8. Jenna #2
“A car is a worse gift than a muffin at this point in my life. Cars need insurance and vacuuming and a parking spot. A muffin, I eat it, I enjoy it, then I don't have to think about it until I step on the scale.”
“I’m not buying you a Starbucks muffin,” he grumbles as the elevator lets us off at the lobby. “They smell like dog food.”
I wave to the doorman.
“Don’t wave at him.” McCarthy swats my hand.
“He’s a human being, and step five is you’re supposed to be nicer to your employees and staff so that they have good things to say about you if 60 Minutes starts prying into your life.”
“Don’t worry, miss. I already know what a terrible person he is.” Anton is cheerful.
“He’s salty because I beat his ass at poker last week.” McCarthy leans on the concierge desk while Truman begs the doorman for pats and maybe a bite of his breakfast sandwich.
I fume. “You can’t be gambling with your doorman. How much did you lose, Anton? McCarthy’s going to pay you back.”
I glare at the unrepentant billionaire .
The doorman smirks at McCarthy. “Pay me back? So you’re going to meow at Mrs. de Vries?”
“You had him humiliate himself for you, McCarthy?” I screech. “This is a new low, even for you.”
“I meow , right?” The doorman is wearing a shit-eating grin.
“I’ll apologize right meow .” McCarthy puts a hand on his heart.
“This isn’t funny! Anton, you should find a new job. You don’t have to deal with McCarthy’s sick games.”
Anton protests. “Hey! This is a good gig, lady. I make six figures.”
“You what!”
Anton smirks. “It’s because I’m cute.”
“Damn, I’m in the wrong profession.”
“And all I have is an associate’s degree.” Anton grins.
“She has an MBA. She’s a little salty about it. Her degree isn’t exactly panning out financially,” McCarthy says, leaning in toward Anton.
“Don’t worry, miss. I beat Mac occasionally,” Anton assures me.
“I’m fairer to you when you lose,” McCarthy argues.
The doorman’s grin broadens. “Last time Mac lost, he had to have dinner at the Aldridges’.”
“That was mean, and you know it. They still won’t leave me alone. That lady convinced my housekeeper to let her into my penthouse, and she was in my bathtub, waiting to ambush me.”
“She could be your girlfriend, then,” I suggest.
Anton and McCarthy both recoil. The doorman crosses himself.
“She has children his age. Have a heart, miss. ”
“Ah… well, then…”
“Also, she has a monkey,” McCarthy adds. “Like, a big one. Someone needs to call animal control on that chimpanzee. Now that’s a PR disaster waiting to happen.”
“Oh my god, I know !”
In the rearview mirror, McCarthy mimes slitting his throat, so I lower my voice as I speak into my headset while navigating through morning rush-hour traffic. “Like, seriously, he popped out of the casket like a jack-in-the-box.”
“You should sue him. You can’t just post videos of someone online like that to make money without their permission. Brock has to make you sign a waiver,” Hannah insists.
“I mean, technically I did sign one a while ago when we were still together.”
Behind me, McCarthy mutters something under his breath that sounds like “Jesus fucking Christ, this woman.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you, especially since Nathan failed to meet the very low standard set for him.” Hannah sighs.
“You and McCarthy—why don’t you like Nathan?” I whisper into the headset because I don’t need to give McCarthy any more ammunition.
He swears under his breath. “Because that guy is cheating on you.”
“No, he’s not!”
“Ehhh,” Hannah says. “I mean…”
McCarthy rummages around in my purse then holds up one of the dating books he bought. Yes, Girl, He IS Cheating on You! the title screams in bright-yellow font .
“That’s not what Nessa Rosemary thinks. She’s a witch, by the way, and she doesn’t like Nathan either.” He tosses the book onto the passenger’s seat next to me. “But let me guess, you’re so in love and perfectly happy in your relationship, thank you .”
I watch him mock me in the rearview mirror.
“You need to buy a limo with a divider,” I snap at him.
“Hell will freeze over before I let you drive a limo, Cupcake. Watch out!”
I blare the horn as I almost run into the car in front of me.
“No backseat driving! Sir!” I say sweetly.
I’m craving coffee and sugar when we finally pull up in front of Dani’s Doughnuts.
“I need fried pastry,” I gasp as I crawl out of the car. I am wearing a skirt at a normal length today. I would have worn my pantsuit except I couldn’t button the top button.
“I feel like we spend an inordinate amount of time on your personal errands.”
“Guess you shouldn’t have lost your license, then, buddy.
Besides, this is for you,” I tell him as the clerk waves us up to the counter.
“You’re going to be the awesome boss who brings doughnuts to the office.
Hi! Pickup for Jenna!” I dig my coupons out of my bag as Dani sets the bags of doughnut boxes on the counter.
“I have these from the newspaper, but I think they expired yesterday. Do you think you can—”
McCarthy slaps my hand. “You’re not seriously trying to con her into taking your expired coupons. Don’t be that customer.”
“You’re the world’s biggest dick, so what do you care?”
“Yes, but not to service workers. Excuse her, her non-dead fiancé is cheating on her, and she’s in denial,” McCarthy says to the baker, who giggles when the handsome man smiles and hands her his credit card with a flourish.
“Oooh, yeah, I saw the video. It’s all over the internet,” Dani breathes. “You really thought he was dead? It wasn’t fake for views?”
My smile is plastered on my face. “It was a surprise. A wonderful, surprising surprise.”
McCarthy’s winding up to say something derisive and offensive. It’s not even seven thirty in the morning, and I’m ready to throw him off a bridge.
“Give me a hit, Dani. It’s going to be a long one.”
Dani shakes the container of yellow and pink sprinkles at me and tips them out in a line on the counter.
“That’s the stuff.” I plug one nostril then snort the line of sprinkles.
“No, no, no, what the fuck?” McCarthy grabs my chin. “What in God’s name is wrong with you?”
I open my mouth, and all the sprinkles are there, sitting on my tongue.
His handsome face screws up in horror, and he releases me with a shove.
“It’s a fun party trick!”
“No, no, it’s not fun. This is horrible.”
“Give me another hit, Dani.” I rub my nose.
“Absolutely not.” McCarthy takes the heavy bags of doughnuts in one hand and grabs my upper arm with the other. “Why did you… Why are you—” he sputters as he herds me out onto the sidewalk. “How do you even know how to do that?”
“Someone has to be the icebreaker in social situations.” I let him drag me to the car, since he seems out of sorts. I take out my doughnut and rip off a big bite, which I chew as we pull into traffic.
“Speaking of… we’re going to be planning some social engagements for your employees. It’s company bonding. I checked with Isaac, and he said that there aren’t any company events, so we’re planning a picnic.”
McCarthy is still visibly disgusted by the sprinkles. “What if they’re still lodged in your nose?”
“Focus! Have a doughnut. You sound cranky and hungry.”
We make good time to the office.
“Your employees will love this! Everyone likes a picnic! And we’re going to have an office-wide scavenger hunt. Oh! And you should make the space more collaborative. Your office environment is sad and stale. You need perks! Social opportunities.”
He sets the doughnuts on the table I asked Isaac to put out in the lobby.
“People like you,” McCarthy says flatly, “are the reason no one wants to work in an office.”
RDC employees are already starting to congregate around the table.
“Everyone wants to work in an office. You can’t just sit at home and work by yourself. I mean, how does anyone get anything done if they can’t collaborate?”
“Fine,” McCarthy says, “then you be the one to tell them the good news.”
I grab the presentation clicker.
Isaac is messing with the giant TV on one wall of the atrium lobby, on which hundreds of RDC employees have joined in over Zoom.
“Welcome, everyone! Grab a doughnut and settle in. ”
Beside me, McCarthy has his arms crossed.
“I’m sure you’ve seen the news that were making a few changes around here.”
McCarthy’s employees look at me blankly. One woman is wearing an oversized unicorn onesie. A man, wearing shorts, flip-flops, and a stained hoodie, has co-opted an entire box of doughnuts and is taking a single bite out of each one.
“Change is fun! We want everyone to see RDC as a welcoming, exciting, fun company. Therefore, we’re going to schedule company events, like a kickball game and a picnic. Shoot, you guys don’t even have a holiday party. The best part of a corporate job is the Christmas extravaganza.”
No one on the Zoom call or in front of me is smiling.
The doughnut guy raises his hand. “Is this a mandatory picnic?”
“Well, uh…”
Unicorn Girl cuts in. “McCarthy, are you selling the company? Because this isn’t what I signed up for. This is some corporate BS.”
That sets off everyone.
Isaac tries frantically to mute the video call as people start yelling.
“No one is selling!” I try to shout over the din.
“I can’t believe I drove in for this shit,” one man complains.
“I thought we were having pizza.”
“I want chicken wings.”
“I have a certain way that I like to work.”
McCarthy’s employees crowd around me, yelling.
“Where’s this money coming from?”
“I thought we were getting a pay raise. ”
“If I have to drive in, that sounds like a pay cut.”
“You MBA stooges, you’re all the same!” Doughnut Guy yells around a Boston cream.
“It’s that consultant,” one lady says in a rage, pointing at me. “They ruin everything.”
A head above the crowd, McCarthy is smug as he watches the carnage. He raises an eyebrow in my direction.
I give him a pleading look.
He finally has mercy on me.
“No one”—he grabs the microphone—“has to return to the office if they don’t want to.
You know how I run my company. I let people work how they want to work and when they want to work.
I don’t need my employees to stroke my ego.
I need them to be productive. And I give bonuses instead of buying a bunch of plants that are going to die.
We are not family. We are a team. You are paid to be here. I trust that you can act like adults.”
His employees nod.
“David.” He addresses the rude doughnut guy. “You like to work seventy-two hours then crash.”
“That—”
McCarthy shushes me.
“Carla, you like to come in early and leave at lunchtime.”
“I have a parrot.”
“You see? I’m here to make sure that you all have the working environment you need to be successful and use all of your brainpower.
And I’ll go to bat for you. My philosophy is that the CEO is a glorified manager, and a good manager is a bulldozer who clears the road so you can do your work.
And of course, no mandatory social events, or even optional ones. ”
His employees still seem suspicious, and they grumble as McCarthy hands out doughnuts and offers encouraging words, asking his employees for project updates.
“You’ll get it by the deadline we agreed upon,” Doughnut Guy snaps, taking another box then sweeping out.
“Ugh.” I slump at the table. “That did not go as planned.”
“I’ll say. I think you just tanked my stock price, Cupcake.”