The Start

Madeline Archer was running late. She had missed her usual bus home from work, and as a consequence, the bus stopped further away from her apartment in Milwaukee. It was late August and Madeline had a job interview in twenty minutes.

She puffed as she jogged on the sidewalk. ‘I can’t believe I missed the bus!’ she thought to herself She turned the corner and her apartment building was in sight. Madeline checked her watch and noted that she had fifteen minutes before the phone interview was to start. She slowed to a speedy walk and raced up the stairs to the apartment entrance.

Madeline lived in a converted house near the University. Before starting school in Milwaukee, she had found a roommate online and they had searched for apartments on the one day that both could make it down to Milwaukee. Madeline and Suzanne, the online roommate, had looked at three dreadful places and one not-so-dreadful place. They signed the lease on the not-so-dreadful place and moved in on Labor Day. The apartment wasn’t ideal, but Madeline was done with school and was ready to move out in a week.

The door opened and Suzanne, dressed in her jogging clothes, almost ran into Madeline. “Oh hey Madeline,” she said. “I’m heading out. I need to clear my head.” Suzanne was an architecture grad student and still had another two years of school left. She hadn’t taken summer classes like Madeline, but she had started working for a architecture firm downtown.

“Okay, I’ll see you later. I’ve got that interview in--" she glanced down at her watch again “-- ten minutes! I gotta go get ready for it!”

“Good luck!” Suzanne bounced down the stairs and started jogging off down the street.

Madeline clattered up the stairs and into her room. Her parents had came down earlier in the week to help her start moving her things home. It had become obvious that she wasn’t going to have a professional job before her lease ran out, so she was going to continue working at her paraprofessional job and commute from home. Plopping her bookbag down by the door, Madeline walked over to the card table and did a quick look through of her interview prep materials. After regaining her breathing returned to normal from the run home, she became nervous once again. Tapping her fingers on the card table top, she once again checked the clock. The interview was supposed to start ten minutes ago. Then an explanation came to her – the interviewers were in the Eastern time zone. Maybe they had scheduled the interview in the Central time zone instead and she had fifty minutes to get ready for it. Madeline put her head down on the table to take a short nap and drifted into a light sleep.

Riiiiiiiing!

Madeline’s eyes popped open and she grabbed the phone and answered. “Hello?”

“Hello. Can I speak to Madeline Archer?”

“This is her.”

“Madeline, this is Sylvia Brown from the Baltimore Free Library. I’m facilitating your
interview.”

“Okay.” Madeline was confused, but donned her friendly interview voice. She needed to get a professional job soon or else moving back home and living with her parents was going to drive her crazy.

“You’re going to be interviewed by a group…”

And with the Madeline’s interview commenced over a speakerphone.

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She hung up the phone and took a deep breath. Her eyes widened and she jubilantly shouted “I can’t believe that they offered me a job after a phone interview! Yes, yes, yes!” She quickly picked back up the phone and punched in the numbers to call home. Her fingers trembled slightly from excitement and nervousness.

“Hello?”

“Hi Mom. It’s Madeline.”

“Hi Maddie. You got the job?”

“How did you know?”

“Well, after you said that they offered it to Kelly after she interviewed there. And I knew they’d do the same thing with my girl. Congratulations!”

Madeline sighed, equally embarrassed and happy by her mother’s confidence in her. “I still have to hear back from the University in Kansas though. But I don’t know…a little University town in Kansas or a public library in Baltimore.”

“Did you take the job?”

“Not yet. I said that I would need some time to think about it. I have to get back to them in two weeks. I’d really like to do what Kelly did before she started working at the library.”

“That sounds like a good idea. You’ve still got some time to make up your mind.”

Madeline sighed again. “I hate to just take the first job that is offered to me, and especially since I really wanted to work at a University, but this just seems like it would be such a great opportunity.”

“Do you know where you would be working? Did they tell you what subject department?”

“Yeah,” Madeline replied. “I’m so happy it’s not Business, Science and Technology. They want me to work in the Humanities Department. I know it’s not an academic library, but at least I would be getting reference experience in the subject area that I really want to work in. And plus it’s not a rinky-dink public library like at home.”

“Honey,” her mom cut in, “it sounds like you’ve already made up your mind.”

“Yeah…I probably have. I don’t know a soul in Kansas and at least in Baltimore, I know Kelly.”

“Why don’t you look for a flight out there and check out the library? You can meet the people who would be your co-workers, get a feel for Baltimore, talk to Kelly, and look for an apartment.”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking.”

“Great minds think a like. Dad’s not home yet. Do you want to call back in an hour or so to let him know about your news?”

“Sure. I’m going to try calling Kelly to see if I could stay with her. I think she should be home from work by now.”

“If you can’t stay with her, we can help you out with getting a hotel.”

“I really appreciate your offer, Mom. Thanks. Well, I’d better go so I can try calling Kelly and then book a flight online.”

“Congratulations, Maddie. I knew you would get a job before you moved back home.”

Madeline smiled. “I’ll call back in about an hour. Love you!”

“Love you too. Bye.”

“Bye Mom.” Madeline hung up the phone.