Chapter 55
“Thank you for attending my first board meeting,” I open and scroll to the next slide. I’ve spent the last eight hours working through Gideon’s guided prompts and timeline, thinking about the pros and cons of this problem, and I am ready for his input.
“You made a real presentation?” G asks, raising his eyebrows, impressed, draping his arm over the top of the couch. He is too casually sexy in his loungewear.
“I never turn down an opportunity to make a deck.” I wink. “We’re going to talk about the pros and cons of hiring full-time team members versus a flexible contractor model.”
“Avoid hiring employees as long as you can,” Gideon immediately responds.
“We will take questions and comments after the presentation,” I chide. He laughs and sips his neat bourbon.
Slide after slide, I make both arguments. One for hiring two full-time team members and another for hiring six part-time freelancers, all specializing in different types of work. They will cost my business the same amount of money each month.
“The floor is open for questions and comments,” I end.
“What is your gut telling you?” he asks.
“After saying it aloud, I’m honestly more confused about the right decision than before.”
“Welcome to my life.” He pats the cushion next to him. I take a seat and pick up my glass of red wine for a long sip. “The best part is this is your business. You can do whatever you want, and you can change your mind.”
“I just don’t know if this is what I want. To scale and build a full-on agency.”
“To your immediate question of full-time versus contractor …” He grabs for my hand, intertwining our fingers.
“I swear I’ve lost years of my life dealing with HR and insurance.
” He pulls up our knotted hands and kisses my knuckles.
“So, my two cents is to avoid full-time employees as long as you can, or until you find someone that is so perfect for your team, it’s worth all the headaches. ”
He kisses my cheek. “Now, close your eyes.”
I laugh but comply.
“Tell me what your life looks like in ten years. Everything about it. Where do you live? What car do you have? Rapid fire.”
In ten years, I’m thirty-seven, Gideon’s age. “I’m in a nice house, I have kids …” Multiple kids? I’ve never envisioned multiple kids before.
“Stop thinking,” he scolds. “Tell me about your life.”
“I feel content. Work really isn’t coming up for me.”
I open my eyes, and Gideon nods silently. “With what you said, what feels right about the direction of your business?”
“Right now, I don’t want to scale … I want to optimize, rethink scopes, do the work I enjoy, and stop doing the other stuff.”
“Good. That’s what you’ll spend tomorrow diving into.”
The juxtaposition of business advice is something I can’t quiet in my mind. Adam was always focused on growth, and G wants me to do what is best for me.
“For full transparency, when I think about my future …” he starts, then pauses, looking at me with hesitancy. “When I do that type of exercise, Real-ity overwhelms my thoughts, then a wife and having a nice home life. Kids never come up.”
“I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about kids over the last few months so I think that’s why it was so top of mind for me,” I deflect.
He squeezes my hand. “I want you to hear me when I say I’m never having kids.”
“I hear you,” I say, knowing I don’t want them right now. It’s too soon to say if this is a deal-breaker for us.
Dinner arrives from a well-known Italian restaurant in River North. Opening the cabinet doors, I look for dishware and am reminded again of how sterile-looking everything is here. Even the dish and glassware are so modern and simple and unlike Gideon’s taste.
“I want to know about your ex. When did you break up?” I ask as he plates the food from the containers.
“Light dinner conversation,” he teases, and I smile big.
“I’m your girlfriend now. I need to know these things.” I swat his arm playfully.
“Over a year ago.”
“How come you didn’t redecorate?”
“I barely have the time to see you, let alone redecorate.”
“So, keeping the place as is isn’t a daily reminder of her?”
“If it had any personality, it might be different.”
“Rude.” I laugh, and he winks at me.
“I’ve thought about selling the condo, but finding a new place that I like will also take more bandwidth than I have. It’s fine for now.”
Fine for now, I internally repeat. I don’t know … I think I would have to find a new place. Like how I had to get my own apartment after Adam. “I’m happy you’re finally letting me stay here.”
“I wasn’t trying to make it a whole thing. I have this hunch that if you started staying here, I wouldn’t make it to work on time … or at all.”
I giggle, considering how Adam and I were rushing to play house; Gideon is the exact opposite. I don’t need to be playing house.
“Do you want more wine?” G asks, and I nod. He opens a new bottle. “It’s a Chianti Classico.”
“Very on-brand for our Italian dinner.” I wrap my arms around his waist as he opens the bottle. “So, why did you and your ex break up?”
He’s awkwardly quiet for a moment, pouring two glasses.
“Honesty and transparency,” he says, handing me a glass.
“I’m not always going to be available.” He takes a sip of his wine.
“You’ve already seen how I have limited free time.
That’s the biggest downfall of being with me. You have to be comfortable with that.”
“The biggest?” I tease.
It doesn’t feel like Adam—that he becomes all consumed by work. He finds time to text me and to see me. I know I’m a priority. Gideon shows that. He isn’t going to try to apologize with gifts, or at least that’s not the vibe I get from him.
Time will also tell how big of an issue Gideon not wanting kids is, but I like our relationship. I like how hard-working he is and that he is a man on a mission in everything in life.
Taking our seats at the dining room table, we fill our plates.
“We were engaged,” he starts, picking up the conversation.
“She … well, I was barely around. I was so focused on growing Real-ity. From the time we met to when we were engaged, the company grew an unimaginable amount, and I didn’t give our relationship the attention it deserved. ”
Stuffing the spaghetti in my mouth, I think how similar that is to Adam and his ex, but they also had the infertility element. I wonder if Gideon’s ex also really wanted kids.
He lightly traces his finger on my thigh, continuing.
“It would be easy for me to tell you that she was the issue and had an emotional affair with a guy she had dated in college.” He pauses, running his hand through his black hair.
“I let our relationship go on autopilot, and then I barely checked in on it … That relationship is my biggest failure in life.”
Is he not over her? My mind races, and I ask, “You guys couldn’t work through all of that?”
“There were other things … She’s Muslim. It was a lot for our families. They didn’t approve, and her parents were more polite about it, but it was a constant strain on our relationship.”
I think back to his religion being a deal-breaker comment from our second date, and now I understand more.
“My parents have always been opinionated, but how they handled my relationship—I had to take a break from them.”
“So, does that mean they won’t like me too?”
“Of course, they dream of me ending up with a nice Jewish girl. But I don’t give a fuck what they think.”
While I barely talk to my parents and don’t have much of a relationship with them, I still care what they think.