Alexander and I met at work. We both were low-wage employees at a customer service center. We were getting paid next to nothing to get yelled at by people for shit we can’t control. He and I shared the same schedule and lunch break so I started up a few conversations with him, mainly because neither of us seemed to know anyone else in the small break room people crammed into for lunch. He was a nerdy guy, but knew his stuff when it came to the Internet. All I knew was what we learned in training. We both were divorced, but unlike me, Alexander had no children.
Once after work, Alexander saw me crying in my car and came to ask what’s wrong. I tried to blow him off but he had known about the angry caller that unloaded a profanity-laden tirade on me. Our supervisor did nothing to help me, so I just had to sit and take it. Alexander consoled me and suggested that I try to find something else. I confessed that I had been trying but could find nothing that could work with taking care of my kids that paid even worse. Then I began unloading about everything going wrong in my life, including the fathers of my kids that wouldn’t pay child support, much less call their own children.