13. Jenna
JENNA
I ’m a more hungover and less confident Jenna when I finally drag myself into the office the next day.
The excessive alcohol consumption and the extremely loud ticking of my biological clock are giving me a pounding headache.
Chugging water doesn’t help. Neither does reliving the death of the dream of my happily ever after. Was I too hasty? Maybe I should give Nathan another chance.
But not Andreas.
Or… him .
I don’t know what possesses me to answer the phone when he calls. And no, it’s not McCarthy. Hannah is delusional—he doesn’t want me at all.
“Hi, Brock…”
Maybe I just want the familiarity of my old ex. Yes, he’s an asshole, but better the asshole you know and trust, right?
“You need to pick up when I call you.”
“I am not your girlfriend. I don’t have to do anything.” I lean over to hiss into the phone. “You pretended to be dead to prank me.”
“I had to! My video views were tanking, and now look at me,” Brock crows. “That was my best-performing skit ever! I’m in talks with a production company.”
“Great. Good for you. All your dreams come true. Not sure why you’re blowing up my phone.”
“You have to be a part of it.”
An incredulous laugh escapes my mouth. “I’m busy. I have a real job and a relationship.” My stomach churns.
“You owe me!” Brock screams into the phone.
I fight to keep from getting sucked back into that same emotional headspace where I would do anything and everything to just try to make him calm, to keep him happy.
Brock can’t hurt me, I remind myself.
“You left me. You ruined my company, and you left me,” Brock rages.
“You can’t expect someone to do free labor indefinitely,” I argue.
“You’re lucky I let you work for me. Shoot, I have to do all of it anyway, going behind you, cleaning up your mistakes.”
A few years ago, I would be falling all over myself to tell him I messed up but would do better.
Not my circus anymore.
“You weren’t paying me; I was working eighteen-hour days for nothing, so what did you expect?”
“I know, Jenna. I’m sorry.” That whining tone. Ugh.
“I need you, Jenna; I can’t do this without you. You know that you’re the brains of the operation. ”
The whiplash is exhausting.
“Come back, Jenna. I love you. You need me. I know you’re failing at your job; I know your boyfriend wants to dump you.”
He’s just playing on your insecurities, I try to remind myself.
But the verbal blows land.
“I thought you cared about me. I always thought you were a maternal woman, that you liked to care for people. You did all those things because you loved me, you said. You wanted to help me achieve my dreams. You said you wanted what’s best for me.
Did you lie? Was our whole relationship a lie?
Were you just using me?” His tone is accusatory.
“ You were using me .”
Hannah is coming over to my desk.
“I was taking care of you; I gave you everything you wanted.”
“No you didn’t—” I clamp my mouth shut. “I’m not arguing with you anymore.”
“Come back to L.A.” He’s begging now. “We were good together.”
“Are you serious right now?” Hannah hisses. She recognizes Brock’s voice, and she is not happy.
“Sorry, got to go.” I hang up on Brock.
“I was going to tell you the meeting leftovers are out, and now I hear you about to get back together with your ex who owes you money and faked his own funeral.” Hannah glares.
“I’m not.” I follow her to the break room.
“Jenna, grow a pair.”
“I just—I can’t really afford my own place. I need a man so I have a roof over my head.”
Hannah snaps a pair of tongs at me. “I’m not even about to unravel that mess of a self-esteem knot.”
One of the teams had a big buffet spread for a lunch meeting, and I scrape the last of the risotto onto a plate.
“I’m never going to have a real family—you know, with a loving husband and beautiful children.”
Hannah nods to my phone, which has lit up in my hand.
“There’s one guy who seems very interested in you.”
“ McCarthy. ” I send it to voicemail.
“Isn’t he your client?”
“He’s not calling about that.”
Hannah’s eyes bug out.
“He’s not calling about that either.”
“Oh my gosh, are you having an affair with him? Is that why his photos that you posted look so yummy? The way he was looking at you? Squirt!”
“Shh! Leftovers bring out everyone in the office. Anyway, that’s not what’s happening.”
I stop and sniff suddenly. There is the oily smell of stretch-mark lotion as the crowd parts for Bethany. Plate in hand, I scurry off, praying she didn’t see me—or worse, hear Hannah.
The email comes when I’m enjoying a massive raspberry chocolate swirl cookie from Arty’s afternoon meeting. It’s a calendar invite with Bethany’s office noted as the location.
Wobbly in my high heels, I brush the crumbs off my face and dress and make a slow procession toward her office. Outside, thunder crashes; the sky’s gone dark.
Bethany shakes prenatal vitamins into her hand as I enter and hover by the door .
“Why are you standing there? Sit down.”
Up on her computer screen is the post I made yesterday, with the thousands of comments.
Am I getting kudos from Bethany finally?
“The CEO sent me a message earlier.” She’s picking through the prenatal vitamins in her hand like she’s sorting through a pile of moldy corn. “Apparently, Mr. Svensson called him to praise a certain Instagram post.”
On her screen loops the video of McCarthy chatting with Granny Mavis then briefly looking at me through the camera.
“Imagine how shocked I was when I found out you took our biggest, most important client to your parents’ house.”
“It’s not ‘parents’.’ Technically, it’s my mom’s house. Zephyr just lives there…”
“You are using this company’s reputation for your own gain, Jenna. You’re engaging in the same manipulative, sexually charged behavior that you did with your last client.”
“I’m not trying to have an affair with McCarthy.” I choke out the words. “He’s a nightmare.”
I bite my tongue before I can give Bethany an excuse to fire me right then and there.
Now that my relationship with Nathan has been thrown in a dumpster and set on fire, I really can’t afford to lose my job.
I swallow the bitter resentment in my throat at my job, at Nathan, and especially at McCarthy for not cooperating with the original plan.
I straighten my shoulders. “I’m sorry, Bethany. I had a lapse in judgment. It won’t happen again.”
Bethany gives me a sour look like she wants me to give her an excuse to fire me. “I don’t want another disaster from you. No more dementia-riddled family members fraternizing with our clients. You’re on thin ice, Jenna. Oh, and Jenna? Clean up your desk. It’s a pigsty.”
“My desk isn’t that messy,” I mutter to Truman as I stack the papers I’m using to plot out the revised ten-step plan. “My desk looks like someone is actually working on real work and not micromanaging other people.”
“That is a very flattering blouse. Where’d you buy it?”
I whirl around.
Truman growls as Bethany’s husband approaches, blocking me in the aisle of desks.
“I’m thinking about buying Bethany a blouse like that.” Stu licks his lips.
I grab the collar of the blouse and hold it closed. I can’t actually button the top two buttons because, you know, the stress eating—what with my job, my crazy family, and my relationship, which, now that I think about it, did have warning signs.
Bethany’s husband isn’t hiding his obvious interest in me.
“Jenna’s such a pretty name.”
“Yep.”
He’s not taking the hint.
“Heard you had a little trouble with my wife.”
“Just work stuff.”
That slimy tongue pokes out to wet his lips.
“We could meet up for a drink sometime, and I could…” He stretches out a hand to rest it on my shoulder. “I could help convince her to be in your corner. Give you a break now and then. I have a certain, shall we say, fatherly affection for you, Jenna.”
Gross, gross, gross.
“ Jenna. ”
At her office door, Bethany’s vibrating with fury. Her eyes dart from me to the hand on my shoulder to her husband.
“I—”
Her husband leans in to give me a kiss on the cheek. It comes too fast for me to step back.
“You just have to humor her,” he tells me with a chuckle. “She likes to bite my head off too.”
Bethany looks like she’s going to chop my head off.
“Get. Out.”
“But it’s only—”
“Out!”
“Now, don’t be like that, pumpkin.”
Bethany slaps her husband’s hand away as I grab my things, stuff Truman into his bag, and dart to the elevator.
Truman yelps as I race outside and a big fat raindrop lands on his nose.
“Don’t freak out. We’ll be home soon.”
Home…
Except it’s earlier than I’d normally go home. Nathan is there with his affair partner. I know he is.
I’m not going back up to that office, even if I did leave my umbrella there.
Also, my phone keeps going off, every little vibration, every noise, every sharp ring making me clench my teeth. Is it Brock? Is it Andreas?
I finally answer it.
“ What? ”
“You’re avoiding me.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Then I guess you’ll have no problem coming into my office.”
It’s two buses to make it to the RDC offices, all in the pouring rain.
By the time I limp inside, my clothes are plastered to my skin, my feet squelch in my heels, and my hair is a rat’s nest. Truman is the only one of us who’s dry because he hid in his tote bag the entire journey.
The office is dead when I drip to the bathroom to blot myself with paper towels. I twist my engagement ring back onto my finger and duck under the hand dryer.
The only sound other than my phone, which goes off every ten seconds, is the annoying lick, lick noise Truman makes as he cleans his paws.
McCarthy’s watching me when I walk into his office. He studies every inch of my soaking-wet body intently, like I’m a brand-new product delivered fresh from the factory floor, all for him to light on fire and explode.
Feeling raw, I clutch my bag to my chest.
His eyes immediately track the engagement ring as I set out my revised ten-step plan.
Truman hops up on the CEO’s desk like he owns it and surveys the room.
McCarthy shoves my papers aside so they spill on the floor. He scoots Truman over a little more gently then sits on the edge of his desk.
“Did you figure out who he’s cheating on you with yet? Do I need to buy you more self-help books?” He’s infuriating, and he knows it.
I twist the engagement ring on my finger. “Nathan’s not cheating.” I kneel down to grab the papers so I don’t look up at McCarthy. “You were wrong.” My teeth are clenched so hard they’re going to be driven into my skull. It would hurt less than Nathan’s betrayal .
McCarthy can’t know.
I don’t want him to see me cry.
“We’re in love.”
“He can’t love you that much if he isn’t giving you a baby.”
Does he know?
Of course not. He can’t know.
“I bet you don’t even have a real wedding date set.”
He’s just fishing.
I finally have my defenses strong enough to meet his eyes.
“We are here to talk about your reputation.”
“Yes.” He reaches for the papers in my hands.
“My ten-step plan. I’m excited about these girlfriends…
Where’s my shopping list? Or are you going to parade them all in?
Or…” He runs the tip of his thumb under his lower lip.
“Or is this some desperate ploy to get me to fall in love with you and rescue you from Nathan and the rest of the ex-fiancé brigade?”
“We are very happy together,” I say with a croak.
“You don’t look happy, Cupcake.” He reaches over, and his fingers lightly brush my cheek. “Is that a tear I see? Tell me what you saw last night,” he whispers like a curse.
I don’t even blink. “I’m glad to see you’re excited about complying with the ten-step plan.”
McCarthy leans back. “Maybe I’ll fall in love with my fake girlfriend.
Isn’t that how it usually goes? You seem like someone who reads those ridiculous romance novels, so correct me if I’m wrong.
Maybe I’ll fall in love with her, ask her to marry me, give her the baby she’s always wanted.
Of course, my child will be better-looking than anything Nathan’s able to scrape up. ”
He does not know.
“I don’t know why you’re so obsessed.”
“Because I want to crush you.”