellie Jo told her and she had this look on her face and this stare that gave Alicia chills.

Alicia wanted to defy Kellie Jo but the longer she hesitated the stronger and more intense Kellie Jo's stare became. Alicia stared back for as long as she could but then she had to look away and that broke her. She got out of the bed wearing just her tee shirt and panties. She looked back at Kellie Jo one more time seeing Kellie Jo with her hands on her hips and still giving her that intense stare. She turned her eyes away as she went to the kitchen to get a dusk rag and furniture polish. As soon as she got one job done, Kellie Jo had another one ready for her.

She didn't get to take a shower until one AM and then Kellie Jo had her back up at five AM. This time she had Alicia swap out three different sections of shelves, which included the two that she had swapped out the day before. Then at nine, there was a truck to unload which she did alone without Kellie Jo's or the trucker's help. It was noon before she was allowed to take the van home with instructions that she was to apply to more companies but instead Alicia went back to the bed but this time she made sure to set the alarm so she would be there to pick Kellie Jo up. She wasn't going to make that same mistake again as she didn't want to spend the rest of the evening cleaning again.

When she picked Kellie Jo up, she seemed to be in a better mood and Alicia was relieved. She hated that Kellie Jo seemed to have this control over her and she didn't want to have to bow down to her again. They entered the apartment and Alicia thought that she was safe as she had put the bed back together so Kellie Jo wouldn't know that she had spent her time sleeping and not working on her computer. She watched as Kellie Jo seem to walk slowly by her desk glancing down for the briefest of moments at her laptop then she turned around and when she did, Alicia got the full force of that intense stare that Kellie Jo had magically developed.

"The bathroom needs to be cleaned, I want it spotless!" Kellie Jo yelled as her stare dared Alicia to protest. Alicia didn't bother as she knew it wouldn't do any good so she went to the kitchen to get the cleaning supplies then she walked around Kellie Jo to the bathroom to get to work. She worked as quickly as possible wanting to get away from Kellie Jo and the world by getting back into the bed but once Kellie Jo looked at the bathroom, she found a number of things wrong so she made her do it all over again. Alicia cussed her under her breath vowing to kill the bitch before this was over with. However when Kellie Jo came in a third time, she found spots that Alicia couldn't see and she was back out at it. That night she didn't get to bed until four AM only to be woken again at five. Alicia wanted to cry uncle but she hadn't gotten to that point as she knew she was in a battle of wills against Kellie Jo and she wasn't going to lose.

That morning her job was to rearrange the stock room, as the other girls had complained that they couldn't find anything with Alicia constantly moving everything around in the store. She worked until noon before she was allowed to go home again with instructions to work at finding an engineering job and ordered not to even think about going to bed. Of course, Alicia never touched her computer and went straight to bed. She got up in time to pick up Kellie Jo at work. When they got home, Kellie Jo walked by the desk then she turned her eyes to Alicia, who then knew that it was going to be a long night. This time spent in the kitchen.

For the next two weeks things went on this way. Alicia spent her time working her ass off on whatever Kellie Jo thought needed to be done at the store then she was to go home to work on getting a job which she instead spent sleeping. Then when she returned home that evening with Kellie Jo she was treated to that stare and she spent most of the night cleaning some part of the tiny apartment over and over again. Even though she did get some sleep during the day when she was suppose to be working on finding a job, it wasn't near enough to make up for the physical labor that Kellie Jo was putting her through. Plus the fact that she wasn't eating the way she needed to all added up to her getting to the bottom of her well. She eventually hit rock bottom, going lower than she thought that she could. She was worn out while Kellie Jo seemed to be doing fine.

It was at this point that Alicia returned to the apartment with orders to work on her computer that Alicia found a piece of her old self. She walked into the apartment and saw the bed which she went straight to. She crawled into the bed but this time no sleep came. All she could think about was Kellie Jo and how she had pushed her so hard lately. Kellie Jo was keeping her from the only pleasure this world could offer her and that made her angry. She was angry at Kellie Jo and what she was doing to her. She spend the rest of the afternoon and evening thinking about this so when the alarm went off she turned it off rolling over not caring if Kellie Jo was pissed at her or not. She figured it served her right to have to catch a ride home. It was on this note that she did finally fall asleep.

"Get out of that fucking bed, you lazy turd." Alicia heard somewhere in the back of her brain, then she felt like a vice grip clamped upon her arm. As she woke up she felt herself being pulled out of the bed. She struggled to gain her balance as she opened her eyes to see a very angry Kellie Jo. When she saw her, she realized that Kellie Jo had dragged her out of the bed she felt her own anger rising within her body.

"I'm tired of seeing you lying around all day when you could be looking for a job; you are the laziest bitch I have ever seen." Kellie Jo yelled at her.

"What right do you have to yell at me and call me a bitch; you don't know what I have been through. I have lost everything; everything that I have ever had is gone. You don't know what that is like to lose everything you have had and everything that you have ever wanted. You're nothing but poor white trash and that is all you'll ever be." Alicia said venomously as she finally told Kellie Jo just what she thought of her and what she thought of all the people that she felt were below her and would always be below her.

Alicia looked at Kellie Jo daring her to deny what was obviously the truth and would always be the truth. However what she saw in Kellie Jo's eyes scared the shit out of her. Her normally calm brown eyes had turned into a fiery red that seemed to be shooting fire toward her. Alicia's eyes were so focused on Kellie Jo's eyes that she never saw her right hand fold up into a fist then come in her direction. She did see that fist a fraction of a second before it made contact with her left cheek. Her head seemed to explode in pain as she lost her balance landing flat on her ass with a thud that shook her body to its core. She looked up at Kellie Jo, who was now bent over her; with right eye as her left one she just saw a huge blurred image just before the eye closed completely from swelling. Alicia couldn't believe that Kellie Jo would ever hit anyone much less her but now that she had Alicia was suddenly afraid that Kellie Jo was going to kick her ass but good.

End of Part One.

To be continued...

Please let me know what you think of my story. I welcome all comments good or bad. You can email me at numlfl@hotmail.com