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like that again. We offer not only full employment but also protection from the dangerous elements that afflict so many at this time. Work with like-minded others! Help solve the nation’s problems of joblessness and crime while solving your own! Accentuate the positive!”
    Back to the man’s face. Not a handsome face as such, but a face you could trust. Sort of like a math teacher, or a minister. You can tell he’s sincere, and sincere is better than handsome. Really handsome men were a bad idea, said Grandma Win, because they had too much to choose from. Too much what? Charmaine had asked her, and Grandma Win said, Never mind. “The Positron Project is accepting new members now,” says the man. “If you meet our needs, we’ll meetyours. We offer training in many professional areas. Be the person you’ve always wanted to be! Sign up now!” That smile again, as if he’s gazing deep inside her head. Not in a scary way though, in a kindly way. He only wants the best for her. She can be the person she’s always wanted to be, after it was safe to want things for herself.
    Come here. Don’t think you can hide. Look at me. You’re a bad girl, aren’t you? No was the wrong answer to that, but so was Yes.
    Stop that noise. Shut up, I said shut up! You don’t even know what hurt is.
    Forget those sad things, honey, Grandma Win would say. Let’s make popcorn. Look, I picked some flowers . Grandma Win had a little patch at the front of the house. Nasturtiums, zinnias. Think about those flowers instead, and you’ll be asleep in no time.
    Halfway through the ad, Sandi and Veronica come in. Now they’re sitting at the bar having Diet Cokes and watching the ad too. “Looks great,” Veronica says.
    “No free lunch,” says Sandi. “Too good to be true. That guy looks like a lousy tipper.”
    “It wouldn’t hurt to try,” Veronica says. “Can’t be worse than the Fuck Tank. I’d go for those towels!”
    “I wonder what’s their game?” says Sandi.
    “Poker,” says Veronica, and they both laugh.
    Charmaine wonders why that’s funny. She isn’t sure that they’re the kind of people the man is looking for, but it would be way too snobby and also discouraging to say so, and they are nice girls at heart, so instead she says, “Sandi! I bet you could be a nurse!” There’s a website and a phone number scrolling across the bottom of the screen; Charmaine scribbles them down. She’s so excited! When Stan picks her up, they can use their phone to view the details. She can feel the griminess of her body, she can smell the stale odour coming from her clothes, from her hair, from the rancid fat smell of the chicken-wings place next door. All of that can be shed, it can peel off her like an onion skin, and she can step out of that skin and be a different person.
    Will there be a washer and dryer in that new home? Of course there will. And a dining table. Recipes: she’ll be able to cook recipes again, the way she did after she and Stan got married. Lunches, intimate dinners, just the two of them. They’ll sit on chairs while eating, they’ll have real china instead of plastic. Maybe even candles.
    Stan will be happy too: how could he not be happy? He’ll stop being so grouchy. True, there’s a grouchy part she’ll have to guide him through first, the part where he’ll say it’s sure to be a scam like everything else, it’s some kind of ripoff, and why bother applying because they won’t get in. But nothing ventured, nothing gained, she’ll say, and why don’t they just try? She’ll persuade him to do it, one way or another.
    Worse comes to worst, she’ll dangle the promise of sex. Sex in a luxurious king-sized bed, with clean sheets – wouldn’t Stan like that? With no maniacs trying to break in through the window. If necessary, she’ll even put up with that cramped back-seat car ordeal tonight, as a reward if he says yes. It won’t be that much fun for her, but fun can wait until later. Until