CHAPTER THREE
The next morning I had to pound on Vella’s door for several minutes before I heard grumbling on the other side.
“We’re going to be late!” I told her.
“I’m going to scream into my pillow for six minutes and then I’ll get ready,” she yelled back.
Or at least that’s what I thought she said. I couldn’t be sure. “Scream later, get ready now. I’ll feed you if you do.”
I went into the kitchen and made her some turkey bacon and eggs. She stumbled into the room, her eyes barely open, and mumbled, “What’s this?”
“Breakfast. I know you may not have much familiarity with it, given that you’re normally asleep when it happens, but it is known as the most important meal of the day.”
She collapsed onto a chair. “The most important meal of the day is the one you eat before you go out for the night so you don’t get too drunk.” I laughed and she began devouring her food, like she was a grizzly bear and I’d just served her up a heaping pile of fresh salmon.
After she finished eating, I managed to corral her into the bathroom, reminding her about the time situation and ignoring her protests that nothing should happen this early in the day.
Despite her complaints, it took her only about ten minutes to get out the door. I was impressed, but then she complained the entire walk to the office. “Don’t we have public transit for a reason?”
“I’d rather not get my neck licked today,” I told her. “Plus, walking is good for you and it’s actually faster.” I’d timed it just to be sure.
“People always say things are good for you when they want you to do something terrible and unfun,” she said, and I couldn’t disagree, given that it was partly true.
We arrived at the office and I took her to HR, where they had her start her paperwork. I hurried to the kitchen to make Adrian’s favorite green smoothie. I’d just put it on his desk when he came into the office.
“Good morning, doll!” he said to me with a big grin.
My heart fluttered in my chest. Whenever Adrian was in a particularly good mood, he would call me doll . While part of me knew I should object on behalf of womankind—it was a bit demeaning for him to call me a term that Don Draper of Mad Men might have used—I did like that Adrian had a pet name for me. It was something personal that we shared.
“Nice shoes,” he said, glancing at my feet.
I was wearing flats. I always wore flats to the office. Because I was 5'10" and Adrian said he was six feet tall but seemed to be the same height as me. When I’d started at Elevated, I’d always worn high heels and I’d towered over him. He’d made a couple of comments about how tall I was, and so I had quickly stopped wearing them.
Which was a shame because I had high arches and had always found heels much more comfortable.
“Thank you. Your agenda is on your computer, and you have a follow-up meeting with the head of events from Origin Telecom this morning. She wants to go over a couple of last-minute details.”
When Adrian looked at me with concern, I smiled back at him, knowing why he looked worried. I added, “I’ve already set up the program on your computer to record the entire meeting, and I’ll give her a call later on today with answers that you might not have.”
Answers he won’t have because he didn’t do any of the work, a voice said inside me, but I ignored it.
“What would I do without you?” he asked, again giving me that approving smile that felt like the sun beaming directly onto my face.
There was a short coughing sound behind us and I tried hard to not let my face fall.
It was Colette, Adrian’s girlfriend.
“Hello, Colette,” I said.
She smiled at me, her mouth full of perfect, gleaming white teeth. “Everly! You look gorgeous! How are you?”
It would be so much easier to dislike her if she weren’t such a fantastically sweet person. I couldn’t help but like her, though. She was also gorgeous—her blonde hair wasn’t mostly brown and was probably her actual hair color. She had dark green eyes and looked like a little girl had wished for her Barbie to come to life. Colette was so tiny that she made me feel overly aware of my height and general awkwardness. She seemed to glide more than walk.
Today she had her little fluffy white dog, Bijoux, in her designer handbag. I had so many questions about purse dogs. How often did they relieve themselves and ruin the bags? Was that why purse-dog women had so many different handbags? Did the dogs get bored? Were they happy with the arrangement, or did they just put up with it to get treats later?
The thing I wondered most, though, was why I wasn’t allowed to pet Bijoux. Adrian had mentioned something about an anxiety disorder once, but I loved animals and it was a struggle every time to not pet Bijoux.
Plus, every time I saw Bijoux, it made me miss my dog back home, Princess. Even though she was ten years old, she still had the energy and mischievousness of a new puppy.
And as much as I missed my mom and my grandma, it might have been a tiny bit harder for me to leave Princess behind.
Then I remembered that Colette had asked me a question. “I’m good! How was Paris?”
She split her time between New York and Paris, where she’d grown up. “Paris is Paris, wonderful as always. You should come and visit! You could stay with me.”
Yes, that was absolutely the first thing I would do when I saved up enough money to travel. Fly to Paris to stay with my boss’s girlfriend, who had no idea that I’d been harboring a secret crush on her boyfriend for years.
Because that wouldn’t be at all awkward.
“It’s on my list,” I told her. I’d much rather take a trip to Monterra, but there was no way I’d be able to afford that anytime soon, either.
“Thank you for the flowers,” she said to me with a twinkle in her eye.
“Hey, I sent you those flowers!” Adrian protested.
She glided over to him and wrapped her arms around his waist, kissing him on the cheek. “I know you paid for it, but I also know that Everly picked them out and made all the arrangements.”
She was better at standing up for me than I was for myself. Maybe I could learn something from her.
Adrian turned to capture her lips in a kiss, and I felt extremely awkward. I snuck out, closing his door behind me. I went to HR and found Vella had finished up her paperwork. To the manager’s great relief, I offered to train Vella and show her how the phones worked at reception.
“I know how phones work,” she said dryly as we went down the hallway.
“Yes, it’s not really a difficult skill to master,” I responded.
She tugged on my arm and pulled me to a stop. “Are you okay? Your eyes are a bit glassy and frenzied-looking. Like that time when you didn’t sleep for two days straight because you had too much to do and I found you eating honey by the spoonful.”
I didn’t even remember that happening. While Vella might have been a lot of things, she did not lie, so I believed that I had weirdly eaten honey because I hadn’t had enough sleep. Weirdly enough, I didn’t even like honey.
We arrived at her desk and she took a seat, adjusting the chair to the right height.
“How about I take you out to lunch to celebrate your first day and I’ll tell you all about what’s going on with me and why I look like I just ate spoonfuls of honey?” I offered.
“Okay.” She drew the A sound out, like she was annoyed I wasn’t telling her immediately and intended to pull every detail out of me later. It always amazed me how much she could convey with a single syllable.
“Hang on,” I said, and sent a quick text to Adrian reminding him of his meeting.
“Who are you texting?” she demanded as I put my phone down. When I didn’t answer, she easily guessed. “Adrian? About that meeting? You know, he is a big boy and he can remember his own meetings. He can even set his own alarms on his phone. You shouldn’t have to text him like he’s an infant.”
“Who texts an infant?” I asked.
She just sighed loudly and waved her hand at me, like she was dismissing the entire situation. “Never mind. Show me how this phone thing works. I’m assuming it rings and then I pick it up and put it to my ear and speak.”
It was a good thing she didn’t have an immediate supervisor, or else her grade A sarcasm would probably ensure that her first day was also her last.
I spent the morning checking up on Adrian, reminding him about what was next on his agenda, and showing Vella the ropes. She managed to keep her sarcastic comments about my boss to just four, which I took as a good sign.
She also got to attend her first department-wide meeting, where the expectation was that she would take notes. I could tell how bored she was, given the comical faces of distress and exasperation she kept making, and I had a hard time not laughing.
At one point she texted me, This meeting is sucking my will to live.
Stay strong , I texted back.
How do you do this every day?
Mostly caffeine and a love for my job, but I knew she didn’t want to hear that. I just shook my head at her and went back to listening to Claudia talk about new possible clients. She made deliberate eye contact with me, and I glanced over at Adrian. I was going to have to ask him. Claudia would absolutely check up on whether or not I had done it.
At lunchtime I knew that Adrian had plans to take Colette out, so that freed me up to actually go out somewhere to eat instead of having lunch at my desk. I took Vella to a little bistro around the corner that I’d had cater many meetings at work.
The manager greeted me by name. “Everly! I’m so happy you joined us. I’ve saved the best table for you.”
“Thank you, Joe.”
“How do you do that?” Vella asked, actually sounding impressed. “How do you know everybody in New York?”
“I have a lot of contacts,” I said, picking up my menu.
“You like everybody.” She said it accusingly, like it was a bad thing. “It must be exhausting being you.”
I did like everybody. “Only sometimes. How’s your first day going so far?”
“Other than that torture method you called a meeting? Pretty good.”
I laughed. “It wasn’t that bad.”
She made a face at me. “Not that bad? My mother once told me after I got my first tattoo that I’d never be able to work in an office because tattoos weren’t professional, but she was so mistaken. If anything, they should show potential employers that I have the ability to stay still for long periods of time while sharp needles prick my skin over and over, because that’s what that meeting felt like.”
I laughed again and thanked the waiter who brought us over some glasses of water.
“Spill,” Vella said when he’d left. “What’s going on with you?”
I filled her in on everything that had happened last night with Claudia, but I left out how Colette’s showing up this morning was probably what had made me appear a bit off. Because I already knew how my best friend felt about my crush.
When I finished, she nodded. “Okay, here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to stop waiting for that spine donor and tell Adrian you want to pitch. Today. When we get back from lunch. If you put it off, you’ll never do it.”
She was right. I couldn’t wait. The new-client meeting was tomorrow. I was running out of time.
“I’ll do it,” I said, determined.
If I wanted things to change in my life, I was going to have to be the one to take that first giant leap forward.
No matter how scary it was.