Chapter 26
“So what did you think?”
“Well,” Lily said sitting in Mr. Turner’s New York office. “It was certainly exciting.”
“It certainly is,” he replied sitting stiffly in his black leather executive chair. He looked at her disappointedly and frowned. “You’re not interested, are you?”
“It’s not that I’m not interested, Mr. Turner,” she started. “In fact, it was nice to be a part of such a great team of people and to really feel like I was doing something important, but I don’t think I can handle living two lives. I don’t think I could work for you and go to school and get good grades at the same time. I think it would be too distracting.”
“I understand,” he said thoughtfully. “You’re a senior now, so this is your last year of high school. Do you have any college plans?”
“Actually, Malaya and I had talked about applying to a couple New York schools.”
“Excellent,” he said smiling. “I know of the perfect part-time job for you.”
“I figured you would say something like that,” she said smiling back. “But we ruled out New York a while ago because the schools were too expensive. We’ll probably just go to a state school.”
“It doesn’t have to be that way.”
“I know,” she said understanding perfectly what he was referring to.
“You can go to the school you want to Lily,” he offered. “This job would more than pay for both of you to go to whatever school you want to attend in New York City.”
“Well, then there’s Landon,” she said shyly.
“He doesn’t want to come back to New York, does he?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“If you chose to go to a college in another state, that’s not a problem. I can fly you anywhere you need to be. Sometimes the jobs aren’t in New York anyway. There’s no need to base your college decision on this job. I will take care of all the flights and hotels you need. I know I told you before, but your help on the job yesterday was invaluable to our team. If you hadn’t been there, we might have injured or even lost members of our team. There was no other way they could have known that the guard was several feet in the air waiting to shoot them. You saved them.”
Lily blushed at his words, but said nothing in reply. Her gift had saved them. She felt a sort of obligation grow inside her. She knew this gift was intended to be used.
“Those people are my family, Lily,” Mr. Turner said openly. “I never want anything to happen to them.” The man was practically a business suit with a head stuck on the top, but for a moment Lily could see through his stony façade to his heart. He truly did care about each member of his team. If he felt this way about his work family, Lily wondered how much more he actually cared for his real family.
“I know what you mean,” she said watching his kind, loving face morph back into his business face.
“I guess my biggest concern is how much the job would affect my normal life. I don’t want to eat, sleep, and breathe it. That might be alright for you, but it’s not for me.” Growing up Lily had never been good at asserting herself, but somehow ever since she had woken up from the coma she had become more courageous and wasn’t as afraid to say what she thought. The gift she had been given was molding her into a new, better version of Lily. A version she had never thought was possible. She was finally beginning to believe in herself, and to care about herself enough to know that she was worth standing up for.
“I understand,” he said clearly disappointed. “Would you be interested in working for me over the summers and possibly holiday breaks?”
“I think I might be able to manage that.”
“Wonderful,” Mr. Turner said happily. “I would love to have you go on every job over the summer, but I’m sure you will want to spend time with your friends and family, so I will let you know which ones are most important, and we will go from there. How does that sound?”
“Sounds like a plan.”