Doris tells everyone she loves her job. She isn’t kidding. You might not think so. She works in cosmetics at an upscale department store. Weekends and three days a week. She gets a salary and a commission. Doesn’t add up to much. Rent for an apartment she shares with two other women, food, an occasional night out at a movie, and bus fare.

For Doris it is more than enough. “I meet such interesting women. I could never be like them. They lead wonderful lives, know so much, are so good and kind to me. I could use more money. That would be nice but I am happy with what I have. I do what I want and no one tells me what to do.

And she is being absolutely honest when she says so. In a very real sense, it is beyond any job she could have hoped for. And for her, it is the height of glamor. And that part she really loves. She also loves helping the kind of people she imagines her customers are like.   She does not like trying to push customers into buying something they might not want or need. She hates her supervisors for making her do that. When they talk about sales goals, she gets anxious. So anxious that she sometimes goes into the ladies room to throw up. Despite all that, she always meets her goals.

Sometimes she goes well beyond what her managers expect from her. If asked how she does it, she always says, “I don’t know. People are nice to me, I guess.” There’s probably some truth in that. Over the years, Doris has attracted a loyal following of women and more than a few men who loved being waited on by her. When they come to the store, they call first to make sure Doris is there. And, if she’s waiting on someone else when they come to her counter, they quietly wait until it is their turn.

It’s not that she uses cosmetics much herself. What she knows comes from a short course she took, nothing very extensive. Here success, such as it is, comes from how she treats her customers. Obsequious, yes. Deferential. Of course. They love that. But it is more than that. There is something about Doris. When you talk to her, you get the feeling she is letting you in on some kind of secret, something between the two of you that no one else knows about.

But they never know exactly what that secret might be. Myra’s sister, Zora, is always saying something nasty about Doris’s job. “How you put up with all that crap and those awful customers is more than I can imagine.”

Doris just smiles. No one knows and she is not about to let on.

Doris’s childhood was not a good one. She was a middle child. Denton, her older brother, was not a nice person. Nor was her mother, a genuinely nasty, self-absorbed woman constantly bossed Doris around and screamed whenever Doris, who was a bit clumsy as a child, dropped or spilled anything. Things got worse as Doris got older. By the time Doris was ten, her mother, who worked as a hair dresser, saddled her with most of the household chores. As soon as she got home from school, Doris washed all the lady’s breakfast dishes, made the beds, and vacuumed the front room. Then, she started dinner. She did her homework only after she’d cleaned up from dinner.

Doris never said much. And it didn’t matter whether she did or not. Her mother constantly told her, “Shut up if you know what’s good for you.” Doris became even quieter, after her younger sister was born. Zora became her mother’s pet. Doris was expected to clean up after Zora and to remain absolutely silent when Zora was sleeping.

One morning, Doris’s father left for work and never showed up at his job. He just disappeared. He was the only one in the family who seemed to show any interest in her. He would sometimes comb her hair or rub her back. After he disappeared, Doris seemed to disappear as well. She could go for days without saying more than a word or two. No one paid much attention. Certainly not her mother. This was made very clear when her breasts began to show. She was twelve the first time Denton raped her. Soon, it became a regular event – as often as Denton was able to buy a condom from a friend at school or to steal one from their mother’s supply – until Denton had an accident.

Doris’s mother kept a pistol in an unlocked drawer in her bedroom. “In case my husband, that bastard, ever comes back,” she said. “None of the kids knew it was there. Denton must have been snooping, found it, and accidentally shot himself.”

Two years after that, Doris left home. She got a job in a bakery, finished high school, and moved out with little more than the clothes on her back. Her mother was furious. “Who was going to do all the housework and cooking?” But there was nothing she could do. Doris was no longer a child and had found a place to live with a few other girls her age.

Then, Doris got married. Norbert was a good deal older, an electrician who thought he was the luckiest man in the world. “You may not think she’s gorgeous but I do. And she’s young and knows how to cook. She’s quiet though. I wish she’d laugh more.” That’s how he described her to Willy, his business partner. When Doris wanted to enroll in a cosmetology school, Norbert happily footed the bill.

But there were a few clouds on the horizon. One of them was children. He wanted them. She did not. A side issue was sex. After the first year with Norbert, she became increasingly unenthusiastic. And then, there was religion. He was deeply religious. Doris went the church on Sunday only because he did and he disliked that.

He drowned two years after they were married. They were on vacation and were out in a canoe in the evening. It was almost dark. She said he leaned over and the canoe tipped. She hung on to the canoe and called for help. He never came up.

It was hard to say just what happened. Norbert was known to be a good swimmer. He had been on the swim team in high school and had been a lifeguard at a local country club. It seemed that he may have hit his head when the canoe tipped.

Shortly after that, Doris got the job at the department store. She didn’t seem to mourn Norbert very much. A couple of people thought she almost seemed relieved. They didn’t know she and Norbert’s partner, Willy, had been meeting at least once a week for extended lovemaking sessions. Doris was terrified Norbert would find out. His death eliminated that concern. And no one seemed the wiser. Or interested.

That is, until they found her father. In a shallow grave in the woods near Doris’s childhood home. The axe was still stuck in the back of his skull.