The Maid(43)

Finally, the doors open and the elevator is empty. I have it to myself all the way down to the basement. I hurry out with my trolley and almost collide with Cheryl as I turn the corner toward my locker.

“Where are you off to in such a rush? And how can you be finished with all those rooms so fast?” she asks.

“I’m efficient,” I reply. “Sorry I can’t dally. I have an errand to run over the lunch hour.”

“An errand? But you usually work straight through your lunch hour,” Cheryl says. “How will you maintain your A+ Exceptional Productivity Score if you’re running all over the place at lunchtime?”

I’m very proud of my A+ Exceptional Productivity Score. Every year, it earns me a Certificate of Excellence from Mr. Snow himself. Cheryl never completes her daily room-cleaning quota, and my excellence bridges the gap.

But as I look at Cheryl, I catch something in her expression that’s always been there, but today I can read it plainly—the curve of her upper lip, the disdain and…something else. I hear Gran’s voice in my head giving me advice about school bullies.

Don’t let them push your buttons.

At the time, I didn’t understand that the buttons weren’t literal. I understand it now. The pieces slide together in my head.

“Cheryl,” I say, “I am aware of my legal right to take a break and will do so today. And any other day that I choose. Is that acceptable, or should I run it by Mr. Snow?”

“No, no,” she replies. “It’s fine. I’d never suggest anything…illegal. Just be back by one p.m.”

“I will,” I say.

With that, I’m off, zooming by her. I park my trolley outside my locker, grab my wallet, then race back up to the elevator and out the bustling front doors of the hotel.

“Molly?” Mr. Preston calls after me. “Where are you going?”

“I’ll be back in an hour!”

I cross the road and walk past the coffee shop directly in front of the hotel. Then I turn onto a side street. The traffic is slower here, with fewer people on the sidewalks. My destination is about seventeen minutes away. I can feel the heat rising into my chest, my legs burning as I force them onward. But no matter. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, as Gran liked to say.

I pass a first-floor office where workers have assembled and are seated in rows, listening to a man in a suit who is gesticulating wildly in front of a podium. Charts and graphs appear on a screen behind him. I smile to myself. I know just what it’s like to be a proud employee fortunate enough to be receiving professional development. I look forward to Mr. Snow’s next professional-development day about a month from now.

I have never understood why some staff members complain about these events, as if they’re some kind of imposition, as if self-improvement and the chance to receive a free education on guest services and hotel hygiene isn’t a bonus of employment at the Regency Grand. I relish such opportunities, especially given that I was unable to pursue my dream of a post-secondary education in hotel management and hospitality. This is a bad thought, an unwelcome thought. I see Wilbur’s face flash in my mind and I have a sudden desire to punch it. But you can’t punch a thought. Or if you can, it does little to change reality.

My stomach rumbles as I walk. I have no lunch, didn’t pack one in the morning as I have so little in the cupboards and could barely eat breakfast anyway. I had hoped to find some perfectly untouched crackers and perhaps a small pot of unopened jam left on a breakfast tray outside one of the rooms, maybe even a piece of fruit that I could wash and discreetly tuck away. But alas, today’s guests have left me very little. In total, my tips are $20.45, which is certainly something, but not enough to placate an angry landlord or fill a fridge with anything but a few scant basics. Never mind.

The honey comes from the hive. The bees tend to the honey.

It’s Mr. Snow’s voice in my head this time. On the last professional-development day, he covered a most important topic: How the Hive Mentality Creates Greater Productivity. I took notes in a fresh, new journal, and I have studied the details at length. In his hour-long lecture, Mr. Snow talked about teamwork, using a most compelling analogy to do so.

“Think of this hotel as a hive,” he said as he looked out at his staff over his owl glasses. I was listening intently to his words. “And think of yourselves as bees.”

I wrote in my notebook: Think of yourself as a bee.

Mr. Snow continued. “We are a team, a unit, a family, a colony. When we adopt a hive mentality, it means we are all working toward the greater good, the greater good of the hotel. Like bees, we recognize the importance of the hotel, our hive. We must cultivate it, clean it, care for it, because we know that without it, there will be no honey. In my notebook: hotel = hive; hive = honey.

At this point, Mr. Snow’s lecture took a most surprising turn. “Now,” he said, gripping both hands on the podium in front of him, “Let us consider the hierarchy of roles within the hive and the importance of all bees, regardless of rank, working to the best of their bee-bilities. There are supervisory bees (here, he straightened his tie) and there are worker bees. There are bees that serve others directly and there are bees that serve indirectly. But no bee is more important than any other bee, do you understand?”

Mr. Snow’s hands balled into fists to highlight the importance of this last point. I was scribbling furiously, recording every word as best I could, when suddenly Mr. Snow pointed at me in the crowd.