It opened with her arrival at 7:00 am for a public area
shift. When she walked into the lobby down the stairs to reception to get the
keys, everyone froze. The same manager was on who’d reprimanded her for coming
in for her shift by the front door once (that could have only arisen for a
reason). When she left going up the stairs, she knew she was about to
get…something, and turned to look down on him with a stare that could have
snapped icicles. He kept the tremor out of his voice, just barely, confining it
to utterly appalled.
“Excuse me,
but you cannot come down here in your street clothes!”
At 7:00 am.
When she only ever did so first thing to pick up the keys. It had took a full
four weeks before anyone had dared to say a word to her about her “street
clothes”, which were always impeccable, and he the manager opened with “Excuse
me”? The ice queen could have laughed if she wasn’t busy, but instead of giving
any it undue significance, that despite being the silent type even a manager
might be so intimidated by her personality that it took him four weeks to
correct her on a serious matter, she attributed it to their usual lack of a
standard and general incompetence, which just made it more of an insult. It
could have been addressed on day one politely so as to correct her, to total
acquiescence on her part, rather than leading to her complacent enjoyment of
the habit, and then being addressed as if she’d been all the time engaged in
some sort of deliberate travesty of decorum that was her fault. She’d
been publically castigated in front of the entire reception staff for what was
in fact his own laxity (or timidity, depending). She didn’t come from a place
so entrenched in classism and was less aware of its nuances. Ice he deserved,
and ice they’d get, for they had not gained her respect. She came from a place
where authority did manage to arise from actual merit. There was no emotion or
malice in the stare; it was genuine ice. Once she was out of sight and waiting
for the elevator, she jumped up and slammed herself into the door. There was
more dignity in being exploited by your own family.
She got accosted by a manager named Nico when she was
helping a woman with a genuine feminine emergency and trying to keep it
private, as if she might be erranding drugs or doing something equally
unsavoury. The washrooms included heroin remains from the night before. A new
woman on her first day who she was training (and was well into middle age) was
forced by Hilde to start with the toilets, wiping out her one plea for basic
dignity.
Then she was approached from behind by a Spanish young man
named Abraham in the study, because, it turned out, he was starting that day as
a porter. He had a lot of questions; he was trying to cess the work
environment. Then he pitched, “You’re
pissed, aren’t you?” Ooh that opened a can of worms. Well, in the first place,
the maids had just been put on the floors singly for two weeks straight,
Gabrielle had quit from exhaustion, and Maria was back only by virtue of
existing perpetually on painkillers, and still got reamed out for
hesitating on what she might be capable of performing, aka rotating/flipping
queen sized mattresses by herself. The staff in both the linen and public areas
used to be double. “Whooo, that’s bad,” said Abraham. She did not notice Nico
walking up behind them until she saw the look of complete horror on his face.
Not because it was true, but for fear that a member of the public might ever
hear her.
Then she went and saw Suede that night and tripped right
out, just on the basis of the content alone. In one song the singer broke out
of context to ask, “Can’t you feel her in your mind?” Another about how we do
“the pills” to reach each other.
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