The Penguin Interview

Jade Thompson had wanted to work with animals since she was six years old. Now she was twenty-three, she had a degree in biology, and she had finally gotten an interview for her dream job: assistant animal keeper at a big aquarium in Boston.

The night before, she practiced with her grandmother on a video call. “Why do you want this job?” Grandma asked, reading from a list of questions that Jade had sent her.

“Because I love animals and I'm a hard worker,” Jade said.

“Boring,” said Grandma. “Try again, but this time tell the truth.”

Jade laughed. “Because when I was six, you took me to that aquarium, and I watched a penguin for two hours. I've wanted to work there ever since.”

“Better,” said Grandma. “Say that.”

The next morning, Jade put on her best white shirt and arrived twenty minutes early. A woman with short gray hair met her at the door. She was Dr. Ruiz, the head of the bird team.

“We're going to do something a little different today,” Dr. Ruiz said. “First, I want to see you with the animals. Then we'll talk.”

She gave Jade a bucket of fish and took her into the penguin area. It was cold and noisy, and it smelled very strongly of fish. Twenty penguins looked at Jade with great interest – or, more exactly, at her bucket.

Jade began to give out the fish carefully, one by one, as Dr. Ruiz had shown her. Everything was going well until a small penguin with a pink band on its wing jumped up, grabbed the name badge from her shirt and hurried away with it.

Jade froze. Her white shirt now had a hole in it. She smelled like fish. And a penguin was walking around with her name in its beak.

For a second, she wanted to cry. Then she looked at the little penguin, which was proudly showing the badge to its friends, and she started to laugh.

“Well,” she said to Dr. Ruiz, “I think she wants this job more than I do.”

Dr. Ruiz smiled for the first time. “That's Pepper. She does it to everyone. Last month, a candidate got so angry that he walked out.” She got the badge back from Pepper in exchange for a fish. “Now, Jade. Why do you want to work here?”

Jade remembered her grandmother's advice. She told the truth: the penguin, the two hours, the six-year-old girl who never wanted to leave.

Three days later, her phone rang. She got the job.

That evening, she called her grandmother. “Grandma,” she said, “you were right. But next time, could you also tell me to wear an old shirt?”