Maybe the sun was shining bright that day, or maybe it was overcast. Either way, Tom wouldn’t have known. Heck, there could have been a spectacular July 4 th parade going down Main Street and he wouldn’t have even noticed. Tom rarely lifted his head as he walked the streets of his neighborhood. Life sucked.

Ten days. He supposed he should be grateful it wasn’t a month. These next ten days figured to be miserable, and separated by nine of the longest nights of his life. How could they do this to a loyal employee, someone who only tried to do a good job? For all the perks that government work offered, Tom was now discovering a major drawback. They didn’t really care about you, when push came to shove. Politics took precedence over human relations.

Tom had one real friend at work, Natalie Tosh. She was a good person, someone with a heart. None of Tom’s other coworkers seemed to particularly like him. Maybe he just kept to himself too much. Or maybe he shouldn’t talk about politics so often when others engaged him in conversation.

“Tom,” Natalie said the next day, “how long have you been a probation officer now?” The two of them were walking to the gym for their lunchtime workout.

“Eighteen years in spring,” Tom said. “Assuming I am still here come spring.”

“Well, there are a couple of things you ought to know by now,” Natalie said. “The first one is, don’t screw around with people in the department who are in a position of power. If someone like a DA tells you to do something you do not agree with, tell them you have to ask your supervisor first. Always put your supervisor between you and any potential trouble. That’s the only thing our stupid supervisors are really any good for.”

“I did go to Josh. He told me to do what she said. So, I went ahead and did what she asked me to anyway. That’s why this whole thing is so unfair!”

“But you resisted and argued with her at first. That woman apparently has an ego the size of Montana. Now she’s gonna show you who’s really boss. That’s all she is doing, you know, letting you know that when she says jump you only ask how high.”

“It’s not right. I didn’t do anything wrong. I don’t deserve to be dragged into a hearing and treated like a criminal. If I lose my job over this, I don’t know how I will be able to provide for my family. And I didn’t do anything wrong!”

“You aren’t going to lose your job, Tom. If there was any danger of that, you wouldn’t be at work today. You would have been ‘walked off’ like Julia Carson was last week, told to turn in your pass and stay home until your hearing date.”

“What did she do?”

“Who knows? Probably a DUI. It’s usually a DUI. That’s why I always make my husband drive after I have had two glasses of wine.”

“I know you are probably right,” Tom said, “but I am completely destroyed all the same. I got maybe 20 minutes of sleep last night. Just lying there, tossing and turning, trying to figure out what else I can do for a living now. Wondering if I will lose my pension. Not sure how many weights I can even lift today.”

“You know what you should do? You should call the union and have a representative come be with you at your hearing.”

“A union representative?”

“Yes,” Natalie replied. “They will absolutely come and help you. That’s what they are for. We pay all these union dues, so you might as well get something back from them.”

“Maybe that isn’t a bad idea.”

“Yes, just do it,” Natalie said. “Let me tell you how to handle the hearing as well. Since you did eventually take the issue to your supervisor, and ended up doing what the DA asked, keep referring to your supervisor in your answers, as much as you can.”

“What do you mean?”

“When they ask why you were disrespectful to the DA, you tell them you were not disrespectful, you just needed to confer with your supervisor before complying with her request. When they ask why you resisted cooperating with the DA, you tell them that you did not resist, you just needed to check with your supervisor first. Just keep doing that.”

“Hmmm,” Tom said. “I guess that is the best answer. Only I did tell the DA no first, before going to Josh with it.”

“The DA probably won’t even be at your hearing. She isn’t going to mess around with this piddly thing. All she is doing is punishing you.”

“I’m glad you are my friend,” Tom said.

“And another thing,” Natalie said. “God isn’t going to let you be wrongly persecuted in this. You are right in that you didn’t do anything wrong. Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m sure glad that probationer was on your caseload and not mine, because I would probably be in a lot more trouble than you are right now. I might have told that DA to go pound sand.”

Tom had a momentary look of confusion and said, “I’m still glad you’re my friend.”

That conversation played itself over many times in Tom’s head over the next nine days. It really helped. The same afternoon, he called the union and arranged for someone to be present at his hearing—somebody in his corner. This alone made him feel better. He slept fairly well after that, at least for the next several nights.

During the days, Tom was a bit more cheerful, at least on the outside. Natalie was right. God wasn’t going to let him lose his job and pension when he really didn’t do anything wrong. He kept telling himself of that, and managed to have moments of near-happiness, brief periods of time where he almost forgot about his pending hearing.

But the dark cloud over his head never completely vanished. Those brief moments of happiness would abruptly end when he “caught” himself in them, and Tom would be reminded that he had no right to feel any joy. The happy moments came crashing down, always, when the heavy sense of impending doom would again descend upon him as a giant weight. He would then gradually start to lift the weight up again, by talking to himself, going back over all the logical reasons why everything was going to be okay. Then the cycle would repeat again. It was constant.

His sleep left him again completely the last two nights before the hearing.

Tom showed up early for his hearing. Thankfully, so did the union representative. They talked together for a bit, and the representative assured him that he would not be treated unfairly or with disrespect. The conversation with the union rep was bolstering. Tom was ready. He wasn’t going to lay down for these people by any means, but the desperate priority for Tom now was just to get this damn thing over with, come what may.

Later that afternoon, Tom walked into Natalie’s office with a big smile on his face.

“Well?” Natalie asked.

“I can’t tell you much,” Tom said, “only that you were right, and everything is going to be okay.” Tom looked around to make sure nobody else was listening before continuing. “Worst case scenario, I get a letter in my file. I can live with that. I really cannot say any more. They seriously threatened me with confidentiality. Thank God I had the union guy there, though. He kept straightening them out whenever they started getting uppity. That’s all I can say.”

Natalie’s smile was so full of warmth, it told Tom that she knew darn well she could drag all the details out of him quite easily, but she wasn’t going to do that.

A few days later, the sun was out. Tom was walking the streets of his neighborhood. Birds were chirping. Butterflies were landing on flowers. Children were playing. What a beautiful day.