Chapter II

Honest Earnest Shop

    “Earnest! Where is it? HUH?! Where is my money EARNEST?!” his ex-wife screeched like a chimpanzee while she frantically went through the drews in his office.

    “Women if you don’t stop yelling, you’re going to scare all my customers away,” Earnest tried to calm her. But she wasn't having it. She just kept stomping around his office in her four inch heels.

    “What customers Earnest? You haven’t had a single customer in weeks,” she yelled throwing her hands up.

    “Well if you knew that then why are you here badgering me for money,” Earnest wittingly said.

    “Don’t you get smart with me Earnest,” his ex-wife's head snapped to the side.

*Ding, Ding* The front door alarm went off.

    “Who’s that Earnest? HA! One of your whores? Cause lord knows that you don’t have any customers,” she said heading out of the office to go see who just walked in. Earnest sat in his chair for a bit shaking his head. He could hear the four inch heels making there way to the front of the shop. Earnest got up to make sure she didn’t cause any damages, or comotion.

    “HELLO!” she yelled out.

    “Hi,” the girl answered with a sign in hand.

    “Earnest now I know you aren’t hooking up with little miss. Jailbait over here.”

    Earnest walked up to the front unknowing of who his ex-wife was yelling at. As he walked up to the front he was thinking up some excuses but couldn’t think of anything solid enough. “Women what the hell are you yelling about now?” he asked his crazy ex-wife pondering how he ever ended up married to her. As he pondered he made eye contact with a young girl holding a sign. “Oh I apologize, my ex-wife can be a bit much at times,” he said as he grabbed one of her arms and began walking her to the door. His ex-wife began hitting his hand away but all of her efforts failed. “I’ll be right with you,” he said as he opened the door ready to toss his crazy ex out.

    She pulled herself away, “Oh hell nah Earnest! Who is this little girl?” she asked. Earnest honestly shrugged with no idea of who the girl was. His ex-wife turned to the girl and asked her why she was here.

    The girl flipped the sign she was holding in her hand to reveal the words NOW HIRING in bright green letters. “You still looking for someone?” she asked.

    Earnest had forgot that he put the sign up there. “Um yes just give me one second,” Earnest said while he tried to push his crazy ex out.

    “So you have money to pay her but you don’t have no money to give for your kids,” she yelled at him.

    “The twins both go to a boarding school, and there all paid up for the next year. So what money do you need?” he asked her.

    “Well,” she thought a bit. “What about JR!?” she spatted out.

    “Jr?” he asked in disbelief.

    “Yup, JR,” she nodded her head triumphantly.

    “JR is twenty eight years old with his own family. Why would you even bring him up?” he asked rhetorically.

    His ex-wife was furiatied she stomped her way into the middle of the doorway and turned around. “Don’t you worry I’m gonna get you Earnest. You just wait. I’m gonna get you.” She slammed the door closed.

    “I am terribly sorry about that,” Earnest apologized. “Please come with me so we can get this over with,” he made his way to the back of the shop and into his office. When he got to the door he opened it for her and pointed at a bi-colored folding chair. She made her way over and sat down. Earnest shut the and sat down in his chair. “So what kind of work were you looking for kid?”

    “You really don’t remember me do you?” she asked. Earnest gave the girl a look over. “Come on grandpa you can do it.” Something went off in his head when he heard her call him grandpa.

    “Wait a minute,” it slowly came together. “You’re the little rat that stole my trash cans a year ago!”

    “Yes siry, that was me,” she said sitting back in the chair with a grin on her face.

    “What did a girl like you need three trash cans for?” he too sat back in his chair.

    “Well if I’m going to tell the truth I stole four,” Earnest mouth dropped, “and I used them for some admissions project for some college.”

    “Huh,” he let out. “So what’s your name anyway?” he asked her.

    “I don’t know that depends if I’m hired,” she wittingly answered. She sat up in her chair with a grin on her face waiting for his response.

    He too sat up in his chair, put his elbows on his desk and his right hand on his chin. “Can you be here at seven tomorrow morning?”

    “The sign says you open at eight thirty,” she responded.

    “Can you be here by seven?” he asked again.

    “Yeah, but ..”

    “Then you’re hired,” he threw his hands up and sat back in his chair. “Now what’s my new employees name?”

    “Hera,” she said while she stood up getting ready to leave.”

    “Hera?”

    “Yeah, once upon a time my parents were obsessed with Greece,” she told him. Then she turned and headed for the door.\

    “See you at eight thirty,” Earnest called out as she left.

    Hera was about to turn around and ask him which time was it. But she just made an elective decision to come at eight to see what would happen. As she made her way to the front a the shop should couldn’t help but glance around. While glancing she passed something that was shiny. She looked back to see if Earnest was watching her. When she saw that it was clear she made her way towards the shiny object.

    She approached a work table and on it was a cracked shell to a left shoulder blade cap. Hera looked around once more and when she saw that no one was looking she picked it up. The bottom right quadrant was loose so when she picked it up it fell off. It clanked on the table and then hit the floor.

    Earnest who was watching from his office had seen enough and paged on the overhead, “We’ll do it tomorrow Hera, go home.”

    “Okay!” she yelled in no specific direction. She quickly pulled out her phone and took a picture of the shoulder cap, and left the shop.

    As she walked down the street she could hear a couple arguing about something. She looked up as they passed by her. She could see the man holding a piece of paper shaking it at her. The women was desperately holding onto her shoes.

    “I miss those days,” a voice came from behind her. Hera quickly threw her hand in her pocket reaching for her phone. Earnest came up from behind her. “Calm down little lady. It’s just me,” he said.

    She looked down and noticed the shoulder cap in his hand. “What are you doing with that?” she pointed at it.

    He lifted it up and gave it to her. “I estimated that the time it would take fix this to be three to four hours. There’s minor internal damage, but all you’d have to do is give the system a reboot. It’s the external damage as you can see that needs to be fixed. If you fix it then you can come in at nine. If you don’t then you might as well go look for another job.” She nodded her head in agreement. He gave a half heartedly salute then he walked back into his shop and turned off the lights.

    Hera started looking over cap while she was walking home. Luckily for her the shop wasn’t to far from her house, and with her JamTraffic mod she never hit a red light. As she crossed the street she felt a drop hit her head. Then another one, and another one. When she went to look up she heard something crash behind her. People started getting out of their cars to see where it came from.

    “OH MY GOD!” a lady screamed as she pointed up to the sky. Others looked to where the ladys finger was pointing. Hera looked as well. Someone's pool was cracking. Everyone on the ground ran out of the way while more pieces of the pool fell.

Everyone please don’t be alarmed. We ask that you all move away in an orderly fashion so that no one gets hurt. Our specialist are on their way now.

    People continued to push one another out of the way. Completely disregarding what the announcer had just said. Another person started yelling drawing attention back to the cracking pool. “SHE’S GONNA FALL!” they shouted.

    At the bottom of the cracking pool there was a woman. Hera looked up and squinted her eyes. She had recognized the woman from earlier on. Eventually a couple of street officers got to the scene and began clearing the area. As the officers cleared people out people kept shouting out about the women. But the officers didn’t seem to care.

    Hera just made her way down the street uninterested in the events playing out behind her. The crowd just kept staring at the woman. They were all recording through their eye cams. Hera slowly became interested in how it would all play out. BUt she didn’t dare to look back. As she passed a woman holding her child Hera wiped out her phone and hit the screen a couple of times.

    On her screen she could see exactly what the lady could see. At the bottom left of the screen there was a warning sign. Hera’s signal jammer was being attacked and someone was trying to shut down her phone for illegal hacking. She quickly backed up whatever she could. Once she finished backing everything up the through it on the ground and smashed her foot down on it.