At eight years old, Lisa dwarfed the desk she leaned upon. Her eyes moved quickly, and side to side, as she read intently from the textbook in front of her.
“She doesn’t even know I’m here.”, Helen thought as she passed the child.
“Child”, the word repeated in her brain as she reminded herself that the person at the desk was, indeed, just a child.
“Then why do I feel so self-conscious?”, she continued the conversation with herself.
This child wasn’t just any child. This child was the boss’s child. Imagined snippets of Lisa’s privileged life played in the form of colorful magazine images inside Helen’s head, as she fed paper into the fax machine.
“What must she think of me, a grunt in her father’s office?”
“Look at the way she studies so intently! She hasn’t moved in minutes! Is this the result of parenting? Is this the effect of having a stay-at-home Mom?”
Helen stood in front of a historically moody fax machine, listening for the sounds of successful transmission, as an image of her own back presented in her head, and she wondered what the child thought of her bulky, discount-store sweater.
A piercing squeal signaled her success and Helen stole a glance at Lisa as she left the room. The child’s head still hung over the book, allowing a curtain of perfectly coiffed, shiny blonde hair to shield her face.
The conversation continued as she made her way back to her cubicle.
“She probably doesn’t see me that way at all. She probably didn’t speak because she’s shy, and I am an adult, and maybe she just doesn’t talk to adults.”
Realizing she needed another copy, Helen turned on her heel upon seeing the crowded bulletin board over her desk.
“This job is embarrassing. It takes no skill.” As she navigated the cubicle maze, the conversation began again. “That child studies that way so that she will never have to work in a place like this!”
Arriving at the antiquated copier, she raised the lid and mitered the paper on the glass.
“But she doesn’t really know what you do! For all she knows, your job is very difficult, requiring lots of skill and education!”
Helen lowered the lid and pressed the button. An image of her boss’s den filled her head as he sat upon an oversized, expensively upholstered ottoman in front of his studious blonde daughter. “We buy this education for you so that you never have to work for someone like me.”
Lights flashed as the mechanism traveled back and forth underneath the glass.
“This isn’t about her, you know. This is about you. That child has no idea what you do or why. But, you do.”
A flood of images filled Helen’s head as she retrieved both copy and original, beginning with that goofy graduation picture, complete with rakishly tilted, white mortar board. She saw an image of her first, hopelessly addicted, husband, and a succession of mindless jobs she worked at to support her children. She saw the jalopies she drove and the unimaginative boxes she’d lived in, and the puzzle began to come together.
She barely noticed the co-worker she side-swiped while rounding a corner of the maze. His “ ‘Scuse me…” brought her head up and she dashed off a smile that stuck as she realized she’d bought it.
Years of negligence and name-calling had left their mark. She saw herself as others experienced her, strong and aloof, yet, caring. Her smile deepened as she realized the permeability of her guise. Her perceived strength was nothing more than a perfected defense mechanism.
Unmasked by and eight-year-old, she filed the copy, and then the original.
© Copyright 2007-2009 Stacye Carroll All Rights Reserved
Are We There Yet? 
Pretty good Stacye
of course I am no expert but that is my opinion.