This is one of the important life lessons that she is taking the time to teach me, and I need to learn it. Just not sure how to say it.

“Everything, in every way, checked out and looked good. All of the numbers matched.”

“True.”

“Numbers do not always reflect reality. Just having the right numbers doesn’t make it so.”

“Never trust everything you see. Even salt looks like sugar.” Now she is giving me that quiet little smile she has as if she is thinking of something funny but doesn’t want to share the joke.

“Is he going to call the cops? Will someone be arrested, and do we have to testify?”

“No, to all accounts. He will get compensation in one form or the other. He always does.”

“What will happen to the people involved?” Not sure I wanted to ask this question. This is starting to seem too much like Savannah.

“That is not a concern for either one of us is it?” She looked me dead in the eyes, neither one of us blinked or looked away.

“No Beverly, it’s not.”

“He might be embarrassed by the whole thing and he is a sweet old man don’t you think? So we probably shouldn’t mention this to anyone. Anyone at all. Agreed?”

‘Sweet maybe, scary as hell when he gets mad – definitely.’

“Of course not Beverly. In fact just consider it forgotten.” Yep, just like Savannah.

“Take the rest of the day off. You will have a check deposited into your personal account on Monday. Have a good weekend and try to relax. Monday we start again and I want to see how your course work is doing.” I simply nodded and got up to leave.

“See you Monday Beverly. Thank you for everything.”

“See you Monday. Say ‘Hi’ to Ann for me.”

I was almost home before the thought hit me. I have never told her what my personal account number was. I smiled and thought to myself. ‘It would not pay to cross or underestimate this woman. I am glad she is on my side.’

Of course this thought was immediately followed by, “I am one step closer to being ‘The Perfect Employee’.”

Chapter Two

I used the weekend to catch up with studying and gossiping with Ann. Sometimes our friends live for drama. It’s like a steadily evolving soap opera. And I wanted to catch up on every body’s lives. Between my doing school assignments, and working for Beverly part time during the day, and with Ann working mostly at night, she and I had some serious catching up to do.

Part of the good news we shared was that Cindy and Phil were an ‘item’. Those two have been dancing around it since I’ve known them. They seem to have been destined for each other. Good for them.

Ann also mentioned that she and Bobby were having some problems. He is getting a little too controlling. My back was to her while I was dicing onions for the chili we were planning to cook so she couldn’t see me. This is good because my knuckles went white while gripping the knife handle.

“In what way?”

“Oh, just little things. No biggie” she said.