The Friend

Alicia

Rodney, if she had to call him something for the duration of this interview, was acting completely strange towards her. He stared at her in the hallway as if she had two heads on her shoulders. Or as if she was a freak show's main attraction. Whatever it was, it made her on edge. It made her want to do something crazy.

As she followed him down the hall towards an empty room, she marveled at the fact that this had to have been the third or fourth time that she was forced to speak to him. Wait until Maxine heard of this. This could've been Dezzi in her situation right now, but Alicia had to play nice and take the interview. Now, she was stuck with Rodney.

She stopped walking when she realized that he was holding the door out for her. Appalled, she instead waited for him to enter. He rolled his eyes.

"Just go in," he said.

"Don't talk to me that way," she said.

"What? Are you not use to people being polite to you? I wonder why."

"Oh, I'm used to it, alright," she said, "Just not from you."

She started to enter when he changed his mind and walked past her through the door. It closed behind him. Because the door was glass, she was able to see him take a seat at the conference table and meet her eyes. Angered, she opened the door for herself and stalked all the way across the room. She sat at the other end of the long table. It would be impossible to do the interview with this much distance between them, but she wasn't sure if she could stand being near him for a second longer.

"Last name?" she asked, her pen scribbling on the loose-leaf.

"Greene. There's an e after the n."

"Okay, Mr. Greene, the interview will be no more than 10 minutes, tops."

"Fantastic," he muttered.

"Maybe even five."

"Even better."

She pretended to be writing some more, staring at her list of questions that she had prepared for someone she didn't think would be him. She wondered if he too was aware of the large distance between them. If she learned anything from doing interviews for Electric, she knew that good ones never came in the direction she was going in with Rodney. She stared past the clipboard, thinking of questions that didn't have an appearance on her loose-leaf.

"You're a construction worker and—"

"There is no and, that's it. I move bricks and shit around," he said.

"You designed the layout—"

"A little bit of it," he rose from his chair, "I picked up on solving equations and designing earlier on as a worker. I just suggested to my manager he change a few things here and there and he took my advice, brought it up to the architect and the layout was revised."

"That's why your name wasn't on the blueprint?"

He frowned, but replied, "Yeah, that's why."

"I thought it would take mastery to understand those types of equations," she said.

"It does," he rested his palms on the table, "Do you think you can master those types of equations? I didn't go to college, is that what you're saying? Well, I guess I didn't really need to then. I've been doing this type of stuff for years. Since I left high school. Understanding those equations didn't come overnight."

"How old are you?" she asked.

"23," he said, "You?"

"You can't ask the interviewer questions."