Free Finding My Own Way by Peggy Dymond Leavey Page A

change into the baggy pocket of his jacket. “What are they paying you, if you don’t mind my asking?”
    â€œForty-three cents an hour,” I whispered.
    â€œReally?” He raised his bushy eyebrows. “Seems rather low to me.”
    I shrugged. “It’s what they pay their students, so I said I’d take it. It’s a job. Till I find a better one.”
    William Thomas frowned at the bag of chips, the glass of Coke. “That’s not lunch, I hope,” he remarked.
    â€œToday it is,” I grimaced. “I was in such a hurry to get here that I forgot to pack myself something. Can you imagine?”
    He put a hand back into his pocket and came out with an apple. “Here, take this. No, I insist. Marge packed an extra one in my lunch today, and I’ll just end up taking it home again. You’ll be saving me from a tongue-lashing.”
    Returning to the floor after my noon break, I spent some time trying to make an artistic arrangement out of the little packages of baby shirts and the bigger bundles of flannelette diapers. I was folding a pile of ladies’ sweaters when a young man with a foxy-coloured brush cut approached. He had a baby face, almost transparent blue eyes, and a smooth, fair complexion. “You’re Libby Eaton, I guess.” He stuck out a slim hand. “I’m the assistant manager.” Bobby Baker couldn’t have been any more than nineteen. He wore a string tie with his white dress shirt, the sleeves of which he’d turned up to his elbows, revealing pale, freckled forearms.
    â€œPleased to meet you,” I said. I’d heard about this young man from Margaret.
    â€œSo, how’s it going?” His tone was friendly as he struck a casual pose against the counter full of ladies’ lingerie and eyed me up and down.
    â€œFine, I think,” I replied, feeling my cheeks grow warm under his gaze. “I helped Pat do some price changes this morning. When she went on her lunch, shetold me to do some tidying.” I bent over my folding job again.
    â€œAlways lots of that to do,” Bobby agreed amiably. “The way some people paw through the merchandise! Mr. Forth keeping you busy enough?”
    I didn’t look up. “I haven’t really seen him. He said just to look around, get to know where things are, until you came in. That you’d be in charge of finding things for me to do.”
    â€œThat’s right.” He uncrossed his ankles and pushed himself away from the counter. “Do you know how to weigh out candy?”
    â€œNot yet,” I admitted.
    â€œCome on over to the candy counter, then. I’ll get Gloria to show you. You can help her there this afternoon. We’ve had a new shipment, and I just brought some cases to her on the dolly. The bins will all need filling.”
    I followed him down the creaking floor to a block of glass cases. “Hey, Blondie,” Bobby greeted a pretty girl who was wiping finger marks off the front of the glass. “I brought you some help.”
    Gloria straightened up and gave me a friendly smile. The assistant manager moved in closer to her. “Now, don’t say I never do anything for you.” His voice was a husky growl.
    With a town as small as Pinkney Corners, I’d seen Gloria Hooper around, but I didn’t know her personally. She was, I discovered, fun to work with. She had a lively sense of humour and kept up a constant chatter while we opened boxes and scooped candy into the compartmentsin the glass-fronted case. She was eager to make me feel right at home. Gloria knew all the staff and the regular customers and seemed to know everything about them. Working with her made the afternoon hours fly past.
    The first time I saw Gloria pop a French cream into her mouth, I was horrified. “My favourites,” she grinned mischievously. With her pink circle skirt, her white blouse, her hair blonder than blonde, she looked