My employers made good on their promise to pay at the end of the month, ending weeks of anticipation and misery. By 3rd, everyone had been paid. I’ve heard stories where come end of month, some people are not paid or if they are, it’s only part of what they were promised.

To my relief, that didn’t happen to us and for now at least, I’m not broke. For those who say money is not everything, I disagree. This side of town, it is everything. At work, everyone has been cheerful this whole week.

The other day, one of my workmates even offered to pay my transport fare! We are also getting more clients now that people just got paid and everyone is happy and spending freely. Wish we could get some sort of commission from the surge in customer numbers.

There have been a few generous tips but like I wrote before, we hand those over to management. I don’t feel so bad about that since I have some money now.

In the true spirit of spending, I treated myself to a decent meal if only to congratulate myself for working so hard and being able to keep my new job thus far. I also bought a few home supplies. You should have seen the smile on Jane’s face.

This whole week, I’ve been the "darling” at home, thanks to the sugar, bread and soap among other things I bought. Even Denis who rarely greets me now does. We are even having meaningful civil conversations which hasn’t been the case in a while since he usually prefers to bully or insult me or both. He joked that perhaps in the near future, I will earn enough to buy a TV set since we don’t have one at the moment. The power of money! Wish I had more of it.

This being my first "real” salary, I had planned to do a number of things and even save some money, but you know how it is.

Once you get money, all your budgets, plans and good intentions go out the window. Unless you’re one of those very principled people, you will find yourself spending on things you hadn’t planned to.

They say Red Bull gives you wings, well; money gives you the itch to spend. I like to show my gratitude whenever I have the opportunity and so I took Spencer for coffee.

He was kind to me and showed me around town back when I had just come and had nothing so I wanted to thank him in a small but special way. He brought his girlfriend along and being the polite girl I am, I didn’t object and only secretly winced at the bill. I also passed by a boutique, which had been no where in my plans and ended up buying an expensive dress.

Bad idea I know but after trying the dress on, I knew I had to have it. It was the perfect fit and it felt like it was begging me to buy it. I would have been haunted for the rest of my life if I hadn’t bought it.

Besides that, I didn’t want to disappoint the gracious shop attendant who had made me feel so comfortable. How would I explain to her that I couldn’t buy the dress because if I did, I would be left with close to nothing?

And so I bought the dress. I know I will pay dearly for that, most certainly by walking to and fro work a good number of days but I will cross that bridge when I get to it. For now, I can revel in the fact that I have one beautiful dress in my bag. How I wish it will be a closet full of beautiful clothes someday!

To be continued…

Email: nsophie77@yahoo.com