Falling For Charlie

Part 3- The Rejection

Mary Anne was curled up under the blankets in her bed reading through work files when she heard her muffled phone's ringtone go off. Mary Anne frantically searching for the cellphone under the covers feeling the vibrations on the third ring under her right knee and grabbing it just as soon as the ringing stopped. Ten seconds later Mary Anne heard the shrill of the ding signaling she had  a text just sent to her. Positioning her head to read the message caused Mary Anne's head to pain sharply in the back of her neck from the fall she succumbed to when she had fainted the day earlier. putting the cellphone back down Mary Anne winced and cursed out loud to an empty room. She took two long fingers and felt the little bump that was aching now and gently rubbed it until it quit. Yesterday was just a crummy day she told herself smirking and it had lingering effects to remind her of all the things of which had gone wrong. Flashbacks hit her in waves. First she was smelling the beautiful flowers that Jenny had gotten her, then she was looking up at Charlie who looked like a cross between her secret crush in high school that even Jeremy did not know about and some young farmer who would be kept busy planting things or tending to farm animals, his beautiful blue-gray eyes were the last thing she remembered seeing before everything turned to blackness and she woke up in the emergency room with Dr. Christie holding that pen light up to her pupils asking her what her name was. 

Charlie had stayed at the hospital in the waiting room until she woke up the nurses said, which took over an hour to get her glucose levels normal again. When they told him that she was awake and alert he had left the hospital without a word to her, Mary Anne felt a twinge of sadness about that and she could not explain why, she definitely didn't want to see Charlie in her hospital gown, vulnerable and feeling stupid. Plus from the  moment she felt Charlie watching her she had felt uneasy about him, again a feeling she couldn't explain to herself. There was absolutely no reason for her to be so paranoid, Charlie had in fact helped her when she had needed it but still she felt uneasy thinking of him, even now when he wasn't even in the room with her. Shaking her head trying to clear her mind Mary Anne focused on a feeling she did understand, anger at her disease she had to endure since she was a little girl, Diabetes.  Being Diabetic was a big pain in the rear and fainting was one of the biggest reasons why. Frequently getting low sugar from skipped meals or stress Mary Anne had made a couple dozen trips to the hospital before and suspected she would make more in the future. She hated how she had to have snacks and three meals everyday or she risked fainting, some days she was just too busy for snacks or couldn't stomach them even when she remembered. 

Coming out of her thought cloud Mary Anne remembered she had a message and gently positioned her head in a benign way so it would not hurt to read it, smiling when she seen it was from Kendra and not her mom as she had imagined.  

Kendra: Hey, How you feeling?

Mary Anne: Much, much better :)

Kendra : Great!! ... You forgot to eat again, yesterday didn't you? :P

Mary Anne: hey, quit sticking your tongue out at me, that is so childish. Anyways I have ate all my meals and snacks today..but yes I forgot lunch yesterday. 

Kendra : MARY !!!!! WHAT AM I GOING TO DO WITH YOU?? 

Mary Anne :  As lovely as this lecture...ummm I mean conversation is I am going to have to go *yawn*

Kendra: okay, okay I will stop yelling ...for now. What I wanted to ask you was, I rescheduled the interview for Charlie on Friday at 9am. Does that work for you? Or do you want me to reschedule it?

Mary Anne imagined Charlie in her mind standing in front of her watching her as she smelled the flowers again and she felt shivers go down her back. It felt like she was hot inside but cold on the outside, fear she knew what it was, but why she wondered, what startled her so much when she looked at him? Mary Anne was shy and quiet but she never gave in to her fears and she did not plan to start now. So taking her anxiety and pushing it away she texted Kendra back.

Mary Anne: Yep works for me. I really am tired K, going to bed. Give Matthew a kiss for me. Goodnight Love. <3

Kendra: Great I will call Charlie now and confirm it. Sweet Dreams Mary XOXOXO 

Mary Anne sighed as she laid the phone down on the nightstand beside her bed. Sweet Dreams she thought chuckling softly, that was what she was most afraid of tonight. Then she turned all the lights out and got back in bed drifting off to dreams she would soon forget when she woke up.

...........

Friday afternoon Charlie sat with the shot glass in her hand pondering over her latest failure. Mary Anne had turned her down without a second glance. She never even got to fill out any paperwork, it felt like she had been turned down before the interview ever began. Charlie shrugged and thought to herself that someone better must have made their impression before she got her chance, just her luck. Charlie looked at the reddish, gold alcohol thinking of her brother Daniel . Liquid courage Daniel had called it the time they had sneaked out of the house and took their old man's booze with them down to the lake. Daniel had drank most of the whiskey but Charlie sputtered on the couple of sips and did get a slight buzz that her fourteen year old body could not handle, causing her to vomit all over the neighbors favorite trimmed bush by the time the sun was rising and they were making the walk back home. Instead of helping her up Daniel had stood there laughing and calling her names, until the neighbors came out then he ran away unnoticed, Leaving Charlie to take all the blame. Shitty memories she thought but Daniel was right, it gave her courage and a thick skin to handle him and the other people who tried to drag her down. Courage she needed some of that right now she told herself, as she swigged the glass all the way back feeling the burning trail a path from her throat then coating her stomach to where it dispersed into the pores all throughout her body.

Briana the bartender looked at Charlie with a pointed glance as she stopped cleaning the beer mugs with a raggedy old dishcloth and strode over to have a chat with whom she thought was a pretty handsome looking guy. "What's your problem? Want to talk it out?"

Charlie looked at her and simply said "No, Ma'am" with a drunken but slightly country accent that made Charlie seem like she was flirting even when she was not. Thumping the empty shot glass on the bar she said "another one". Then burped loudly "Excuse me" 

Briana went over to the bottles and picked up the best in the house, pouring it slowly into the glass. "well if you won't tell me  your problems then at least have this one on me. No charge." Briana said smiling as she set the glass of courage next to Charlie.

Sighing Charlie looked up at Briana's kind eyes saying " Thanks. It's nothing really, I am just being a baby. Things didn't go my way for the millionth time and I am left disappointed and pissed at everything right now." Hardening her expression Charlie continued "bombed a job interview today and may have to go back home to Jersey If I don't find another one soon."

Briana's oval eyes perked up at this news " A job, is that all you need?" Briana's smile got wider making her whole face light up. "Well I think I can help you out there, um what's your name?"

"My name is Charlie." she said in a flat tone.

"Well Charlie, Meet your new boss, my name is Briana." Briana stuck out her hand that had iced white nail polish and little rose decals that she painted herself on each thumb and middle finger. Charlie gratefully looked up and gave a weak smile shaking her head in acceptance while giving Briana's hand a firm but kind squeeze back.

Charlie looked around at the dark and dusty place noticing that it was packed with people and that she could potentially make quite a bit of money here. Pushing away Mary Anne's words from her mind "I am sorry but you are just not the right fit here at KeKe and MiMi publishing. We are looking for someone a bit more stable." Stable that hurt down to the core. Charlie was unstable, when you come for a background like hers it was hard not to be but she thought now, things are looking up for once and where one door closes a window does open. 

However Charlie doesn't know it yet but someone is going to walk through the door and open another window for her soon and she will not be able to keep Mary Anne's words out of her mind for long. Find out in Part 4- The Misunderstanding