Rebecca’s eyebrows rose. “You can’t compare the two.”
“You’re fired, Miss Neumann.”
Hello? Rebecca’s mouth fell open. “What? You can’t do this.” She held tight to the desk, so tight her fingers turned white. Okay, maybe she had flouted the rules a bit, but firing her?
“I’m your employer. Of course I can.”
No, she couldn’t. Rebecca might be a mere kindergarten teacher, but she knew the law. “There’s no documentation trail.”
The headmistress’s eyes were cold and calculating. “If this had been the first time I noticed your behavior, yes, but year after year, you have ignored the principles we teach in this school. It’s all written up in your file. I’m not sorry, Miss Neumann. I don’t have a choice. Not anymore.”
“But the kids…” Rebecca trailed off, realizing the kids would be fine. Oh, yeah, they’d grow up thinking there wasn’t a Santa Claus, they’d grow up to run Enron, and cheat on their golf scores, and fudge on their charitable donations. And it’d all fall on Rebecca’s shoulders. She’d be the one responsible. Rebecca. No way. She had not yet begun to fight. “I’ll tell the papers. The media will be incensed. I have the spirit of Christmas on my side.”
Cruzella didn’t even stop to breathe. More proof of her subhumanity. “I have five hundred of the best lawyers in New York on my side, along with the heirs to three of the major networks, two of the news cable giants and three of the newspaper barons in the city. How many major networks are there, Mistress Neumann?”
“Three.” Her fighting ideals were going…
“News cable giants?”
“Two.” Going…
“New York dailies?”
“Three.” Gone.
“Have I left anyone out?”
“No,” said Rebecca, who had spent four years as a cheerleader and knew that if your team sucked, fighting wouldn’t get you squat.
“When they hear of your addiction to drugs and your scandalous doings with men, your reputation will be in tatters, and you’ll never teach kindergarteners in this town again.”
“I don’t have a drug habit,” snapped Rebecca, glancing down to make sure that her Advil was out of sight.
“I’ve seen the painkillers, Mistress Neumann. And then there’s the scandalous doings with men.”
“I don’t have doings with men.” God knows, she had given it her best shot, but somehow it never seemed to work out.
“Mr. Murphy tells otherwise.”
“I have never, ever, kissed, fondled, caressed, groped, touched, teased, flirted with, or petted Mr. Murphy. He’s lying.” Mr. Murphy was the weasely science teacher who kept asking her out, which, of course, she had refused. Rebecca had meticulous standards in men. Mr. Murphy was a reptilian dweeb.
Cruz didn’t seem to care. “Would you like to testify to that in court, Mistress Neumann? Go away. You don’t fit in here. You have never fit in here.”
There it was. The writing on the wall, in Palmer method cursive script. Rebecca swore, a particularly vile interjection, just to see Cruzella puff up in rage for one last time. Then she tucked the letters back in the Prada bag and hooked it over her shoulder. “I’ll pack up my things.”
“And don’t forget those reindeer antlers. Tacky, tasteless and made in a third-world country by sweatshop workers.”
Proudly Rebecca stuck the reindeer antlers on her head, and walked out, never looking back.
Chapter 2
Rebecca shared an apartment with two of her sorority sisters from college. Both were on their way to matrimonial glory, brandishing two-plus-carat engagement rings whenever they got the chance. The plus side of the arrangement was that they were hardly ever home, and Rebecca saved enough in rent to subsidize her fashion habit.
She stalked into her apartment and kicked off her shoes, fighting the urge to cry, scream, or both. Her feet ached, her head ached, her stomach ached, and now she had no job. There was only one cure. Rebecca took out a pint bottle of bourbon, the liter of diet soda and started to pour.
One down, then two, and she still didn’t feel any better. The phone rang, caller ID said Mom, and Rebecca didn’t answer. She couldn’t face her family. She was too ashamed.
Fired. What a miserable word. She pulled the pen from her ear and wrote it out twenty-five times on her While You Were Out Shopping…message page. She didn’t deserve this. She had worked hard for her kids. Who was going to bake them cupcakes with extra buttercream icing when she wasn’t around? No one. Who would be there to bandage bruised knees with a hug and a kiss rather than tincture of iodine? Not a soul. Give them extra candy on Valentine’s Day? Not even Natalie.