Chapter Text
Mike sits tensely on his chair, tapping his fingers on his legs. Like he did in the past interviews, he wonders if it was really worth trying to find a summer job. But he promised himself to try one more time, so he can’t jump to conclusions. But no matter how hard he tries, Mike gets a pit in his stomach that he won’t get the job. He glances around the Party room, checking for any unusual details that catch his eye. Anything to distract him. But no matter where he looks, Mike always looks back at the manager, which does nothing to help his nerves.
The manager is wearing a tag with the name “Alvin” on it and writing on a mini white board with a blue marker between them, sitting across from Mike on a table. Mike is still thinking about what happened when the interview started. Saying it was awkward is an understatement. The look on Alvin’s face when Mike told him he’s deaf was just like the past hiring managers’ expressions.
The hiring manager nods at Mike with an fascinated eyebrow. He passes the whiteboard to him. “I see. You are an unusual candidate.” the board reads. Of course he isn’t. Why bring it up when there could be more important questions?
The questions have been basic. How will you get here? Ride his bike. Do you have experience as a security guard? No. Mike leans his head towards him, waiting for Alvin to write, “Do you need any accommodations?” Mike’s hand is aching to write “I have a TTY.” But Alvin never wrote the question. He didn’t even glance at his resume, paying more attention to his click-board than to Mike.
Alvin glances around, staring at the ceiling for several seconds before he slowly writes on the board again. He glances at his walkie-talkie on the table, pointing his index finger up to state “One sec” before putting the talkie near his mouth.
Mike already knows what Alvin is talking about to the other person, and he wishes he doesn’t. God, if only if Alvin could at least walk to another room and not let Roy read his body language. Alvin’s eyebrows are scrunched up the entire time, before he slowly puts the walkie-talkie down, and writes again.
Mike takes a deep breath and closes his eyes tight. He twitches his eyes after several seconds, imagining a clock speeding up so Alvin would write the words faster. He let out a sigh, and opens his eyes with a pulse on his forehead, ready to see the words “We’ll call you back” or “Sorry, we can’t hire you” on the board.
“You’re hired.” the whiteboard read.
Mike widens his eyes, not moving a bit. That was the fastest job interview he had. An interview that actually happened, and didn’t end before it even started. His past job interviews usually took 7 to 12 minutes before the hiring managers would give him the look of pity that always make him grit his teeth. Mike glances at the clock and sees it was only 5 minutes. He snatches the whiteboard and marker, and writes “Already?” in one second.
Alvin nodded with an indifferent smile, and writes “Of course”. He stops, giving Mike a face that he has trouble reading. The emotion in his eyes is like cloudy glass. He also wrote the words differently; his handwriting used to be sloppy. Now it’s jagged. He is also darting his eyes left and right away from Mike, his mouth and stomach moving like they were making chuckles. But with a smile too big to be real, and his chest moving back and forth like it’s not working.
Why did he hire him? But then again, Mike applied for the job despite thinking he won’t get it. So he has no right to ask about it. He forces a grateful smile and keeps his hands on his legs. He can’t afford to let Alvin have second thoughts. Hell, Mike wants to feel lucky that he got hired at all.
Alvin takes a deep breath, before slowly passing the board back, not without tense fingers, “Just to make sure; safety is our number one priority. But you should also have fun.”
Mike raises an eyebrow and can feel himself mhm-ing. He remembers the newspaper ad he found while he was sadly drinking a Sprite at a park. “Not responsible for injury/dismemberment”, the ad says.
The person who wrote the ad must’ve been sleeping with a snot bubble coming out of their nose just when they finished writing it. Whoever submitted the ad to the newspaper company was probably too busy with paperwork or dealing with energetic kids to check for errors.
Alvin then writes something else, this time with his shoulders shrugging, “It’s just odd. We never hired a Deaf person before. Never heard of Deaf security guards, either.”
Mike almost couldn’t stop himself from rolling his eyes or sighing, before signing in ASL. “Yes. I’m deaf. Since birth.” with pursed lips.
Alvin raises an eyebrow, but Mike didn’t bother writing down what he meant. The first three signs are easy to understand with context. He mentally waves off the birth info because Alvin can always look at his background paper. If he bothers doing it.
Mike waits for him to write, “Are you sure you can handle this job?”. But Alvin writes nothing else before he stands up and gestures for Mike to follow him. The twenty-year-old grabs his whiteboard and marker before he sprints to Alvin.
Something tells him that Alvin won’t be explaining things about the pizzeria as they would with hearing candidates for obvious reasons. That leaves a sour taste in his mouth, but it’s better than nothing.
Still, Mike couldn’t stop thinking about why they hired him. So much he swore he can see big question marks floating around his head. Why did they hire him? Isn’t a security guard is about making sure everyone and everything is safe? To stop teens, robbers, or raccoons from getting in? Doesn’t it take hearing? If the pizzeria was some luxury store or fancy museum, Mike wouldn’t trust himself to protect the luxuries inside.
This job shouldn’t be too hard if they hired him. Just sitting on a chair and checking a computer for six hours? But a huge lump forms in his throat, with both his hands and legs crawling. Otherwise, a bad feeling, and Mike can’t find any noises or chat with Alvin to distract himself.
But he can’t give it up. Before he discovered the ad, Mike was ready to give up on finding a summer job. Almost all the hiring managers gave him a look of pity or disapproval. Many ended before they even started. Other places he doesn’t bother even submitting an application because they were customer service jobs. Yet here he was, simply because he got desperate.
Yet he gave the one last chance to a job he’s not qualified for. And got hired quickly, no less. Mike can’t imagine himself in a guard uniform, walking around dark hallways with a flashlight and checking security cams without wondering if he can do that. Mike almost thought of applying somewhere else because of that. Honestly, the chances of getting hired looked so low, he thought it wouldn’t hurt to give the job search another one last chance. Did the company make a mistake, or couldn’t find anyone else?
But it shouldn’t be hard. Just watching the animal machines, right?