There’s always the people that can’t let go. Be it from school, relationships, phones lost, they just can’t leave it. They can’t say goodbye.
They can’t accept that being fired is embarrassing and it means you probably shouldn’t hang around anymore.
YOU'RE FIRED
Alas, Dear Readers, this is a scenario that confronts me.
The last place I worked before my current position was a quiet little café in a neighbourhood pretty much ruled by pensioners. Suffice to say it wasn’t the busiest place. We did sell a lot of lemon slices though.
mmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Anyway the reason I got a job there was because another girl was leaving. (read: was fired) But little did they know that she wasn’t going anywhere.
My shifts were relatively long- around 7 hours each. So a dedicated effort to appearance was completely unnecessary, if not ridiculous. If you can imagine it, I would take orders and deliver meals to people’s tables in loose-ish faded jeans and a plain black t-shirt, with my hair back because that’s just plain hygienic. Enter fired girl.
If it hasn’t been implied already, this neighbourhood was not trendy by any means. Most of our customers would come in whilst on a walk or something, generally in track pants and orthopaedic-friendly runners.
Every time she’d come in it was an entirely new, and very pre-empted LOOK. Nay, AURA. One day it would be aloof-I-don’t-care head-to-toe-black with leather heels to the sky and black smokey cat eye makeup, the next it was sun-goddess-summer-fun-look-at-my-floral-dress-and-accordingly-bright-yet-subtle makeup. Standing next to me, in my coffee stained t-shirt, handing someone a chicken foccacia.
Awkward.
I never had any idea what to say to her, because all I was thinking was “You got fired. Why are you still here?” Followed closely by, “Why on Earth would you spend that long getting ready for a place like THIS?” again leading me back to the initial question.
Surely you wouldn’t want to hang out (and I mean hang out, for hours at a time some days,) at a place that has actually, physically told you, in that many words, ‘We. Don’t. Want. You.”
Another thing I struggled to understand was the way she would speak to myself and the other female employee my age. The word condescending was re-born with every word that exited her mouth. I should also mention she is the same age as me.
It was like being in year 7 again and watching those girls that wanted to grow up too fast strut around in their hitched-up netball skirts. And it was really disarming.
Now being a university student, and dare I say an adult, I found it really really REALLY awkward being back in that adolescent-social-power-struggle time warp. But this time I had a reality to step back into.
Eventually I was offered another position and have only seen her in passing a few times. But I have no doubt she still hangs out there. And I think I’d almost pay money to find out why.
Let's get awkward... 
WOW. This situation reeks of a gal that needs assistance re adjusting to her live sans cafe.
Perhaps you could suggest she try a sushi place, a wine bar or an ice cream parlour in which to while away her hours and part with the awkwardness that she is imparting on your and your fellow staff members.
If sushi, ice cream and wine fail to heal her, ring a ding therapy my friend, I sense separation issues!!!!
Hahaha, that reminds me of this time I had to kill someone because it was too awkward. Props!
We had a girl the exact same at my job, and I didn’t like her so was all ‘OK if your life is so amazing since you left this place please go now and enjoy!’ But she was always back and it was sooo awkward.
Now she’s actually back working there again and its even more super awkward!
Mon, this is apparently a widespread issue. My best friend experienced a similar thing: she was telling me at school about how she’d just been accepted for a new job and had been asked to take on extra shifts because they needed someone to replace a girl who had just been fired.
Enter fellow classmate who snidely comments something along the lines of, “Why would you want to work THERE?”
Well. So my friend starts the job and, despite the classmate’s obvious disdain for the shop, she mysteriously keeps popping up everywhere, we guessed to indulge her love of pizza (although there were 3 other pizza shops in this town). Weirdly, though, she never actually ordered anything, just kept coming in. She also brought up the place at every opportunity at school, constantly asking my friend how the job was going.
Eventually we asked why she was so interested in the place. She revealed she used to work there but “was regrettably forced to quit” due to being hit on by the manager’s son. She said she felt threatened so had no choice but to leave.
Which begs the question of why she kept putting herself in such a ‘threatening’ situation by constantly hanging out in the shop.
Anyway, a little worried about said manager’s son, my friend asked around some of the other workers…
they expressed suprise at the accusations and added they were equally baffled as to why our classmate kept coming into the shop, especially considering she had been given a very public firing!
So there you go. We pondered why she made up the story (we assumed due to embarrassment/shame) but could not fathom why she kept putting herself back in the situation.
But at least now I know she’s not alone…
haha awesome post! It used to happen to me too, only it wasn’t that they were fired – they quit. You’d think that’d be just more reason to move on from work and get over it…