On the Verge (41 page)

“Why didn’t you tell me about Lacey?”

“Are you hungover or something?” Is it possible she doesn’t know?

“Meet me downstairs for a cigarette in five.”

“Eve, it isn’t the most convenient time, and you aren’t being very polite.”

“Tabitha, you are going to want to meet me.”

“Fine, in ten. Bring a better attitude.” She hangs up on me. I hadn’t meant to be so aggressive, I’m just pissed that not even my leaving this hellhole could be sacred. Now I have to go find jovial Jennifer and haul her back to the desk to cover for me. I find her standing obediently by the soda machines. She smiles when she sees me.

“Hi, Jennifer. I need to run out for a couple of minutes. Could you, maybe, I don’t know, cover for me?” Her smile fades and she looks scared. I am successfully managing to intimidate her; I am an awful person to be training her.

“But, we haven’t gone over anything yet. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do.” I take her arm and start leading her back to the desk.

“Jennifer, you are going to be fine, all you have to do is hang
out at my desk and familiarize yourself with it. Don’t answer the phone or anything. Just sit tight, and if anyone asks you anything, just tell them I will be back in five.”

I am waiting for Tabitha when she gets downstairs. In addition to a better attitude, I brought a lighter, which I hold up to her cigarette. This news is going to upset her, too. She takes the light and gives me a bitchy look. “Okay, Tabitha, sorry I was a bitch. I thought you were holding out on me, but now I think you are just as ignorant as I was.”

“Nice, Eve.” I wait a minute, letting her get a couple of good puffs in. This isn’t going to be easy.

“Have you been involved any more in the interview process for the new editor?”

“Well, we’ve had a few interviews, but no decisions have been made. When the Big C told me about her new plan, she assured me I would have a say in approval.”

“How big a say?”

“Eve, what’s up? Could you stop looking at me like you just got proposed to by Prescott!”

“Tabitha, it’s Lacey Matthews. She’s the new editor. They announced it in our meeting this morning.” Tabitha’s mouth forms a perfect “O” and she starts to step away from me, around the side of the building. I follow her. “I thought you knew when I called this morning.”

Tabitha leans against the side of the building. She is turning white. Her mouth forms a tight line. She can’t stop saying, “I can’t believe this.” I’ve never seen Tabitha this upset and I’m not sure how to deal with it. I’ve seen her pissed off, but now she looks downright defeated. I grab her arms and look at her face.

“I know you’re pissed off, Tabitha, but you know what? It isn’t going to matter, soon enough. It’ll just be us. We will make our own decisions, we will be the ones with influence in our lives.” She shakes her head, her eyes are filling up with tears.

“But we don’t know, Eve, we don’t know for sure.”

“No, we don’t, but I believed enough to quit. Even if we’re being stupid, you have to think we’ll do it and not let anything in this building make you lose sight of it.” I am not sure if it’s working. She pulls a pair of sunglasses out of her jacket pocket. I can’t tell if she is crying behind them.

“It seems like a dream, Eve—your dream. And I guess I just wanted to believe that I would still have something here if things didn’t work out.”

“Well, you do, just because I don’t get along with Lacey doesn’t mean you won’t.” She pulls her sunglasses down her nose and raises an eyebrow over red eyes. “Okay, you probably won’t. I know you’re pissed that the Big C didn’t keep you in the loop, but you have to start thinking that our thing will work out. Come on, believe in it. I’m starting that class in three weeks that will give me something to do other than sit on my ass. It’s got to work, Tabitha—come on. Remember when your shoulder was in Styles?”

“Oh, you bring that up!”

“Yes, because there’s more to come. It’s only the beginning. We made the first step. And, Tabitha, it’s not just about me, you know, it’s your dream, too.” She nods like it’s sinking in a little, so I feel comfortable in saying, “Besides, I need to be consoled because the Big C stole my shining moment.”

She laughs and then we hug against the side of the building. I’m not sure how she feels, but I feel a lot more confident about what we are going to do.

I have to. It’s sink or swim.

When I get back to my desk, I notice that Jennifer is sitting up very straight. She seems embarrassed when I look at her. She better not be reading my e-mails. I have to remember to print anything important and delete everything when I leave.

“So, it was pretty quiet, huh, Jennifer?”

“Well, kind of. Eve, are you in some kind of trouble?” Trouble?

“Trouble? Why?”

“A cop from NYPD called.” Her lip is quivering. “I told them I thought you were coming back, but I didn’t know, you ran out so quickly.”

“Do you mean to tell me that the coppers think I’m on the run?” I start giggling.

“I’m sorry if I gave them the wrong info.”

“Jennifer, this may be one of the most exciting days in your entire career as an assistant here.” I can tell Jennifer is still a little worried. I know after about a month or so, she’ll truly believe this is the most exciting day of her working life.

I call the number and speak to the obnoxious Agent (or whatever cops call themselves) Shinners. He assures me that I checked out okay. He’s got a whole new tone than he did last week.

“So what’s going on with Gary? Is he going to go to jail?”

“Ms. Vitali, I’m afraid I am not at liberty to discuss that. But I would just advise you to not have any contact with him.”

“Well, thanks for calling me.”

“Yes, and again, I apologize for any inconvenience. We’re the NYPD, we’re here to serve.”

Jennifer must really think I’m a freak. Her eyes are huge when I get off the phone. I know I should play this up more, but I don’t want her to quit or anythng. Who knows, maybe they’ll try to keep me here longer if she does? I try to act more normal.

“Well, looks like they’re aren’t going to be arresting me this week.”

“What did you do?”

“I did nothing. I am innocent.” When I explain to her about Gary, she keeps nodding, her smile getting smaller and smaller. I reassure her that stuff like that never happens, but I can tell she doesn’t believe me.

I decide to put her at ease by making small talk with her for the remainder of Monday. She keeps asking me if there’s stuff she is supposed to be learning, but I assure her we can get to that later in the week. I wish they hadn’t forced me to have a week’s transition period with the temp, it’s literally a day’s worth of teaching, and that’s if I stretch it.

Wednesday morning I decide I should make Jennifer feel like she is learning something, so I give her a little overview of the departments, the history, the merge, other corporate folklore. She listens in wonderment. Then I show her where I keep all the supplies and how to get more. As I am showing her, Lacey comes up and stands by my desk. As I look at her muscular calves and her round little boobs revealed in her too-soon-in-the-season summer dress, I decide that I don’t care about burning the proverbial bridge with her.

“Lacey, how appropriate that you would come now that I am going over supplies.”

“Yes, Eve. I need to get packing supplies and someone to assist me in moving my stuff.”

“Well, Lacey, this is Jennifer, my replacement. She has just learned how to fill out the supply request forms.” I smile at Jennifer encouragingly. I hope she is up for the challenge. “Also, we have the Yellow Pages, and I’m sure you can find listings in there for a personal assistant—maybe they can help you pack.”

I smile. I can tell by the way Lacey’s nostrils (surgically enhanced?) flare that she doesn’t appreciate that. Jennifer is begin
ning to cower, but I’ve got to hand it to her, she does a good job of diffusing the situation by dutifully going through the ordering procedure I taught her.

“Well, good luck to you, Eve,” Lacey says, turning her attention back to me. “It isn’t easy out there.”

“You know, I’m young, I can bounce back. No real roots yet.”

“Despite that, nothing comes on a silver platter.” I will not let her rain on my parting parade.

“Not even an editor position.” She glares at me. With any luck, I will never have to see her again, let alone be in a position where she can help me. But I’m taking that chance. I know she is unfazed. Like Herb, she is happy living in her ignorance. She waves to me and turns on the heel of her cute sandal. Jenny looks at me in disbelief.

I tell her to organize the supply shelves while I begin the arduous process of deleting all my e-mails and saving my incriminating files to disk.

Thursday, I head over to Rob King’s floor. Sherman has a huge picture of a man having sex with a chicken up. He tries desperately to escape when he sees me coming, but his computer freezes.

“Sherman, you should call the help desk ASAP, you don’t want that stuff on your computer forever. Not a very Prescott Nelson image.” I look past him into Rob’s office. Rob is sitting at his desk, on the phone.

“Yeah, I don’t know how I wound up on this page, I was looking up my stocks.”

“Happens all the time, I’m sure.” Rob has gotten up and is standing in his doorway. “Got a minute?”

He smiles at me and steps back into his office, so I follow. “I was wondering if you would see me before you left.”

“I’m not even going to ask how you know that.” He must enjoy telling me things that piss me off, but I’m not going to make an issue.

“So you’re going to do it, Ms. Vitali. You are going to be the enemy.”

“With Prescott’s blessing. Thank you, but I bet you know that, too.” He doesn’t say anything. “So, what’s up with you?”

“I’m going to finish out the summer and then it’s off to Dallas to help set up some new offices.” Still not sure what he does? Me, either.

“Oh.”

“Yeah, I’m glad I got to see you before you left. I didn’t know
if I would.” I nod. “Maybe when you get your e-mail and stuff set up, you could e me.”

“Yeah, I may need some business advice.”

He nods. “Or whatever else.”

“Yeah.” We look at each other for a while. I am proud that my stomach is stabilizing as opposed to flip-flopping. It shows I’m maturing.

“Happy birthday, by the way.”

“Thanks! The big two-four. I am mature at twenty-four.” He laughs. I’m not sure what more to say to him. Have we always had so little to talk about? “Well, take care of yourself.”

“Oh, yeah, I guess that’s it. Take care of yourself, too.” Then I walk toward the door. I stop in front of him and lean up. We kiss lightly on the lips. When I open the door Sherman is staring up at us from his desk.

“Good luck with your computer, Sherman.” I turn back to Rob. “Thanks, Rob, for everything. Take care.”

“You, too, Ms. Vitali. Watch out for elevator sports.” As I leave, I hear him ask Sherman what’s wrong with his computer.

So that was the big relationship. Sigh!

Had I waited one more Friday, early release Fridays would have started, but Memorial Day comes late this year so I am forced to stay the whole horrid day. Yesterday, I started teaching Jennifer the Excel program that I use to enter all the data. She is not picking it up very easily, so as I clean out my drawers, I give her pointers.

“I’m not sure I’m ready to do this alone.”

“Trust me, Jennifer, you’ll have plenty of time to get ready, it’s a long way until that point. I’ll never need all these folders again. No one cares about old T and Es.” I dump huge folders into my trash bin. I smile at Jennifer. “This is super liberating.”

I have a large shopping bag, full of stuff I’m taking home—my pictures, old funny e-mails printed out, a couple of Prescott Nelson T-shirts, a handful of sugar packs that have Prescott’s name on it. Jennifer stares at me in disbelief. She is so fresh-faced, out of school. You wouldn’t think that the year and a half between us would make such a difference. We stare at each other blankly.

“Well, I guess I should go say goodbye to Herb.” I walk down the hall to his office. Enya is playing and Herb is leaning back in his chair with his eyes closed. I almost leave, but I really don’t want to prolong this anymore. I knock softly on his door, and when he doesn’t hear me, I bang.

“Oh, Eve, didn’t hear you there. Are you getting ready?”

“Yep, I’ve cleaned out my desk and trained Jennifer. I think she’ll be fine.”

“She’s got a tough act to follow.”

“Thanks.” I guess.

“I’m sorry we didn’t get to do more for your departure. If time had allowed we would have had a separate lunch for you and Lacey. Now, you’re lucky, you get our fondest wishes.”

I can’t believe he’s gone this long without making a stupid joke, but I guess since I’m not a crowd of his underlings, I’m just me, he doesn’t feel the need to impress. “I guess I just wanted to say ’bye and thanks for everything.”

“I hope it wasn’t too terrible, Eve.” He looks up at me hopefully. I don’t say anything. “Well, keep in touch.”

“I will.”

I take a little walk around the floor. I stop at only the desks of people who I think will really care. Some of the YFL people actually stop me and are very sweet. When I get back to my desk, Jennifer appears to be on the verge of tears.

“What’s up?”

“You can’t leave until you explain this Excel thing to me again. I don’t get it. I’m not going to be able to do it.” She is almost angry.

“All right, I’ll show you again, but, first let me send out my goodbye e-mail.” Jennifer doesn’t seem too happy to wait, but this is the lasting impression I want to leave. The final e-mail to put a smile on people’s faces:

There. Short and sweet. I spell-check and send. Now back to the matter at hand. Jennifer is breathing down my neck waiting to unlock the knowledge only I can provide. We switch places so she can sit at the computer and I can lead her through it. Tabitha calls in the middle of my lesson.