Chapter 8 – Anna
EIGHT
ANNA
He was different from other men. He was more.
Monday
“And here you go,” I said, walking into E.G.’s office promptly at nine.
It would not be hyperbolic to say this was the best part of my day. It would probably actually be fair to say that I loved this part of the day.
Over the past few months of working together, we’d established we both liked separate time in the morning to settle in.
He was always in before me and would open the office, which I was fine with.
It gave me time to suck down my second cup of coffee of the morning and properly prepare for our first confrontation.
I couldn’t say that E.G. was much of a talker during this time. Or at any time during the day, really. But he was intense. Never someone I wanted to deal with when I was not mentally fully on my game.
I could tell if he was having a good day or a bad day, just by a single crease above the bridge of his nose. I knew if I should hold back a few updates or plow forward with the deluge of people who wanted to reach out and just get five minutes of his time.
If I gave it to everyone who wanted five minutes of E.G.’s time, the day would need to be sixty hours long.
During this first part of the morning, though, it was just the two of us. Our routine with no interruption.
Until I was ready to disrupt. I paused for a second in the doorway leading into his office. He was wearing a lightweight long-sleeved shirt despite the brutal humidity outside in July. I wondered if maybe the AC was up too high for him and made a note to check the thermostat.
He wore khakis today, but sometimes he wore jeans. I never did. As limited as my new wardrobe was, it was definitely more business oriented than his was. As the first face people saw of his operation, I thought it appropriate I appear less casual.
Often, I was the face or voice of no. I found it easier to say no in a button-down polyester blend blouse.
His hair was disheveled. A mix of red and gold like leaves turning in the fall. I’d never had my hair professionally cut, styled, or colored, but I imagined the women who did would gag for his natural hair color.
I shook myself loose from the thought. I shouldn’t be thinking about his hair.
One deep breath and I was ready to hit the internal go button on our day.
“WAPO, NYT and your coffee,” I announced. He didn’t startle. Either because he sensed my presence or he was used to my routine, I wasn’t sure. “Question? How come I don’t bring you the Wall Street Journal, too?”
I’d been doing some research in general about the start-up investment industry and the Journal felt like something someone in his position would naturally read, as the paper lent itself to more financial news.
I was sorting the papers out on the credenza as he liked them. And plopped his coffee on his desk by his left hand.
After a second, he looked up from his monitors.
There were times I wondered if that was all he did every second I wasn’t in his office. Just sat there staring at dashboards on his monitors.
It wasn’t good for his eyesight.
As evidenced by the way he always rubbed his eyes like a little boy waking up from a nap anytime he looked away.
“There are several things that bother me about that statement,” he began. “One. If I wanted the Journal I would have told you so. Two. You assume I can learn something from the paper. I can’t. I know more than they do. And three. I would like to repeat number one.”
I rolled my eyes, before I could check myself.
“Habit, Flowers.”
He liked to point out any time I failed to do so. He said eye-rolling was immature.
Whatevs.
“Working on it, E.G.” I said, but I was lying. “So you know more than the whole Wall Street Journal combined? That sounds a little hyperbolic.”
“It isn’t. I have better inside sources than they do.
In fact, I have my own tentacles, if you will, inside all our major financial institutions and industries.
I read these papers simply to confirm information I usually already know.
Or sometimes, world events can trigger market changes most other people can’t predict or expect.
The Journal,” he said, with the disdain of a Frenchman eating an American donut, “doesn’t interest me. ”
Yeah. E.G. was badass. “That’s what I told Kenny,” I said, vocalizing my internal thoughts.
“Who?”
“Kenny,” I repeated. “My date on Saturday. I said I work for a really smart guy.”
His lips pursed again like the American donut was actually sour. “I’m sure Kenny was thrilled.”
I groaned. “Actually, I don’t think he was.”
“Excuse me?”
I shook off the memories, having zero desire to replay the events of Saturday night. My first, and possibly last, official date.
“You don’t want to hear about my awful date,” I told E.G.
He sat back in his office chair and stretched his hands behind his head. “No, no. Please enlighten me. Kenny was awful, was he?”
I grimaced. “Yes, no. I don’t know. I told you it was my first date. Not like our first date. I’m talking about my first date. Ever. Which, as pathetic as it sounds, I don’t feel bad about now. So awkward. Like…that’s what I missed during my high school years? Uh…okay.”
“You’re meandering.”
Another habit he often accused me of. I crossed my arms over my chest. “You asked me for the story,” I reminded him.
“I did,” he acknowledged. “Go on.”
“Anyway, I didn’t exactly know what I was doing or what I should talk about. I talked about my job. I mean that’s a thing, right? People talk about their work on dates.”
“So I’m told.”
“Anyway, I talked about you, how you’re really smart, and, well, what I do all day.”
“Kenny wasn’t impressed?”
“No,” I huffed. “He said he didn’t want to spend our date with me talking about some guy. That’s what he called you, some guy.”
“The little shit,” he said, as if he knew Kenny.
“Right? I told him, E.G. is not some guy. He’s the guy. I mean, you are. You’re my boss. You’re a significant person in my life right now. We spend like, fifty to sixty hours a week working together. Who else would I talk about?”
“Exactly,” he agreed.
I nodded, feeling somewhat justified. I wasn’t obsessed with my work, something else Kenny had accused me of, I simply liked my job. It was important to me. It was new and hard and came with all these obstacles. And E.G. was important to me.
Maybe he’s not supposed to be. Maybe I shouldn’t care about his eye strain.
“How did it end?” he asked.
I don’t know. I don’t know how this ends.
But that wasn’t what he meant. “Not well,” I admitted.
“Do tell.”
“I didn’t have anything to say after he said he didn’t want to talk about work. It’s not like I have a list of hobbies in my back pocket. Things mostly ended in awkward silence. Then we split the bill and I called an Uber.”
“You split the bill?” he asked, the corners of his mouth turning down. “So he’s a cheap little shit.”
“I offered,” I said, defending Kenny. That was actually a pretty great memory from the night. That feeling of freedom. Strength. Maybe even a little power. I didn’t owe Kenny anything for a night out. “Do you know how happy I am that I can pay for my own dinner?”
“I’m sure it’s thrilling,” he drawled. “It’s not how a proper date works. You wouldn’t know because you’ve only been on one. Apparently, with a cheap little shit.”
“Okay, just to be technical, Kenny was over six feet tall.”
“Doesn’t matter. A man asks you out, he pays for the date.”
“That’s so 20th century of you.”
“Hmm,” then he looked at me like he was reading something in my head. “He said something that bothered you, though. Beyond him just not wanting to talk about your work.”
“You don’t know that.” Except he was right. I wasn’t going to say it out loud though. It was too embarrassing.
“You wouldn’t have brought up the date at all, if it wasn’t still on your mind. And given that it was a total disaster-”
“I wouldn’t say total disaster,” I corrected him. “He didn’t get up from the table and leave. It was just uneventful.”
“Except for the thing he said to you. That has bothered you so much you had to hold it in all day Sunday, waiting until first thing Monday morning to dump it on me. Now tell me what it was.”
I scrunched up my nose. “I sort of hate you’re the only person I know in Houston.”
“I’m fairly certain, I’m the only person you know. Period. Now spill it, Flowers.”
I wasn’t going to say it. What Kenny said.
“You know, you talk about your boss so much, maybe you should date him.”
Kenny had said it was a joke, but of course I got defensive.
It was a ridiculous statement and didn’t deserve repeating. But it got into my head because it made me wonder how I sounded when I talked about E.G.
My childhood was extremely normal in many ways people wouldn’t consider, being a product of a foster home.
I was housed, fed, schooled. I had friends and jobs.
Goals and aspirations. I didn’t date, not because it was forbidden or anything like that.
Hookups and relationships happened all the time in the home.
I didn’t date because personal connections were difficult.
My childhood was as abnormal as it was normal, because I didn’t love anyone.
“Is this normal?” I asked him, pointing my finger back and forth between us. “I mean, this is a normal working relationship, right? Because this is also my first serious job, and maybe, I don’t know, I’m doing this wrong.”
“Doing what wrong?”
“I don’t know,” I said, throwing my hands up. “Caring too much about my job?”
“You’re not doing it wrong, Flowers,” he said, as if I’d insulted him.
“You’re a competent assistant. You work for a demanding sonofabitch and you do it effortlessly.
If Kenny couldn’t handle you being focused on your work, then he wasn’t a serious person and you should always avoid non-serious people. What does he do for a living?”
I thought back to what he told me. “He works for a landscaper part-time, but he’s trying to get his band off the ground. He’s a bass player.”
“A band.” The word dripped out of his mouth. “The epitome of non-serious. You didn’t do anything wrong on your date. There is nothing abnormal about what you do here. If he made you feel insecure about either, he’s an ass.”
“I appreciate that. Especially the part about being competent.”
“Fishing for compliments, Flowers?” he chided me.
Which made me laugh. E.G. didn’t do effusiveness or compliments. Besides, I didn’t need someone to tell me how I was doing. “No. I think I’m good at this.”
“Oh my God, you are so needy,” he groaned, then turned back to his monitors. “I’ve heard this about your generation.”
“Slow your roll, Grandpa. I’m not needy. But I do think I can do more.”
That caught his attention. “More?”
“I don’t want you to think I’m limited,” I confessed. “Because I didn’t go to college, that is. If you need me to learn something or do something you think might be out of my reach-”
“Why would I give you something I know is out of your reach?”
“That’s my point. I can at least try. For the unreachable…thing.”
His expression turned suspicious. “We went from talking about your awful date to you wanting more responsibility. Why do I feel like this has been a trap all along?”
“I’m not saying I want or need more,” I told him.
I didn’t know exactly where these feelings were coming from.
Just some sense that if I was going to go all in, I should go all in.
“I don’t want you to think I turned into one of those candidates who wanted to use you to teach them things or get to the next level.
Nothing like that. I guess I’m saying I want you to know how important this job is to me.
If you need me to push myself, I can. If you need me to be something besides the person who gets your coffee and manages your schedule…
I can do that. I can at least try to do that. ”
“Remind me how old you are again,” he said.
I winced. “Why does that matter?”
“It does. Tell me.”
“Twenty-three as of last Wednesday. But I’m not young in here,” I said, putting a fist on my chest. Then I realized how cheesy that must have looked and sounded and put my hand down at my side. “What I mean is…”
“I know what you mean.”
“I’ve lived,” I said. “More than a lot of people my age. And I’m adaptable.”
“Tenacious,” he muttered. “It’s what I saw in you when I hired you.
Turns out though, you might have a little ambition in there too.
Alright Flowers, you want to see if you can take on more.
Go grab a pad and pen. You can sit in on my next meeting.
Just sit there. You say nothing, you contribute nothing. You’re just there to observe.”
“Awesome. Good. Yes. Thank you.”
His eyes narrowed. “Did you plan all this? When you started talking about your awful date with Kevin?”
“Kenny,” I corrected him. “And no. It just sort of came to me while we were talking. This job is my life right now, I should make it as important as I can.”
Because it was the work that was important.
“Is this the part where I’m supposed to say a work/life balance is important to your overall health, or some shit like that? Because I won’t.”
“Ha,” I barked out a laugh. “No.”
“Why not?”
“Simple. You don’t care about that shit.”
He moved his chair closer to his desk and went back to looking at one of his two computer monitors.
“You’re correct. I don’t. We’ll need another chair for you to sit.”
“On it.”
“Don’t disappoint me, Flowers.”
“I won’t,” I said, confidently.
There was only a small, small part of me that understood how crushed I would be if I ever did.
He went back to his screens and I turned to leave.
“Oh, and Happy Birthday. The tenth you said?”
It was a made-up date. I’d been left at the hospital and someone in the administration department had filed paperwork on my behalf so I could get a birth certificate.
I nodded. “I’m not a big birthday person.”
Birthdays were for kids who had parents to celebrate them. I wasn’t wistful about the things I didn’t have, I preferred instead to focus on what was in front of me.
This job. This was the thing that mattered.