Chapter 10
Avery
By the second day of new employee training, I had learned that boredom could be weaponized.
I spent the morning in a conference room with three other new hires, a laptop, a legal pad, and a training platform that congratulated me every time I answered a question correctly, as if I were a golden retriever with moderate reading comprehension.
At one point, a cartoon padlock wearing glasses explained secure document disposal to me, and I stared at it with the hollow-eyed despair of a woman who had once believed adulthood would contain better graphics.
Benjamin checked on me twice before lunch, which was either kindness or surveillance depending on how much generosity I was willing to grant a man who had told me, without blinking, that my note-taking posture ‘lacked conviction.’
The first time, he appeared in the glass doorway shortly after nine, holding a coffee cup and wearing the expression of someone who had interrupted a minor crime.
“Are you retaining information?” he asked.
“I have never known more about workplace document classification.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the answer you deserve.”
His mouth did its tiny almost-smile again. I was beginning to live for those, which probably meant onboarding had damaged me psychologically. He set the coffee beside my laptop.
“Dana says caffeine improves compliance.”
“Does Dana say that, or do you?”
“Dana says nothing she cannot defend in court.” He glanced at the training screen. “Ah. Vendor ethics.”
“Yes. I’ve learned not to accept diamonds from subcontractors.”
“Good. We lost three promising interns to bracelets in ‘18.”
“That didn’t happen.”
“Not with that attitude.”
The second time, he brought a stack of forms and a warning not to make faces at the sexual harassment module because the training software sometimes recorded engagement through the webcam.
I looked at him. “That cannot be true.”
“No. But for three seconds you sat up straighter, and that was valuable to me.”
“You’re a terrible person.”
“Yes, and now you’re alert.”
He left before I could decide whether or not to throw a pen at him, which was how Benjamin survived most social interactions, I suspected.
The Hartwell situation moved around the office like a weather system.
No one explained it to me directly, but I caught fragments.
Dana passed by at one point saying, “If anyone uses the word optics in my presence again, I will resign and become a beekeeper,” to which Benjamin, without looking up from his tablet, answered, “You would bully the bees.” It made me laugh into my sandwich, which made Dana look at me as if laughter was an invoice she had not approved.
By two in the afternoon, my brain had softened into a paste of acronyms and policies.
By three, I had passed four assessments, including one in which I correctly identified that accepting a luxury weekend from a contractor was inappropriate, even if the contractor had a charming dog.
By four, I had begun writing increasingly elaborate notes in the margins of my legal pad just to stay alive.
Do not click suspicious links.
Do not accept diamonds.
Do not pout.
Do not think about Callum’s hands.
The last item appeared before I could stop it. I stared at the words, then scratched them out so hard the pen tore the paper.
Benjamin materialized beside me.
I jumped. “Do you teleport?”
“Only when disappointed.” His eyes moved to the torn paper. “Aggressive notetaking.”
“The cartoon padlock pushed me too far.”
“It does that.”
“Has anyone ever died during onboarding?”
“Several people have left us spiritually, but HR refuses to count them.”
I leaned back in my chair and rubbed my eyes. “How many more modules?”
“Today? Two.”
I lowered my hands. “That’s a hate crime.”
“That is a phrase best not used during workplace conduct training.”
“I’m being slowly made less intelligent.”
“You are being made employable.”
“I was employable yesterday.”
“You were employable-adjacent yesterday. Today we are adding policy awareness and password hygiene.”
I gave him a look. He gave one back. Then his tablet dinged, and his posture adjusted by half an inch.
“Mr. Rowe would like to see you at five-thirty.”
My pulse took one hard, stupid leap.
“Is it about training?” I asked.
“That depends.”
“On what?”
“Whether you’ve done something during training that requires Mr. Rowe’s attention.”
“I have passed every test.”
“Then perhaps he wants to congratulate you on meeting the educational standards of a suspiciously bright corporate monkey.”
“Ben.”
“He said five-thirty,” Benjamin repeated, and then his voice softened in a way so slight I might have imagined it. “Finish the modules first.”
“I was going to.”
“I know.” He hesitated, which was unusual enough to make me look at him properly. “And Avery?”
“Yes?”
“Remember that offices have walls, but walls have people near them.”
My face heated before I could stop it. Benjamin gave me one long, judgmental look, then turned and walked away with his tablet tucked against his side.
The final two modules took eighty-seven years.
At 5:23, I closed my laptop, collected my notebook, and went to the bathroom to stare at myself under fluorescent lighting that had clearly been installed by an enemy of women.
I looked professional. Tired, but professional.
I was a serious employee and also a woman who understood boundaries, having recently passed a quiz on them with one hundred percent.
I washed my hands even though they were clean.
Then I walked to Callum’s office.
The floor was quieter than it had been all day, though not empty.
A few people were still at desks. Dana was in a glass conference room with Marcus from government relations, one hand braced on the table as she appeared to explain something devastating with only a red pen and the force of her displeasure.
Benjamin sat outside Callum’s office at his own small workstation, two phones, a laptop, and a half-eaten granola bar beside him.
He looked up as I approached.
“You survived,” he observed sardonically.
“Barely.”
“Barely counts in corporate learning environments.”
“Does he still want to see me?”
“No, I invented it to watch you become anxious for an hour.” He paused. “Yes, he wants to see you.”
I looked at the matte black doors.
Benjamin leaned back slightly. “Do you need a moment to make a face privately?”
“No.”
“You made one publicly, so that tracks.” He picked up one of his phones. “He’s expecting you.”
“Is he in a mood?”
“Mr. Rowe is always in a mood. The question is whether the mood has legal implications.”
“Does this one?”
Benjamin studied me for a second. “Potentially.”
My breath caught and he did not smile.
Then he pressed a button on his desk phone. “She’s here.”
A low voice answered from inside, indistinct through the speaker.
Benjamin looked at me. “Go in.”
“Any advice?”
“Many pieces. None you would currently enjoy.”
“Helpful.”
“It is my purpose for existing.”
I opened the door and stepped inside.
Callum was behind his desk, jacket off, shirt slightly unbuttoned, sleeves rolled again, tie absent, hair slightly disordered in a way that suggested the day had put up a fight and lost. The office was dimmer now, the city beyond the glass turning blue-gray with evening.
Files were stacked along one side of his desk.
His laptop glowed. A legal pad sat in front of him covered in hard, slanted notes.
He looked tired, his face more severe for the long day, the silver at his temples catching the last of the light.
He looked up when I entered and the effect was immediate. My body recognized his attention with a humiliating loyalty. My pulse lifted. My skin warmed. Every stern promise I had made to myself in the bathroom quietly packed a bag and left town.
“Avery,” he said.
“Mr. Rowe.”
His mouth twitched at that. “Still?”
“We’re at work.”
“So we are.”
I closed the door behind me because leaving it open felt theatrically safe, and I refused to perform virtue for Benjamin’s benefit when he was already judging me through the drywall. The latch clicked softly. Callum’s eyes flicked toward the door, then back to me.
“Sit down.”
I sat in the chair across from his desk, crossing one ankle over the other, notebook in my lap. “You wanted to see me?”
“I did.”
“Am I in trouble?”
The question came out lighter than I intended, almost like I was testing him just to see what he would do, which to be honest, was exactly what I was doing.
“Should you be?” he asked.
I looked down at my notebook to hide a smile. “I passed every test.”
“I heard.”
“Perfect scores.”
“Benjamin told me.”
“Did he use the word perfect?”
“No.”
“Coward.”
“He used the word acceptable.”
“That sounds more like him.”
Callum leaned back in his chair. “And how was your day?”
I narrowed my eyes slightly. “You already know.”
“I know what Benjamin reported.”
“Then you know I completed training.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
I tilted my head. “My day was informative.”
His brows rose.
“Enriching,” I added.
“Was it?”
“Transformative.”
“Careful.”
The word slid across my skin.
I smiled before I could stop myself. “Engaging.”
“Avery.”
“Yes?”
“How was your day?”
“It was boring,” I sighed, dramatically enough to be a choice. “I’m sorry, did you call me in here to ask me a question you already knew the answer to?”
“I called you in here to see whether you’d answer honestly or put on a performance.”
“And?”
“You did both.”
“That sounds thorough.”
“It sounds like you.”
I should not have liked that. I did anyway.
He tapped his pen once against the legal pad. “What was boring?”
“All of it.”
“Specific.”
“The bribery module. The part where I was taught not to leave confidential drawings in a taxi. The twelve-minute video on respectful workplace communication.” I leaned back.
“The quiz that asked me whether I should share my password with a stranger over the phone, and I want you to know that I heroically selected no.”
“I’m relieved.”
“You should be. I also learned not to accept diamonds from contractors.”