Photo by Jean Gerber on Unsplash

Seasons Change, People Don’t

Pedro Jacob
Aug 31, 2018 · 4 min read

I remember my first day.

I had fallen in love with the city at first sight. That post-spring, pre-summer glow fuelled my infatuation.

Getting off the train, going up the stairs, and leaving the station as part of the human current flowing from the residential areas into the endless rows of buildings and offices.

I was there, I had made it. Not in the traditional sense, but I was exactly where I wanted to be. Working to make the world a better place with one of my favourite charities.

My father wasn’t thrilled by the idea of his little girl slaving away for a minimum wage which bore no hope of ever covering the costs of living in London. It didn’t help that most of my friends had taken the corporate route, filling my Instagram with photos of £15 rooftop drinks, painfully rehearsed cleavage snaps, and salmon and avocado on sourdough bread.

The office wasn’t much of anything which was fine by me — there’s nothing about tackling human trafficking that requires a fancy headquarters.

Sophie was happy she finally had someone to help. She hugged me when I walked through the door, showing me the ropes before I even had time to put my lunch in the crowded fridge of our co-working space.

Her blond hair was naturally curly, and her short stature gave her a warm demeanour which I found comfortable in our first interview.

My tasks were purely administrative. There were mountains of paperwork to do with grants, tax returns, donations, and never-ending forms of various natures. Sophie told me what to fill out, where to sign my name and what to include where.

Intellectual achievement had never been my forte, but I could put a system and follow it. In a couple of months, the mountains turned into sizable hills. Progress was slow yet purposeful.

My dating life was the first thing to go. Between being told “my face was too pretty to be stuffed away in an office” by some aspiring Casanova or slapping the multitude of nocturnal groping octopi, I thought it worthwhile to take a break from the scene.

I enjoyed the boredom of administrative work. It kept me busy and it added to the sacrifice which quickly became my raison d’être. Every other week during that mild summer, my father would tell me over the phone to get a real job. He joked about it, in the same way, people “joke” about things they want to come true.

It didn’t matter, I was fulfilled. My work ensured victims of sex trafficking were supported. It freed up Sophie’s time, so she could make a difference.

I must have done an impeccable job because it wasn’t too long until she was so free she flew away. When autumn checked in, Sophie checked out.

I kept myself busy during that first week. Sometime later, I filed a missing person’s report. In hindsight, not my brightest moment. Looking back on it, I remember my grandmother’s words when I told her I didn’t want to be a housewife.

“Julia, my jewel, what would a career get you in the future that those dimples can’t get you today?” Dad kicked her out of my life in a heartbeat. He was always good like that.

I thought she might have had a point when my meagre salary failed to materialise at the end of the month. Sophie’s number had been disconnected, and I only figured out the company account had been cleared out when the letter came from the bank.

As it turned out, the missing person’s report I filed got flagged up by the authorities along with a few accounts of fraud. She’d played the oldest trick in the book.

Be nice, look nice, talk about nice things, have a nice cause, have a nice purpose. Her charm got her the donation. Her greed turns them into personal funds.

Sophie tried to cover her tracks with my signatures, but it was obvious to anyone who wanted to look past the documents I had nothing to do with what she’d done.

That is until she called me out of the blue one day, apologising about her behaviour and offering to split the money. The leaves fell from the trees as the shame vanished from her character.

Sophie wasn’t as brazen as you might have assumed. Her spin was that the donors were pressuring her to spend the money on PR and marketing while she wanted it to go straight to the victims.

She was convinced I had the IQ of a mildly roasted potato, but I played along. We spoke a few times over the coming months. She wouldn’t tell me where she was and I wouldn’t tell her I was briefing the authorities on every conversation we had.

They got her a present for Christmas, and I never heard from her again. When my father told me about his plans for our holiday season, I was surprised by how much I looked forward to it.

When winter came, it found me happy. I remember that day well.

It was the start of something completely different.

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Pedro Jacob

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