Mitch says all I have to do is go back to my office and find the e-mail Amy sent me—the one telling me to skip the written warning—and forward it to him. Also forward him the draft of the letter I was writing to Mrs. Lopez but never finished. He seems to think this will make everything all right.

But how will it make everything all right? Sure, it’ll prove I didn’t have anything to do with that letter. But it won’t help theJournalwin Mrs. Lopez’s case against it. And isn’t Mitch supposed to be on thepaper’s side, not Mrs. Lopez’s? I mean, isn’t theJournal paying his fees?

But it’s like . . . it’s like hewants Mrs. Lopez to win. Like he set up this whole thing to make Amy look like the big, fat liar she is.

Which is fine, except that . . .

Amy KNOWS we call her the T.O.D. She KNOWS.

I mean, that’s not going to make working with her slightly UNCOMFORTABLE or anything. . . .

Oh, WHY did we ever start calling her that? I mean, she IS a tyrannical office despot, but we ought to have kept it to ourselves. It isn’t nice to call people names, even if they deserve it. All human beings have worth and dignity, that’s what Professor Wingblade always said. All human beings have worth and dignity. Except maybe for Nazis. And Al-Qaeda. And tyrannical office despots. . . .

STOP IT! Amy is not as bad as Hitler! She hasn’t killed anyone.

THAT WE KNOW OF.

I will never call her the T.O.D. again. I will never call her the T.O.D. again. I will never call her the T.O.D. again. I will—

Oh, God, my cab is a block away from 216 W. 57th even as I write. Please God, don’t let Amy be there when I walk in. Please let me get to my desk and forward the e-mail and the draft and get my stuff and go home sick for the rest of the day. . . . Please please please please please . . .

$4.50, plus $1 tip for cab. Don’t forget to send the T.O.D. a reimbursement form!

Wait . . . Why is Carl Hopkins standing by the door?

THE NEW YORK JOURNAL

New York City’s Leading Photo-Newspaper

Security Division

The New York Journal

216 W. 57th Street

New York, NY 10019

212-555-6890

MEMO

To: All Personnel

Fr: Security Administration

Re: Persona Non Grata

Persona Non Grata Notification

Please note that the below-named individual has been classified “persona non grata” in 216 W. 57th Street as of the date of this notification and will continue to remain so indefinitely. This individual is not to be allowed on the premises of 216 W. 57th Street at any time during the term of above sanction.

Name: Kathleen A. Mackenzie

ID#: 3164-000-6794

Description: (photo attached)

White female, 25 years of age

5 feet, 4 inches, 120130 lbs.

Blonde hair, blue eyes

Contact Security immediately upon sighting of above individual.

cc: Amy Jenkins, Director, Human Resources

Hello, you’ve reached the voice mail of Jennifer Sadler. Sorry I can’t take your call right now. At the tone, please leave your name and number, and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

(Tone)

Jen? Jen, where are you, it’s Kate. I’m in the lobby downstairs. They won’t let me up. They say I’m PNG’d. I told them there has to be some kind of mistake, but they say there’s not, and they even showed me the form. It says I weigh a hundred twenty to a hundred and thirty pounds. Do I really look like I weigh that much? I only weigh one seventeen. I’ll bet Amy wrote this! That would explain it. . . . Do you know what’s going on? I’m . . . Oh, wait, here comes Amy. She’s holding . . . Oh my God, she’s holding a box of my stuff. That’s my Disneyland snowglobe from on top of my computer monitor. Why does the T.O.D. have my Disneyland snowglobe? Oh . . . my . . . God. . . .

(Click)

THE NEW YORK JOURNAL

New York City’s Leading Photo-Newspaper

Amy Denise Jenkins

Director

Human Resources

The New York Journal

216 W. 57th Street

New York, NY 10019

212-555-6890

amy.jenkins@thenyjournal.com

Kathleen A. Mackenzie

Personnel Representative

Human Resources

The New York Journal

216 W. 57th Street

New York, NY 10019

This letter serves to inform you that as of today’s date, your employment at theNew York Journal has been terminated. Your belongings from your work station have been inventoried and packed. You are to be escorted from the premises by Security, and have been listed as Persona Non Grata at this location. Should you need to speak to anyone regarding the termination of your position at theNew York Journal, you will need to do so by telephone. Your initials below indicate receipt of this letter.

Amy Jenkins

Director, Human Resources

Journal of Kate Mackenzie

Well, it’s happened. I’m fired. I’m actually fired.

I’ve never been fired before. Even when I was the salad-bar attendant at Rax Roast Beef back in Luxor, and my manager, Peggy Ann, said I was the worst salad-bar attendant they’d ever had, because I picked the cauliflower out of the dressing canisters instead of stirring it to the bottom, I still never got fired for it.

Until now.

How could this have happened? I don’t understand how any of this could be happening. This morning I had a job. This morning I had no boyfriend, or place of my own to live. But I still had a job. I had a job that I even sort of liked.

And now I have no job. I have no boyfriend, I have no place to live, and I have no job.

Oh my God. I’M HOMELESS!

It’s true! Except for the fact that I’m sitting in a penthouse suite (that doesn’t actually belong to me), I have become a statistic—one of New York’s many unemployed homeless.

Oh God! Soon I’ll be living in a cardboard box! In Alphabet City (except Alphabet City has become totally gentrified—I bet even a cardboard box there costs $1200 a month . . . and they probably want first and last and a security deposit on it, too).

What am I going to do? I mean, seriously. I have no job to go to, no place to live. . . . WHAT AM I GOING TO DO????

I guess I could ask Dale for a loan. He just came into millions. Or however much they pay members of bands that have just been signed to a major label.

But if I ask Dale for a loan, I’ll actually have to talk to him. And I don’t want to talk to him. Not after the chicken-with-garlic-sauce incident. Plus he’ll just feel all superior—Oh, she couldn’t make it without me.

Ditto Mom. I mean, she isn’t about to touch a penny of what Dad left her when he died . . . not the principal, anyway. And besides, she’ll just tell me to go back to Dale again. I swear, she’d be prouder of me if I followed Dale and the band around wearing nothing but a hand-knitted poncho than she’ll ever be over my having a job or my own place to live.

Jen? No, I can’t to go to Jen, she has her own problems. I can’t keep running to Jen every time I suffer a financial or emotional setback.

Mitch? Mitch? How can I even think about going to Mitch? I mean, this is all his fault, anyway! He KNEW Amy forged that letter! He knew she forged it, and he wanted Mrs. Lopez’s lawyer to see that, because for some reason Mitch is on Mrs. Lopez’s side and not the paper’s. Which is all well and good, since Mrs. Lopez is a sweet lady and all, and none of this is her fault, anyway.

EXCEPT THAT NOW I HAVE NO JOB!!!!!!!!!! Is that what he wanted? For me to get fired????

No wait. Mitch is a reasonable person. A decent person, even. A reasonable, decent person would never get a girl fired because her ex threw chicken on his pants.

I should have have just quit my stupid job in the first place in protest over what happened to Mrs. Lopez. Seriously, this is like karma, or something. Because I didn’t quit my job, as I knew I morally should have, my job has been taken away from me.

And hey, don’t I get severance pay? Or at least unemployment? I should AT LEAST get unemployment. Why didn’t I read the personnel handbook more closely? Let’s see, I’m administration, not staff, so that means I get . . . two weeks pay as severance? Or is it four weeks? WHY couldn’t I have been union? Then the T.O.D. wouldn’t have dared fire me without issuing both a verbal and written warning first. . . .

Let’s see . . . unemployment for someone who was making $40,000 a year is . . .

Oh God. Skiboy just walked in. He says Dolly told him to meet her here after work. They’re going to some benefit dinner, or something. Doesn’t Skiboy look nice in a tux? Yum. Not as nice as Mitch Hertzog, but . . .

OH MY GOD, I CAN’T BELIEVE I WROTE THAT!!!! I am never thinking another kind thought about Mitch Hertzog again. THAT GUY GOT ME FIRED!!!!!!!!!

Skiboy just asked me what I’m doing here in the middle of the day. I told him that I was fired on account of standing up for my convictions at work. He seems impressed. He says this calls for a celebration.

And really, if you think about it, I SHOULD celebrate. I am free of the oppressive rule of the tyrannical office despot! I don’t know where I’m going to find a new job, let alone scrounge up first and last month’s rent, plus a security deposit for a place of my own while living on unemployment checks, but I’m free! Liberated! Why shouldn’t I celebrate by drinking a vodka and tonic in the middle of the day?

“Yes, we SHOULD celebrate,” I just told Skiboy. And he is breaking out the Grey Goose now.