She flipped the page. At the top, it said WELCOME in bold, underlined type. “Our most precious resources in this country are patriots like you, those who are willing to give of themselves to help this great nation. Your contribution will help end suffering and unhappiness.”
“So.” Lena put down her pen. “This is a government program?”
“Keep reading.”
“But in my letter it said this was for a survey company.”
The woman lifted her eyebrows in annoyance. “Read all of it, especially page nine.”
After rigorous evaluations of her mental, physical, and emotional health, the form explained, she might be invited to join the study. Once she signed, all interactions were private.
Lena flipped to page nine. It was an NDA. No questions about the studies and their true nature could be signed until she signed this page. There were $50,000 in penalties if she violated this agreement.
Deziree had texted her earlier this morning to say that the electricity had been shut off and she was going over to Miss Shaunté’s. They had paid the electricity with the only credit card that wasn’t maxed out. Potential jail time. She sucked her bottom lip into her mouth. It tasted of bad coffee and mint toothpaste.
On their last day together, in retrospect, it seemed as if her grandmother had known somehow that it was the end. Lena knew this was how memory worked; looking back at an important day, everything could seem portentous. The apricity and brightness through her grandmother’s hospital room windows. How the hospital coffee tasted. As if they had switched to a better brand whose flavor could almost be described as coffee. The way her grandmother said, “You’re already doing a good job helping your mother. I’m so proud of you.” There had been a mixture of true compliment sweetness and warning sharpness in her grandmother’s voice as she said it.
Lena signed. The woman smiled, took the clipboard, and said, Now we can get started.
While waiting for further instructions from “Great Lakes Shipping Company,” Lena continued applying for other jobs. She came close to getting a job as a temporary worker at the post office. But according to her mom, it went to someone’s daughter. It was fine, though, Deziree had assured her, while reminding her that the post office is a corrupt institution filled with drug addicts and older white ladies who wore wraparound sunglasses inside. She was only half kidding.
To her interview at Burrito Town, Lena wore Your-Honor-I-Plead-Not-Guilty and arrived five minutes early. She handed her résumé to the manager interviewing her. He scanned it, pursed his lips, and said, “Art History?”
“That’s my major.” Lena smiled, hoped her voice sounded chipper enough.
“So, what’s your greatest strength? Weakness?”
She said that her greatest weakness was probably that she was too hard on herself. Tanya called it a case of the Dumb-Lena-Dumbs. “And my greatest strength—” Lena squeezed her knee. The manager was smoothing his blond mustache as she spoke. His skin was a shade of pink that made him look perpetually a little drunk. “I guess my greatest strength is that I’m good at being task-oriented and getting things done on time.”
“Honestly, all I really care about is whether or not you can fit in the costume.”
“Costume?”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t think you’re ready to be a burrito maker,” he said. “Stand up.”
Lena kept her face blank, pleasant as she stood. The manager also stood and took a step backward.
“You are a very small person, you know that?”
“Oh. I thought five-foot-two was tall.”
“Whoever told you that was wrong.” His eyebrows were raised, as if he couldn’t believe she knew someone so stupid, or would be so simple as to believe that stupid person.
She nodded, reminding herself there was no point in trying to joke around with an old white man who thought you were an idiot.
On the walls were large prints of burritos in the style of different artists. An Andy Warhol screen print, Van Gogh’s sunflowers with burritos instead of flower petals, a Lichtenstein burrito that was crying a single tear, a burrito with Frida Kahlo flower crown and eyebrows that Lena thought someone would complain about within a day of the location opening. The space smelled good, like sautéed red onions and fresh dough, though the restaurant wouldn’t open for another few weeks.
“There’s no way you can be the burrito. But maybe you would be a good Ms. Blue Corn Chip. Smile, please.”
Lena bared her teeth.
“Bigger. People need to see you from their cars. Come on, I know you have it in you.”
Lena smiled.
“Smile like you’re looking at your best friend.”
She pictured an alligator plotting against her enemies. A large, openmouthed grin.
“People like to feel invited.” He gestured at her mouth. “Keep trying.”
She stretched her lips the widest they could go, knowing she was making more of a welcome-to-my-death-house face than a spend-all-your-money-on-these-burritos face. Her cheeks ached after 10 seconds of it. Lena held it another five, another 10, felt her cheeks trembling, and stopped.
“Your teeth are a nice shade of white,” the manager said. He wrote a note on his clipboard and underlined it. “We would only need you three days a week, during the first two months after the grand opening.”
The manager ran his fingers over his mustache. He tapped the side of his face, then spoke as if offering Lena a hundred-thousand-dollar salary with unlimited vacation time. “And if you do well at this and can prove that you’re reliable, we can talk about you moving up to the assembly line.”
“How much does being the chip pay?”
“Nine-twenty-five an hour. And if you make it to the assembly line, you’ll go up to nine-fifty.”
“I’ll take it,” Lena said. Money was money.
“We’ll call you,” the manager said.
Burrito Town was 10 minutes away from her mother’s house. The neighborhood was gentrifying. Office buildings, the historic old supermarket being turned into a canoe-and-worthless-nice-looking-leather-object store, and a log cabin placed on top of a high-rise. It was supposedly used as an Airbnb. Urban camping was apparently a thing. As Lena drove four blocks down, the barbecue restaurants and bookstores—new and old—were transformed into scorched and crumpling buildings. A group of white kids with video cameras and microphones were breaking into a Victorian home that had once been painted an incredible grape-soda-purple color. It was now patchy with brown spots, almost lavender from the sun.
Down the block was a park where kids she went to high school with spent their days, their skin already fading, their eyes dulling. At least three of them had already overdosed since graduation. Although, Lena knew, this was more of a statewide problem than just the city’s. The kids from Tanya’s rich-kid school were also starting to die. Open lots of land that were becoming meadow, some that were gardens. Lena drove past sudden stretches of a liquor store, a Church’s, apartments, the street with a legendary pothole that could swallow a whole tire, though that could be any street now that it was April.
It was the first no-coat-at-all day of the year and people were walking slow. Despite the interview, the warmth and how alive everything was made her heart rise with its spring joy. On her block there were buds on the trees. Kids on bikes. All the neighborhood aunties sipping decaf with their Bibles on their laps while gossiping. There was an empty chair at the table now, and it was somehow only nice to see that they still left space for Miss Toni, as if she was running late as usual.