92. Chapter 92
Chapter 92
One month after the honeymoon, while Paige was sitting at her desk and finalizing a contract, the cloying scent of Chanel N°5 drifted into her office, alerting her to Linda’s presence.
“Can we talk?” Linda asked from the doorway, in her I’m annoyed to be here voice.
Looking up, Paige said, “Sure,” even though the last thing she wanted to do was talk to her boss. “What about?”
Linda came in and sat down in one of the chairs in front of Paige’s desk and crossed her legs, before smoothing out the material of her black Ralph Lauren skirt. “Your time cards.”
“My time cards? Is there a problem?”
“Yes. I’ve noticed that you’ve been clocking out early during the last several weddings, and this is a trend that concerns me.”
“It … concerns you?”
“Yes. And frankly, it can’t continue.”
Paige leaned back in her chair and gazed at Linda for a long moment. “Well, I’m sorry, but it’s going to continue, because leaving at midnight isn’t leaving ‘early’,” she said. “I stay until all the food is served, the cake is cut, and there’s nothing left but drinking and dancing. My staff is more than capable of overseeing that and then cleaning up—which is their job, as you know. Plus, on the days we have receptions, I arrive at 2 p.m. to oversee set-up, and stay until midnight, which is a ten-hour day.” She tilted her head and asked blandly, “When was the last time you worked a ten-hour day, Linda? Hell, when was the last time you worked a six-hour day, that didn’t include an hour for lunch? Go ahead, take as much time as you need to think about it.”
Linda’s lips tightened. “I have to say, I really don’t appreciate your attitude this morning—”
“It’s mid-afternoon, actually, so it would be more accurate to say you don’t appreciate my attitude ‘this afternoon’.”
Linda’s expression morphed into a mixture of extreme annoyance and uncertainty; it was clear she didn’t know how to deal with her employee right at the moment, and Paige took advantage of that, because suddenly it felt like she had a pair of brass balls.
“Was that the only problem you wanted to discuss? My supposedly clocking out ‘early’ on Saturdays? Or, was there something else, like the fact I work fifty-five hours a week on average and get paid for forty? Because that actually is a problem worth talking about.”
Linda gave her a steely-eyed glare.
“That’s what I thought,” Paige continued. “So, I don’t want to hear about how it’s not okay that I leave ‘early’ on Saturday nights. I might even start to leave ‘early’ during the week, too, since I now have a husband and a child I’d like to see more often than just on Sunday.”
“Since when do you have a child?”
“Since I got married. David has a son.”
“That doesn’t make him your child.”
Paige raised her eyebrows in disbelief at such an ignorant, shitty thing to say. “Yes, it does. End of discussion.”
“I seriously don’t like your tone—”
“I don’t like yours, either,” Paige countered, rather rudely. Then, like a spigot had been cranked all the way on, the words just kept coming. “And you know what else I don’t like? I don’t like that you rarely come in before 10 a.m. and always leave in time to beat rush-hour traffic. I don’t like you getting the best parking spot and I don’t care if it’s because you own this place. You don’t act like you own it, and I really don’t like that.” She looked Linda over with a critical eye. “And I also don’t like your ugly, overpriced blouse.”
Linda’s cheeks were flushed with anger, likely from the dig at what she was wearing. “That’s enough. You’ve given me no choice but to document this conversation, along with your unacceptable attitude, in your personnel file—”
“Go ahead, Linda. Document away. To be honest, I don’t care what you do, because I had to get up today at the ass-crack of dawn to be here by 6 a.m., which meant having to forgo really good, morning sex. That aggravated not only me, but my husband, too.”
For a moment, Paige thought about all the sacrifices she’d made over the past several years for her job and how they’d bettered Linda’s life, at the expense of Paige’s. And suddenly, she was remembering the conversation she’d had with David months ago, about her job interfering with her life, and what she would choose if a decision needed to be made between her job and her life.
She’d told him she would choose her life … so that’s what she was going to do. Right now. “You know what? I’m done.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I’m done working for you,” Paige clarified, as if speaking to a child. “I quit.”
Linda blinked at her in shock. “What?”
“Oh, I think you heard me. But just in case you really didn’t, let me repeat myself: I. Quit.”
“You can’t quit.”
“Yes, I can, actually. Consider this my two weeks’ notice.”
Linda’s face actually blanched at that.
Paige decided to make Linda’s day even worse. “And I mean two weeks at forty hours per week, not fifty or sixty, which means you’ll have to make up the difference, starting today. I got here at 6 a.m., so I think I’ll be leaving at 3 p.m., which is in about—” she quickly checked the clock on the wall, “—one hour. So you’ll have to take care of the dinner function tonight for the Chamber of Commerce. And you should know they like to talk a lot and linger long after dinner’s over.” At Linda’s look of dismay, Paige told her, “It’ll be good practice for you, which, God knows, you really need, especially with wedding receptions scheduled every Saturday night for the next six months.”
Linda made a choking sound. “Paige, I’m begging you. Please—”
“Take your begging and your ‘please’ and shove them up your lazy, entitled ass. You’re lucky I’m giving you two weeks’ notice, and not just walking out the door right now.” She shook her head in disgust. “You know, if you hadn’t given me so much shit about the time I took off for my honeymoon, I might be giving you more than two weeks’ notice, but you did give me shit, so I’m not. Actions have consequences, Linda, and sometimes the peasants rise up.” Paige’s expression turned flat. “Oh, and you know what else? Last year, when I asked for a raise because I fucking deserved it? You should’ve given it to me.”
“I’ll give it to you now,” Linda said quickly. “How does … five percent sound?”
“It sounds insulting as hell.”
“Ten percent, then—”
“Shut-up. There’s no amount of money you could throw at me to make me stay. I’m beyond done here.”
“You can’t do this.”
“Just watch me.” Paige turned to her computer and pulled up a new Word document and began typing.
“Damn it, Paige. It’s going to take me weeks to find a replacement!”
Paige knew it would probably take way longer than that, but said, instead, “You better hope not. Because until you do, you’re going to be putting in a lot of extra hours, especially on Saturdays.”
Done typing, Paige hit print and a few seconds later she was signing her new, married name on the bottom with a flourish. Then, with supreme satisfaction, she handed Linda the simply worded document. “Here’s my official letter of resignation for my personnel file. You should probably post my job immediately … and maybe leave out the part about brutally long hours, crap pay, and a boss who doesn’t do shit when she bothers to come into the office, other than complain to her employees who work harder than she does, that they’re not working hard enough—and that they leave ‘early’ on Saturday nights,” Paige finished with a heavy layer of venom.
Looking like she was on the verge of having a stroke, and avoiding all eye contact with Paige, Linda got to her feet and walked to the door, noticeably unsteady.
“One last thing,” Paige said to Linda’s back. “I promised my friend, Jules, that when I finally did quit my job, I’d tell you to fuck off twice. So, fuck off. And then fuck off again.”
After Linda left, Paige took a deep breath and waited for panic to kick in—or regret, or something—but it never did. All she felt was complete and utter peace.
“Holy shit, that felt good,” she murmured, before picking up her phone and texting Jules.
PAIGE: You’ll NEVER guess what I just did.
JULES: Well, you’re at work, so it probably wasn’t very interesting …
PAIGE: Wrong. I just quit my job and told Linda to fuck off twice!
JULES: Wait … for REAL? You’re not just messing with me?
PAIGE: For REAL.
JULES: Congratulations!
JULES: But you were supposed to get me on speaker phone so I could hear it.
PAIGE: I’m sorry. It was so spur-of-the-moment, I didn’t get a chance to.
JULES: Well, you’ll have to give me all the details over drinks tonight as we celebrate.
PAIGE: Over drinks tomorrow night. I have to give David all the details and celebrate with him tonight.
JULES: Ugh, you’re SO married.
JULES: Fine. Tomorrow night.
When Paige went out to tell Andrea the news, Paige was a little surprised at how upset her assistant was.
“No, you can’t leave,” she declared. “I won’t let you.”
“I’m sorry, but I am.”
Behind her Edna Mode glasses, Andrea’s eyes looked slightly panicked as she rushed around her desk and hugged Paige. “Then take me with you.”
Paige almost chuckled at the heartfelt, but dramatic plea. “I can’t,” she said with regret.
“Please, I’m begging you. I promise to not give you any grief about your disorganized crap-piles ever again—”
“I appreciate that, but I’m not actually going anywhere, so there’s nowhere to take you. But if I was—and I could bring you—I absolutely would, because you’re one of the few things I’m going to miss about this place.”
“Do you really mean that? You’re not just saying it to make me feel better as you walk out the door, and leave me here to work with that awful woman by myself?”
“Yes, I really do mean it. ‘A thousand times, yes’.”
Andrea gave a half-hearted smile at the Pride and Prejudice quote, before returning it with one from Airplane! “‘Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue’.”
Paige couldn’t help but laugh out loud at that; God, she loved Andrea. “I really am going to miss you,” Paige said, and gave Andrea another hug.
While speaking with her banquet staff—most of whom were also noticeably upset—Paige let it be known that now might be a good time to ask for a raise. To her amusement, before she left work at 3 p.m., Paige saw several of them paying a visit to Linda in her office, all of them coming out with smiles on their faces.
After driving home and parking in the back, she let herself into David’s studio and found him at his desk, talking to someone on the phone. When he saw her in the doorway, his eyes widened first in surprise, then lit up with happiness.
As soon as he was done with the call, he was on his feet and heading toward her. “What are you doing here?” he asked. “Not that I’m complaining or anything, but—”
“I quit my job.”
He stopped and stared in shock. “Jesus Christ. Did you really?”
“I really did. I gave Linda my two weeks’ notice this afternoon.”
He grabbed her, wrapping his arms around her and squeezing like she’d just returned from war. “Thank fucking God.”
She’d known he was going to be happy, but not this happy.
“Was it epic?” he wanted to know. “Please tell me it was.”
With a grin, she proceeded to share as many of the details as she could remember.
“Damn,” he murmured. “This calls for a celebration. I’ll check with my mom and see if she can watch Jacob for the night and then you and I are going to get ridiculously dressed up and go to the restaurant of your choice, where we’ll order the most expensive thing on the menu. And champagne … because we’re going to get drunk as fuck, then come home and really celebrate, if you get my drift.”