5. Two Plus Two Equals Idiot
5
TWO PLUS TWO EQUALS IDIOT
ANSEL
I was three minutes into a presentation when I realized the numbers were wrong.
Not just wrong— disastrously wrong.
The graph on the slide in front of me showed a projected return that didn’t match the report I’d read that morning. I flipped through the hard copy of the presentation, my pulse ticking faster as I saw the discrepancy. If I kept talking, I’d be selling an impossible forecast. If I backtracked, I’d look unprepared.
I was never unprepared.
“Excuse me.” I glanced at the junior analyst fumbling with his laptop. “These figures—are they final?”
Across the table, the client frowned.
“Uh—” The analyst’s face turned red. “That’s what I was given.”
I blew out a breath, my jaw tightening. This wouldn’t have happened if Neha were here. She would have double-checked the numbers, anticipated my questions, and flagged the error before I stepped into this room.
But Neha wasn’t with me. I’d fucked that up good.
In the past two weeks, I’d discovered how much I relied on her and all the bravado of how I was king of the fucking word had evaporated.
I confronted Vanessa, who insisted that she wasn’t lying. I didn’t believe her, but I also couldn’t do anything about it. No one put a gun to my head. I let Neha go of my own free will and after careful consideration because I was obviously not as smart as I thought I was.
I apologized to the client, whom I’d worked with for several years, and I knew he’d give me grace by letting me reschedule our meeting.
“What happened to your other assistant?” he asked when I walked him to the elevator. “You know, the Indian woman.”
“She got an MBA and couldn’t be my assistant any longer,” I lied.
“Moving on to bigger and better things. Good for her,” he said approvingly. “She was a smart one.”
“Yes.” She fucking was while I was a grade-A idiot.
Back in my newly outfitted Vice President office, I closed the door shut and pinched the bridge of my nose.
Since Neha left, I had nothing but chaos. Lori had worked for me for two weeks, and then, with my new job, I got a new assistant. Joanna, who came highly recommended. She wasn’t bad, but she was just an assistant.
When I asked her to go through my presentation, she looked at me like I’d asked her to dance naked on my table.
“I…you mean to make sure everything is spelled right?” She gave me a confused look.
Right! Assistants usually didn’t share their insights on strategy and client presentations. They took care of your calendar, got you coffee, and ensured that your inbox only contained emails that you needed to see.
Joanna was a decent assistant, I had to give her that, but I found her slow, easily flustered, and utterly unfamiliar with how I worked.
She did her job and nothing more.
I couldn’t send her a market report and ask her to give me a summary I could use in a meeting. I couldn’t forward a financial model at the last minute and expect her to catch discrepancies my analysts had missed. I couldn’t rely on her to refine my pitch decks, pulling out key insights to strengthen my arguments.
Too little too late as they said!
I now knew that Neha had been more than just an assistant —she had been my safety net. She kept me ahead of the game, tracking industry trends and competitor moves before they even hit my radar. She made sure I walked into every meeting armed with sharp, airtight numbers, anticipating potential counterarguments before they even came up. She caught mistakes, smoothed over team conflicts, and ensured that I was never unprepared.
I didn’t have any of that now, and I was feeling the impact intensely. I felt helpless—because I wasn’t used to struggling. For years, I’d thought I was hot shit, never stopping to appreciate just how much she did for me.
And it wasn’t just the work.
It was the empty space where Neha should have been. The office felt colder without her, and the days stretched too long without her quick wit, sharp mind, and quiet care.
Fucking hell! I missed her. And not just as my assistant.
I let my insecurities—my fear of not being good enough for this career—push me away from the one person who had worked tirelessly to ensure that I was more than good enough.
I had no one to blame but myself.
“Come in,” I called when there was a knock on my door.
“Ansel, would you like me to bring you lunch from the café?” Joanna asked.
I nodded. “Thanks, Joanna. I’ll have the steak salad.”
She beamed.
“Ah, with the chimichurri dressing,” I added because she wouldn’t know. And just like that I was back to the words that were running themselves ragged inside of me: Neha would know .
I’d have to pay attention to things in a different way now because I didn’t have Neha to take care of me.
She took care of me. Day in and day out.
What had she said?
“You somehow figured out that I had feelings for you.”
Well, she probably didn’t have the same loving fuzzy ones she used to, I thought sardonically, wanting to kick myself.
It wasn’t how she felt about me that made me uncomfortable, it was how I felt about her .
I wanted Neha.
My eyes tracked her all the time. I looked forward to her bringing me coffee every morning. I had fallen for her, and I’d resisted it because that wasn’t something you did if you wanted to have a successful career. Having a relationship with your assistant was a damned cliché.
What I regretted most wasn’t that I had let her go—it was how I did it. I had humiliated her first. God , I couldn’t even remember all the shit I had said to Vanessa—but I knew it hadn’t been good. I’d basically dismissed Neha as not capable enough to continue working for me. And it hadn’t just been words because I had acted on it—gone to HR and had her severance contract drafted.
I buried my face in my hands and measured my loss, the one I deserved.