Chapter Thirteen The Managers Observation
Gerald Finch had been in the entertainment industry for thirty-seven years. He had started as a script reader in Toronto, worked his way up through development hell, survived three studio buyouts and one literal fire, and learned to spot a power dynamic from across a room.
He was not a kind man. He was not a generous man. But he was a practical man, and practicality had kept him employed while more talented people had been fired, downsized, or simply evaporated into the industry's endless appetite for fresh meat.
So when Lena Thomson walked into Golden Thread Pictures for the annual CEO visit, Gerald watched. And when Miu Srisuwan—his junior screenwriter, the one with the cat hoodie and the perpetually late pages—said "we can discuss this later, at home," Gerald's brain started connecting dots.
He did it quietly. That was his way.
---
The morning after the visit, Gerald arrived at 7:45 AM.
This was his routine. Coffee from the machine downstairs, the one that tasted like burnt regret.
Ten minutes of silence in his office before the chaos started.
He liked the quiet. Liked the way the building felt before people filled it with their noise and their questions and their desperate need for approval.
He sat at his desk, which faced a brick wall. He had chosen this office. He liked the brick. It didn't pretend to be anything other than what it was.
His computer was already on. He opened his email. Scrolled through the usual—budget approvals, script submissions, a passive-aggressive note from accounting about the coffee budget.
Then he opened the file he had been thinking about since yesterday.
Miu Srisuwan's personnel file.
He had pulled it after the CEO visit. Not because he was nosy. Because he was practical. He needed to know what he was dealing with.
He read it again. Hired two years ago. Junior screenwriter. Three unproduced scripts. One optioned. No complaints. No disciplinary actions. Nothing remarkable.
And yet, three weeks ago, someone had made her workload lighter. Someone had pushed her deadlines. Someone had told him—without telling him—to be nicer to her.
He had assumed it was a corporate initiative. Some new program to support creative staff. He had not asked questions. Questions were dangerous in an industry where the answer was usually "someone knows someone."
Now he knew who that someone was.
Lena Thomson. CEO.
The woman who had looked at Miu Srisuwan like she was the only person in the room.
---
Gerald spent the morning doing what he always did: reading scripts, sending notes, avoiding the break room where people talked too much. But he found himself watching. Not obviously. He had been in this business too long to be obvious.
He watched Miu arrive at 9:14 AM, fourteen minutes late. Her hoodie today said I'm silently correcting your grammar. Her hair was in a messy bun. She looked tired.
He watched her sit down at her desk, open her laptop, and stare at the screen for approximately seven minutes without typing anything. Then she pulled out her phone, looked at it, and smiled.
He watched Colin approach her desk. Colin, who was too nice for this industry and would probably get eaten alive someday. Colin said something. Miu shrugged. Colin laughed. Normal. Ordinary.
Except Gerald noticed that Miu's phone stayed in her hand. And she checked it three times in the next hour.
He did the math. Three weeks ago, the workload lightened. Three weeks ago, Miu started showing up tired, wearing unbuttoned jeans, drinking herbal tea. Three weeks ago, Lena Thomson moved to East Vancouver.
Gerald leaned back in his chair. The brick wall stared back at him.
Interesting, he thought.
---
The lunchroom was quiet when Gerald walked in. He rarely ate lunch in the break room—he preferred his office, alone—but today he needed to see something. He needed to test a theory.
Miu was at the communal table, eating a banana and scrolling through her phone. She was alone. The other writers had scattered, probably to avoid him.
He sat down across from her.
Miu looked up. "Did someone die?"
"No."
"You never eat in here."
"I'm expanding my horizons."
She squinted at him. "You're being weird."
"I'm being present."
"Same thing, with you."
He watched her peel the banana. Watched her take a bite. Watched her glance at her phone again. The screen lit up. A text message. She smiled. The same smile he had seen from across the room.
"Who's that?" Gerald asked.
Miu's smile disappeared. "Who's who?"
"The person you're texting."
"I'm not texting anyone. I'm looking at the time."
"Your phone buzzed."
"You imagined it."
"Miu."
She set down her phone. "It's my landlord. They're very attentive."
Gerald filed that away. The file from yesterday had mentioned Miu was pregnant. No father listed. But now there was a landlord. A very attentive landlord.
He said nothing. He was good at saying nothing.
"The CEO visit went well yesterday," he said instead.
Miu's face did something complicated. "Did it?"
"You seemed familiar with Ms. Thomson."
"We've met. She's my landlord."
"Right. The very attentive one."
Miu's eyes narrowed. "What are you doing, Gerald?"
"Eating lunch."
"You hate lunch. You say lunch is 'an unnecessary interruption to the workday.'"
"I'm trying new things."
Miu stared at him for a long moment. Then she picked up her banana and stood. "You're being suspicious. I'm going back to my desk."
She walked out. Gerald watched her go. He noticed that she took her phone with her. He noticed that she was still smiling when she left.
---
The afternoon was quiet. Gerald read scripts. Sent notes. Avoided the break room.
But in the back of his mind, he was turning over what he had seen. The way Miu checked her phone. The way she smiled. The way she had said she's my landlord like that explained anything.
He thought about Lena Thomson. He had met her before—briefly, at a corporate event, years ago. She had been cold. Precise. The kind of woman who looked at you like she was calculating your value and finding it insufficient.
Yesterday, she had been different.
He had watched her walk through the office. Watched her shake hands, ask questions, perform the rituals of a CEO visit. It was flawless. It was meaningless.
Then she had seen Miu.
Her mask had slipped. Just for a second. But Gerald had seen it. The way her posture changed. The way her eyes softened. The way she said we can discuss this later like it was a promise, not a dismissal.
He had seen that look before. Once. A long time ago. Before his wife left. Before he learned to stop looking at people like they mattered.
He pulled up Miu's personnel file again. Scrolled to her recent projects. The deadlines had been moved twice. The coverage meetings had been reassigned. Someone had made sure she had time. Space. Room to breathe.
Not a corporate initiative. Not a new program for creative staff.
One person. One very powerful person who had a soft spot for a junior screenwriter in a cat hoodie.
Gerald closed the file.
He did not ask questions. He did not need answers.
He only needed to know one thing: Miu Srisuwan was not a junior screenwriter anymore.
She was a junior screenwriter who could call the CEO at any time.
Who could say my deadlines need to move and have it happen.
Who could look at Gerald across a lunch table and call him suspicious without consequence.
He picked up his phone. Called his assistant.
"Cancel the notes meeting for Friday. Move it to Monday."
"Any reason?"
"Miu Srisuwan needs the time."
His assistant paused. "She does?"
"She does now."
He hung up. Leaned back in his chair. The brick wall was still there. It hadn't changed. But everything else had.
---
At 4:30 PM, Gerald walked through the office. It was his routine. A final lap before he left for the day. He liked to see who was still working, who was pretending to work, who had given up and gone home.
Miu was at her desk. Her screen showed a script—the cat one, probably. She was typing. Actually typing, not just staring at the cursor. Her phone was face-down on her desk, but he saw her glance at it twice.
He stopped at her desk.
"Pages are due Friday," he said.
Miu looked up. "I know."
"You're behind."
"I'm aware."
"Can you make the deadline?"
She paused. He saw something flicker across her face—fear, maybe. Or uncertainty. The look of someone who was trying to do too much with too little energy.
"I can try," she said.
Gerald nodded. "Take Monday. You'll have extra time."
Miu blinked. "What?"
"The notes meeting is moved. You have until Tuesday."
She stared at him. "Why?"
"You need the time."
"I didn't ask for it."
"I'm giving it to you." He turned to walk away. Then paused. "And Miu."
"Yes?"
"The cat script. It's not terrible."
He walked back to his office. He did not see Miu's face. He did not need to.
---
He left at 5:15 PM. The building was emptying out. People heading home, heading to bars, heading anywhere that wasn't a desk.
In the lobby, he saw Miu waiting by the door. She was on her phone. Typing. Smiling. The same smile from lunch.
He pretended not to see her. Walked past. Pushed through the glass doors into the gray Vancouver evening.
A black sedan was parked at the curb. A black sedan that cost more than Gerald's annual salary. The window rolled down.
Lena Thomson looked out. Her face was neutral, controlled, the face she wore for the world.
But then Miu walked out of the building, and Lena's face changed. Just slightly. Just enough.
Miu got into the car. The window rolled up. The sedan pulled away.
Gerald stood on the sidewalk, watching the car disappear into traffic.
He thought about his wife. The way she used to look at him before everything fell apart. The way he used to look back.
He walked to his own car—a sensible sedan, ten years old, paid off—and drove home.
He did not ask questions. He did not need answers. He only needed to know one thing: the CEO had a soft spot for his junior screenwriter. And his junior screenwriter had power over the CEO that no one else in the company had.
He would be careful around Miu Srisuwan. Not because he was afraid. Because he had learned, in thirty-seven years, that the people who mattered most were the ones who never asked for anything.
And Miu Srisuwan had never asked for anything.
---
That night, Gerald ate dinner alone in his apartment. The same dinner he had eaten for ten years: grilled chicken, rice, vegetables. The apartment was quiet. It was always quiet.
He thought about calling his daughter. He didn't. He thought about watching television. He didn't do that either.
He sat in his chair—the one that faced the window, not the wall—and watched the city lights flicker.
His phone buzzed. A text from his assistant: Miu Srisuwan's pages. She submitted them early. They're good.
Gerald stared at the message. Miu had submitted early. She had taken the extra time he offered and not used it.
He typed back: Send them to development. Fast-track the coverage.
His assistant replied: Fast-track? For a junior?
Yes.
Any reason?
Gerald set down the phone. He did not answer. He did not need to.
The city lights flickered. The apartment was quiet.
Gerald Finch, who had been in the entertainment industry for thirty-seven years, who had learned to spot a power dynamic from across a room, who had watched a CEO fall in love with a junior screenwriter over three weeks of unasked-for favors—Gerald Finch sat in his chair and thought about his wife.
She had left. That was ten years ago.
But he still remembered the way she looked at him. The way he looked back.
He wondered if Lena Thomson knew what she was getting into. He wondered if Miu Srisuwan knew what she had.
He turned off the light. Went to bed.
Tomorrow, he would go back to work. He would read scripts. Send notes. Be grumpy. He would treat Miu Srisuwan the same as always—except when he didn't. Except when he gave her extra time. Except when he fast-tracked her scripts. Except when he made sure she had what she needed to succeed.
Because that was what you did when someone mattered. You showed up. You gave them space. You didn't ask for anything in return.
He had learned that too late.
He would not make the same mistake twice.