Hot Mess (LBSC #1) | Completed

Chapter 9

After I clipped the offending hair with toenail clippers—because I couldn't find scissors—and reassured Ms. Beatty that Zoey and I weren't being killed in our apartment, I sat on the couch with my laptop to tidy up my resume before I headed to the EME Digital Open House. I hadn't opened my resume since I'd been hired at Day Glo over seven years ago, let alone edited it. I was a little worried.

On first glance, the document looked great. Everything was formatted nicely and the whole thing looked professional. But the problem wasn't with my aesthetics; it was the content. I'd created the resume during my final semester of school and hadn't updated it since.

Across the top of the page, my name was printed in capital letters. Below that was my education information. I quickly updated it since the resume still said "Expected Date of Graduation." Under that I had a meager list of skills: Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite, conversational French.

Well, the French skills were long gone. I deleted the phrase from the document and tapped a finger on my chin. What other skills did I have? I could mix a mean drink and I could spot a pervy customer from across the bar, but I was saving those items to go under the "Experience" section. I left the skills section alone for the time being and moved on.

Relevant English Courses: Introduction to News & Article Writing, Introduction to Creative Writing, Reading and Writing Drama, Fiction and Poetry Workshop, Contemporary World Literature, Literature and Culture.

I nodded to myself; those would totally still apply to this position. I would leave them in. Besides, I needed some space fillers since there was a lot of white space on the page. That being said, I deleted the portion of my resume titled "Course Projects." No one would care that I wrote a twenty-page research paper titled "ALF and The Golden Girls: Greatest TV Shows of All Time" or created a portfolio for my English Studies Seminar.

Under Work Experience, I only had one thing listed. At one point during my time in school, I thought I'd wanted to be a librarian, so I'd worked at one of the campus libraries for two years. When I found out that I'd need to get a post-graduate degree in Information Science after graduation, I'd quickly nixed that idea. I perused my responsibilities as a Student Worker.

Assisted library patrons with general questions. Collected all library materials and re-shelved them in the appropriate place by call number. Purged expired magazines, journals, and other periodicals, as well as transported materials to different sections of the library.

I sighed. My resume sucked, but I didn't have a lot to add to it, besides my job at Day Glo. I needed to get it together; at the moment I was more than a little discouraged. I put my laptop down and headed to the kitchen where I made myself a cup of coffee. After pouring in half the sugar bowl and adding a generous amount of half-and-half, I returned to my spot on the couch and stretched my fingers.

Okay. I needed to add to Work Experience. I started to type "Bartender," but thought better of it and typed "Bartender Extraordinaire," because adding the word "extraordinaire" to anything made it more legit. But the title felt bulky; I wanted something that sounded sleek and cool. Something that would make the hiring person stop and go, "Hmm, we need to talk to this girl."

Mixologist. And just like that, I became a mixologist. On to the next thing: how long had I worked at Day Glo? I looked at my graduation date and let out a gasp. I'd been at the bar for seven years. When did that happen? It definitely hadn't felt like seven years.

Holy crap, what am I doing with my life?

When I'd taken the job, I'd only planned to stay there until something better came along. I swallowed deeply. Seven years. And what did I have to show for it besides an unrequited lust for my coworker who had a new girlfriend?