CHAPTER 2 #2
A jolt of dread speared through me. The presentation. I’d almost managed to forget that part of my day, to bury it under everything else. But Meg, in her usual uncanny fashion, knew exactly when to land a gut punch when you thought you had one last breath to take. It hit harder than it should’ve.
“I completely bombed it.”
“Completely?” my friend asked, aghast confusion in her tone, her eyes widening. “But I don’t understand—you had it down. Your pitch was perfect on the phone last night. I’m a hard sell, and even I was convinced Skoll Corp was worth going into business with.”
“I wasn’t nervous with you. I woke up late and…
and it was a disaster from the beginning!
Nothing went right. And Erik…” The memory of his cigarette smoke returned to me, and I thought I would be sick.
Saliva flooded my mouth, and I took a hasty sip of cool water from my glass before pressing it against my cheek.
“Let’s just say he wasn’t happy. I have to take off a full week.
Who knows if I’ll even have a job when I go back. ”
“Wait, what?” Megan said, spreading her hands in front of her to stop me. “You’re actually off for a week?”
“Eldritch strongly suggested it,” I said, my lips lifting at the corners in a humorless smile.
My head dropped into my hands and I pressed the heel of my palms to my eyes.
“A workplace injury is a company liability. HR’s words.
They put me on a leave of absence. Apparently there was a big fight about it between Eldritch and Erik. Lots of people heard it.”
I could only imagine what had been said. To be a fly on that wall.
“But that’s great!” my best friend said as I raised my head again. “Finally, you get time off. So, why aren’t you happy?”
“Because it’ll only be worse when I get back,” I argued, my vision bleary when I looked over at her, scowling.
“People call me at all hours of the day and night. You know this. Emails pile up. Meetings have to be rearranged, schedules need to be accommodated like one big jigsaw puzzle. And whenever Accounting or Acquisitions or Public Relations have an issue, who do you think they call? Me. Not Erik. I’m the little messenger to the big bad wolf, like a sacrificial lamb for slaughter because no one else wants to deal with him. And so it all falls on me!”
I took in a deep breath, already feeling my blood pressure rising.
“I hope it is worse when you get back…because you can do his job, but he can’t do yours.
It’ll show them how much they need you,” Meg grumbled, her manicured hand smoothing down my spine.
“Deep breaths. You just got out of the hospital, not the frontlines of a war—though with Erik, I get the confusion.”
I exhaled slowly. I didn’t feel any better, only defeated. “I’m done. I’m sorry.”
“You’re allowed a pity party. Gods know I’ve thrown myself more than a few—and not exactly in secret either.” She gave me a look. “You’ve always been there for me, and that’s why I’m here for you.”
“I’m sorry…I know I’ve been distracted lately.”
“Respectfully, Bee, you’ve been distracted for the last year now. Ever since Erik took over, I’ve watched you slowly wilt. Where’s the girl I used to know? I get that it’s hard to be alone and you miss your grandmother. But we’re all we have right now…and I don’t want to lose you,” she murmured.
A sharp pain zinged in my chest, my eyes flickering to the bookshelf, at the gold foil on the spines of the books.
Meg believed I had, quote, “super-unhealthy guilt” about my grandmother’s death…
and she was probably right. She wanted me to go to therapy, had even booked me into appointments with a Dr. Gene Weismann that I’d ended up later canceling.
She continued, “But this can’t go on. This job is literally killing you, and I can’t bear to watch it anymore.”
This talk again. I didn’t need to hear it tonight.
“It wasn’t always so bad,” I argued, slouching down. “And it’ll get better. It’s just right now, with the Vulcan partnership…”
“It wasn’t so bad when Eldritch was in charge,” Meg corrected. “But he’s not anymore, and things are going to get worse, not better. I know you’re tired of hearing me say this, but you need to consider quitting this time. Seriously.”
“Megan…no,” I sighed, a snap of irritation roiling my belly. She didn’t understand.
“Did you ever think that maybe all of this is happening for a reason?” Megan asked, eyes narrowed like she was reading my fate in the creases of my exhausted expression.
“Like the universe, or whatever you believe in, is nudging you onto a different path. A better one. One where you’re not collapsing in boardrooms and ending up in hospitals.
” She softened and continued with, “You could do anything, Bee. Just…move forward. For you.
“Take a temp job. Come work for us. I’ll ask Father—you know he adores you, like you’re one of his own. It’ll cover things until you figure it out.” Then, with a sheepish smile, she added, “I’d just give you the money, but I know how much you hate feeling like a charity case.”
That was easy for her to suggest. Megan Banks had never wanted for anything in her life. Anything and everything she wanted, she got. People fell over themselves, scrambling to open doors for her. She was like a princess in Willowmere, the affluent district in the heights of Graymore.
“And just give up the eight years I have with Skoll?” I asked, my tone sounding hollow. “No. Just another two and I’m at my ten years. Erik promised me a promotion, and that will fix all of this. I can’t give up now. Not when I’m almost there. I don’t want to be stuck here forever.”
“You know what promises are when they’re never fulfilled?” Megan asked, her violet eyes stripping me down to bone. “Lies.”
That last word echoed between us. I could never hide anything from her.
“I can’t quit, Meg,” I said quietly. “I just can’t.”
“You can. You just won’t,” Meg corrected. “Maybe someday you’ll see that.”
She was never one to give up. I’d been fighting with her about my job ever since that night a year ago, shortly after Erik had been appointed CEO, when she’d found me hysterically bawling on the couch after an awful day at work.
Erik had humiliated me in front of the entire office floor that day.
And that had been before my grandma had passed.
I peered around my dim living room. The TV was off, and I could see the string of glowing fairy lights in its black reflection.
“So much for our celebration,” I said, not wanting to talk about it anymore.