Sensing her discomfort, the Patron continued his sales pitch. “It doesn’t matter if most of the flyers are ignored. The point is not to convince them to come here; the point is to increase awareness.”
“How can this tiny menu penetrate their mental defences?”
“The more this place is made aware, the more it’ll stick in their minds. Better to have passing familiarity with something mentioned in passing than to go into a place you know absolutely nothing about.”
As easy as the Patron made the job sound, the Girl knew it would be anything but. “It sounds interesting, but I’m afraid I won’t be able to get very far.”
“If it’s too much for you, you can always quit.”
“No, I mean, with this...” pointing at her ankle bracelet.
“Understandable. Consider this a trial run. If your results are acceptable, I’ll lengthen your chain, so you can travel further.”
This backfired tremendously. Instead of using her limitations as an excuse, the Patron used it as another bargaining chip. Sure, she had the option of widening her radius, but that was only if she gave a better business plan, and now that was beginning to look more and more unlikely.
Even though the Patron allowed her greater freedom, she felt more trapped than before.
The Girl was caught in a dilemma. She could either chicken out of the deal, or point out her constant fatigue, but that would be using her tiredness as an excuse. She was exhausted, but couldn’t afford to have her tab increased any further. So she had no other recourse but to accept these demands. But this would only be temporary. She could wait until the next paycheck.
As the days went on, she went into a bit of a routine. She would wake up, go to the Factory, do what little was necessary, then make her way to the Café to pick up the flyers for the day. After which, she would traverse the confines of the City she could travel, spreading word of the diner wherever she could, going until she could go no further.
But this wasn’t always easy. For most places simply refused to accept her papers, and the few that did didn’t look very friendly. She made mental notes for where those places were, and what their common elements were, and sought out elements among similar lines.
For the most part, when she was simply overwhelmed, she just dumped the majority of the ads at Ye Ol’ Inn and Out, the Grand Inn Temple and the Lopsided Hotel.
Sometimes she wouldn’t even bother going to these places, and just place the stack on one of the street corners in a tall pile a reasonable distance away from the Café. After the flyers were distributed by whatever means necessary, she’d go back to the Factory where the Garbage Woman would be patiently waiting for her. Then the two of them would go back to the warehouse, picking up whatever scraps of foods they could find along the way, before collapsing from exhaustion.
Her energy was rapidly draining from the constant workload, but she couldn’t afford to slack off for even a moment. For if she did, the rates would continue, and she’d be left in a more unforgiving place than she was right now. This constant frenetic pace was extremely unforgiving, and the stress on her form was beginning to take its toll.
She kept herself going by continuously telling herself that the debt would be taken care of in just two or three payments.
The only problem was, her next pay seemed to be taking longer than usual. Two weeks later when everyone else was having their payslips handed out, her hand remained conspicuously empty.
The Garbage Woman sympathized. “Oihyeah, that happened to me too.”
“What happened last time?”
“Well, I bought the lunches sold here at first, until I realized that I could save more if I simply brought my own. It turns out they didn’t like that very much, and accused me of not contributing to company funds. But they couldn’t attack my devotion to the Factory since I was working more than everybody else. So they withheld my pay, figuring that I would either complain or quit. But the joke was on them, since I found I could save even more by rooting through the garbage, and you know the rest.”
After asking around, the Girl found out the specious reason for the delay in pay. It turned out her first payment was actually an “advance”.
The excuse they gave was that she only slept outside the Factory doors once, instead of on a continuous basis. Most of their employees didn’t stray very far, or stayed far away from the Factory. But the Girl betrayed common convention, and the usual discount rate was all screwed up. The bulk amount for sleeping outside a single day was bigger than expected, but she hadn’t worked at the Factory long enough to compensate for the cost.
The only way this could be avoided was if the Girl was paid for the whole month ahead of time. This was a risk, since there was no guarantee that she would stay after finding this out. The gamble paid off, since there was practically nowhere else for her to go.
The ironic part was that it was only by refusing the Factory’s generosity that she was paid so soon. Even so, she was still being paid too little.
If the Factory and the Café weren’t in completely different locations, she’d swear they were working in concert with each other.
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