What’s the most important thing to do right after you’ve changed jobs? Let an expert in job changing (not proud of it, by the way) tell you. It’s relationships! You have to start building bridges. If you can get even just one person on your side, you’ve got a good shot at making it through your first days at your new workplace.
“What, really? Aw, shucks, you think so? Hee-hee!”
For the sake of networking, I laughed my most girlish laugh. I had officially been hired as a real estate salesperson, and the other women in the office had taken me under their collective wing right away, so I was busy playing the part of the ditzy new girl. None of them suspected I was a seasoned job-hopper with a résumé that would make anyone recoil.
The first thing I discovered upon starting my new job was that the quality of my voice had nothing to do with the actual work. Like, nothing at all. You were just showing rooms to clients who were standing right next to you, so there was no need to shout. I admit, when the guy handed me his business card, I did wonder what the heck he was talking about, but a job was a job, so I kept my mouth shut. Turns out I was right; my shouting and my selling had nothing to do with each other.
Sitting with the other women and munching my bread at lunchtime, I asked a few careful questions and discovered that Mr. Floofy Beastkin, who ran this place, had a habit of recruiting cute young ladies from time to time. The others nodded and said it was the same with them—which I took as a roundabout way of saying that they were cute and they knew it.
Still, at least we were talking. It was a friendly chat, and it meant I was getting close to the other women almost as soon as I had joined the company.
“You should watch out, though,” said Miss Curly Hair (sorry, ladies, I don’t remember all your names yet, so we’re going with prominent physical characteristics) to my right, picking at her boxed lunch. “The president doesn’t waste any time. He likes to put the moves on new hires, and he doesn’t hesitate to stoop to sexual harassment. Why, just the other day, he patted my head!”
“Oh, I know! He was trying everything with me. The way he put his hand on my shoulder!” Miss Short Hair, to my left, shrugged expressively.
Apparently, the president had an insatiable appetite for women.
Young Miss Ripply Wave, sitting across from me, raised her hand. “Me too! He did the same kinds of things to me until a week ago. And he kept begging me to go to dinner with him. ‘Just once,’ he said! ‘Pretty please,’ he said! It was a nightmare.”
Ripply Wave continued to munch on her sandwich as she complained. She didn’t notice the ominous silence from Curly Hair and Short Hair. A few minutes later, Miss Short Hair heaved a sigh that sounded like it could have meant anything.
“I’m sure he’s left you alone ever since I gave you that perfume,” said Miss Curly Hair, adding that we should all be grateful.
Oh? What’s this?
“What perfume are you talking about?” I asked. It’s an ironclad rule, and indeed a privilege of new hires that they can immediately voice any questions they have. I supplemented mine with a puzzled look.
Curly Hair gave me a smile that was clearly pasted on. “You want to know?”
Looking back on the experience, I can tell it was a bit of a loaded question, but at the time I didn’t really think about it; I just nodded.
Curly Hair shot the other two a look. Short Hair nodded, but Ripply Wave cocked her head.
“Hand over the perfume,” Curly Hair said with a touch of irritation.
Ripply Wave seemed a little confused, but she said, “You mean this?” and plonked a gaudy pink bottle down in the middle of the table.
“You had your week,” Curly Hair said, fixing Ripply Wave with a look. “I think it’s about time you shared with the new girl.”
“Aww, do I have to?” Ripply Wave huffed. She didn’t look thrilled about it. Me, I just sat there smiling, because I had no idea what they were talking about.
“Don’t be difficult. You had your fun this week. And all the riffraff stopped chasing you. Now it’s MacMillia’s turn to make some happy memories.”
What did she mean? How did the perfume give you happy memories? None of this was making any sense.
Curly Hair gave me a puzzled look. “Don’t tell me you don’t know about sancta, MacMillia. Everyone who lives in this country knows about them.”
Sancta…
The word was well-known in Cururunelvia; it referred to objects that had been imbued with prayers. And what did that mean? Exactly what you’d expect it to mean. They could be almost any object, imbued with almost any prayer, and it all came of praying to the statue of Cururunelvia.
For example, a girl freezing from the cold might be given a match that, once lit, showed her a fantastic vision. An aspiring magician might get a door that led to a faraway place. There was no magic in our land, but these objects, born of prayer, might as well have been crafted from pure magic. Sancta was the general name we gave to such objects with all their varied and unusual powers.
What she was saying was that the bottle of perfume sitting in front of me was very special—something someone had prayed for at some point in the past.
“Um… Yeah, sure, I know about them,” I said. “It’s just…”
This was my first time seeing a sancta in person. I stared at it for a long moment, but it just looked like an old, slightly beat-up bottle of perfume to me.
“The way I got this sancta was, well…special. I only let my closest friends borrow it.” Curly Hair leaned in and lowered her voice conspiratorially. “But I’d be happy to let you use it, MacMillia.” She grinned and added that it would do wonderful things for me.
At that moment, a gust of wind came through the window and caught Ripply Wave’s hair. The smell of roses tickled my nose.
“Awww, no! I don’t feel like sharing!” Ripply Wave grabbed the perfume with both hands, pouting.
That piqued my interest. “If I may ask, exactly what kind of prayer is imbued in that perfume?” I said to Curly Hair. Whether I decided to take her up on her offer or not, I thought it would be prudent to find out the effect of the prayer first.
“Well, I suppose I can tell you…”
In retrospect, it’s possible I was already under the influence of the perfume then. The whole time Curly Hair was talking, I couldn’t take my eyes off the bottle.
The women had a pet name for this perfume: They called it the Perfume of Destiny.
“Do you believe in love at first sight? Destined meetings?” Curly Hair asked. What a romantic high note to start out on. She claimed that just wearing a hint of the perfume could attract the person you were destined for. “This perfume has a special property: From the moment you put it on, people you want nothing to do with stay away from you.”
That included the president, who was probably the least popular person among these women. They said that after only a spritz of the perfume, he left them alone completely. Not only that, but anyone at the company, regardless of gender, whom they didn’t get along with quietly seemed to make themselves scarce.
“You get to spend all your time enveloped by the lovely aroma of roses; plus, the president stops hitting on you—it’s been so wonderful!” Ripply Wave said.
Not only did it shoo away unwanted interlopers and give the women their ideal environment, but gradually, the person of their dreams showed up.
“Thanks to this perfume, I’ve started going out with that guy in Sales who I had my eye on!” Short Hair whipped out a photograph, eager to show off.
“The same thing happened to me,” said Curly Hair, giving a flutter of her hair.
“Well, I didn’t get a boyfriend, but I feel like good stuff has been happening to me, too.” Ripply Wave said.
Apparently, this Perfume of Destiny had made their lives shimmery and great. All three had gotten what they wanted after using it, which seemed to be pretty good evidence of its effectiveness.
“Think of this as a little sign of our friendship. We want to get to know you better and better. Hee-hee…” Curly Hair coughed and placed the perfume in front of me.
It was all…too neat. You know the expression “too good to be true”? Didn’t it seem weird that three people I barely knew were just giving me this powerful, coveted object?