The first time I met Deputy Director Maelstrom, I was clean shaven, sober, and dresses in my best suit: the navy blue with khaki pants and burgundy tie. My hat was crisp and clean, having been purchased for the occasion, and the stiff rim was a comfort as it rested in my lap. I’d travelled a long way for this job interview and my hopes were neither high nor low: apprehension was the word. I gripped the hat a little tighter.
The lobby was a large round room with the Equestrian Weather Service seal in brass on the floor. I couldn’t make it out from my seat, but I’m sure it was very fitting. I decided to take my attention off the impending meeting by watching the employees come and go: some in suits, others in leather flight jackets with patches all over. They paid me no mind and that was okay.
My name was called and I crossed the room promptly. I tried to get a better look at the seal as I crossed it, but the room was too busy putting one hoof in front of the other to look anywhere else.
She was standing in the doorway, her crisp, severe business suit a fitting partner for her expression: cold, bureaucratic indifference. It would be an expression I would come to know well; a countenance whose outward expression never could, never would betray something like, or not entirely unlike, emotion.
“Mr. Quick Quill, if you would please come with me,” she said with careful pronunciation. You could hear the typeface with each click of her tongue. I doffed my hat and followed her into the interview room.
An Interview Room is a unique euphemism for a kind of church where there is much judgement and even more praying. My experience with Maelstrom was no different, but as the interview lingered, my confidence waivered that I was anywhere near what she was looking for.
“What can you tell me about the weather, Mister Quill?”
“It’s made by Pegasus, such as yourself, ma’am.” It was a flimsy reply. I knew more. But, there was something unnerving in the way she looked at me; that cold, insufferable indifference. Those cool, emotionless eyes. There was an invasiveness to her stare; she could see past the thin venire of professionalism and know all my insecurities at once: the jobs, homes, friends, family I’d all lost at one time or another. You can blame it on bad luck or timing or stupidly, but it was me: I knew it, I knew I was the one pushing myself all over the country, without a real place to settle down.
In the end, I was certain this was one more in a string of failed interviews. Another job I’d taken a stab at and totally missed the mark. When she showed me out, I was sure that was the last time we’d see each other.
That evening I stood in the ticketing queue at the Baltimare Train Station with every intention of going back to Manehatten when a greasy kid in a velvet tuxedo bumped into me. “Sorry,” he chimed in the half-hearted, contemptuous way only an adolescent can.
I was about to turn my attention back to the queue when Greasy Velvet Tuxedo (I assumed that was his name, but you can’t be sure these days) tapped me on the shoulder. I turned to find his mug right up next to mine. He stared with a kind of intensity which was uncomfortable (it was a day of uncomfortable stares); like meeting a kid in a warehouse at midnight who says “Hi” before disappearing in a puff of smoke and nightmares.
“Listen, pal, you wouldn’t happen to be a,” he looked at a notepad carefully, “a Mister Quick Mill would you? I gotta letter for him.”
“The name is Quick Quill.”
“No, pal, I’ve got it right here: M-I-L-L.”
“Then no, beat it.”
“Shoot, you know, I can’t find this guy worth nothin’? He’s not at the hotel, but they said I’d find him here going back to Manehatten. Hey, you kinda look like the guy: Grey Earth Pony, tan coat, brimmed hat. Too bad you ain’t him.”
The next part was kind of a blur, but the end result was me holding the envelope and him waddling off with a face full of bits. Carefully, I opened the letter and began to read:
Mister Quick Quill,
We are pleased to inform you that we have selected you for the position of Administrative Assistant to Deputy Director Maelstrom. If you accept, please reply by same courier promptly…
I had to read it again:
We are pleased to inform you...
You always hear phrases like “I love you” or “You complete me” or whatever sentimental garbage they regurgitate on chalky heart-shaped candies as being the end-all of sweetness. But, I assure you, to a tramp, “We are pleased to inform you” are the sweetest five words you could ever hear.