"Yea but to step back down as an associate; man what are people going to think? I feel like I'm being singled out for that class action lawsuit lost that we took. You know it was a technicality." He explained to the senior partner. Jacob was worried. He didn't want to admit it, but he knew what he had to do. If the senior partners insisted on demoting him and cutting his salary, he would have no other alternative except to take out a second mortgage on their home and cash in both of their term life insurance policies. These were the only two options left for him in order to come up with Markus and Dinah's college tuitions. His and Louise's income barely covered their own living expenses and car notes.

"Okay fine, I'll take the demotion but I can't deal with a fifty percent salary reduction…" He said feeling suffocated just thinking about his financial obligations. Abruptly his eyes came to rest on his notice for child support payment. Damn, that kid wasn't eighteen yet he wondered silently as he listened to his boss. He tried to remember what year was the boy born, but because there were so many distractions going on right now he couldn't think straight.

"Twenty percent? Well I'm not happy about it… Do you think you can find another ten percent for me?" He all but begged the senior partner. As he waited for Howard's response he picked up the child support notice and slipped it inside the shredder that was tucked on the side underneath his desk. The shredder made a fast grinding sound as the notice was literally obliterated into a thousand tiny pieces. He figured the kid had to be eighteen by now and besides he had paid more than enough. If that eighty dollars a month meant that much to Marla and that kid, then she could take him back to court he decided.

"Okay fine, I don't like it but I don't have any other choice." Jacob conceded glad that the partners hadn't voted him out of the law firm. A temporary demotion was truly a slap on the wrist for him. He could last for a year and make it all work out.

"Fine I can live with another five percent…" Jacob reluctantly agreed. At least it was better than losing half his income. He had managed to retain seventy-five percent of his income and that was much better than the rest of the lawyers involved in that failed lawsuit had fared.

* * * * * * * *

January 1999




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