The Delivery Girl

6. Phone calls

Julie

I'm balancing a tray of food in one hand and a tray of dirty dishes in the other when I suddenly feel my phone buzzing.

"Shoot," I mumble. Maybe I could let it go to voicemail, but I'm expecting a call from Professor Kim. I interviewed for a TA position for her intro undergrad engineering course a few weeks ago. She's starting her class late, apparently she was at some conference in Switzerland. Mei suddenly walks by me, holding an empty tray tucked under her arm and a tall stack of cups in her other hand. "Mei? Could you help me with something?"

"Sure! What's up?" she asks with wide, bright eyes. I've always been secretly jealous of her looks; she's often being complimented for her big round eyes, thick and shiny hair, and delicate feminine figure.

Meanwhile I'm over here, stuck at barely 5'4" with the figure of a twig. I keep my chronically messy hair tamed in two long braids.

"My phone's ringing, could you hold this?" I ask.

Without any hesitation, she smoothly places the stack of cups onto her tray, balancing the tower with one hand. She takes my tray of food with her now free hand. It's been years since Mei quit ballet, but she's somehow as graceful as ever.

"Hello?" I say, slowly walking around to continue serving. Mei follows along, holding the tray while I place the dishes onto the tables.

"Hello, am I speaking to Miss Leong?" the voice says.

My heart skips a beat when I realize this is definitely not Professor Kim. "S-speaking."

"This is Callen Sterling, I wanted to say thank you again for coming in to chat last week."

"Thanks for having me." I wait to hear the usual, unfortunately we've decided to move on with other candidates spiel.

"I'm calling to offer you the position of junior assistant," he says.

I abruptly stop walking – making Mei nearly crash into me. She gives me a curious look I pretend not to notice.

"Oh... thank you." A million thoughts run through my mind but none of them come out.

"It might not be the... er, exact role you were looking for, but... I will say that it's a good way to get your foot in the door of the industry." He pauses for a moment. "Are you interested?"

The noise of the room fades away until it's completely silent. The only thing I can hear is my heart thumping in my chest. There's clearly something off about him right now, but my mind is buzzing with too many thoughts to care.

"I'd... be happy to take the position," I finally say, trying to sound confident.

What did I just do?

"Excellent, I'll send over the paperwork shortly. Please feel free to call me if you have any questions."

Mei looks at me, slightly tilting her head once I've ended the call. "What was that all about?"

"I got a job."

"Congratulations!" she squeals. "The TA job? Dad's gonna be thrilled."

"Yeah... that job." I do my best to mirror her smile.

–

I open the email attachment, finding a lengthy contract. The last page is a brief job description.

Junior Assistant.

Reports to: Executive Assistant.

-Provides support in calendar scheduling, meeting minutes, data entry, phone calls, emails, and other administrative tasks as assigned by the executive assistant.