Backwards [Joncer]

Backwards

Most of the time, Spencer Smith considered himself to be a pretty smart guy, but sometimes, his big, stupid mouth gets him into trouble. Sometimes the problem is that he thinks on his feet a little too quickly. Sometimes the problem is that he has a fairly vivid imagination. Sometimes the problem is that he got used to lying a little too well. And sometimes, the problem is that he is determined to get what he wants.

He has no idea why he’d said it.

It was just a job.

But it was a job that Spencer wanted, and a job that he’d already been trying to get for a solid six months. He just wanted to get out of being a secretary and to actually do something with his life for once. He wanted to help people, to help families, and Pete Wentz had practically offered him a job the moment he’d walked into the agency. He had gone to school for accounting, and Wentz’s “Fueled By Ramen” was the exact kind of place he’d always been looking for.

Some people wanted to save the environment, but Spencer just wanted to help families save their pocketbooks. Everyone deserves the chance to live, and helping low-income or single parent families had been one of Spencer’s dreams since he’d seen the impact that both of these have on children and their parents when he had been growing up. He would have gone into counseling if he was any good with people, but he was better with math.

He had gone in for his interview, extremely nervous about the whole affair. From all the research he’d done, Fueled By Ramen seemed like Spencer’s dream job. They required that a family be below the poverty line, and their rates were subject to change depending on the family’s living situation. It was the best agency of its kind that he’d seen so far: all of the employees seemed happy, and the people in the waiting room did, as well.

Pete had invited him into his office, and Spencer’d shifted uncomfortably in his gray suit in the cushy chair.

“So, Spencer Smith,” Pete had said, a grin on his face. “I read your résumé. It was really good. I really liked the reasons for wanting to work here that you put in your cover letter, actually. Could you tell me more about them?”

“Well,” Spencer had said, and listed off the things he’d been spouting off for months, now. “I want to help people, but I’m not really a people person, so I thought I’d go into accounting. Most jobs at accounting firms seem to sort of just to make a lot of money, and I really want to help people who might not have a lot of money. Your agency looks like it does exactly that, and, well, I’d really like to be included as a part of it.”

Pete had nodded, still grinning. “I just have one last question for you, Spencer. This is a family place, as you saw. We help families. So we try to hire family people, as well. Vicky T out there has a son, Gabe and William are married, Frank is married to a guy called Gerard, I’ve got my Patrick, and Ray has a daughter. One of our requirements, actually, for working here, is that you have a family. Even if it’s just a partner, we’d really like to keep things consistent. So, Spencer. What about you? Married? Engaged? Kids?”

“Married,” Spencer’d said, quickly. “Not for very long, uh. But. Yeah. To a guy. I’m kind of a private person, actually, so I guess I’d like it if the subject weren’t brought up a lot? But, yes.”

“Oh, totally, I can totally respect that,” Pete had said, and that had been that.

There were company parties, but Spencer always managed to get out of having to bring someone by saying they were sick, or visiting their family, or working. But it turned out that while Pete was okay not asking Spencer about his spouse, he was not okay with never having met the guy. And it turned out that you only got three strikes to bring your spouse to a party, at least until everyone had met them.