Paycheque (7 page)

But you're not, Claire wanted to yell. You just check him every so often. She stared at the nurse, frowning.

‘It's all right, sometimes when we want something so badly…'

‘I didn't make it up.' This time she had spoken. It was obviously a fraction of what he would have experienced, but Claire now thought she could understand the frustration Dr Burrows had felt.

‘Please keep your voice down,' the young nurse pleaded quietly.

What would she know anyway? She looked like just a kid, was probably barely out of university. Claire felt like slapping some life experience into her.

‘I think you really should go. Visiting hours are ending soon anyway.'

Claire took a deep breath, gave Jack's limp hand another squeeze, leant forward to kiss his forehead and got up. She flashed the nurse an icy glare and stalked out.

Still fuming as she marched across the car park, she thought of what might have happened if he'd woken to see what all the commotion was about. That would have shut the smarmy kid up. Except there would have been nothing more humiliating than her father coming out of his coma to tell his thirty-something daughter off.

Claire sat for a few moments, collecting her thoughts and letting her emotions subside. Had she really dreamed he woke up, the tears? No, she hadn't been asleep. Imagined it, then? Anything was possible in the state she was in. Claire sighed wearily. She was beginning to lose all perspective.

The next morning Claire bounded into work full of purpose and energy, her leave form already filled out and awaiting Derek's signature. If she got all her work done, she might even take the last few hours off – get an early start to her break.

After dumping her handbag and laptop, Claire made her way down the corridor to Derek's plush corner office. He had his back to the door, and was hunched over something on his desk. Something about his tight, uneasy posture – one hand holding the side of his head in contemplation – stopped Claire at the open door. Her eyes darted across his desk, which was scattered with papers. To his left was a takeaway cardboard coffee cup, the remains of cappuccino froth lining its upper edge, and a half-eaten toasted sandwich lying on a white paper bag. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Claire shook the uneasy feeling free, she was just being paranoid. She knocked tentatively on the frosted glass sliding door.

Derek looked up and turned in his chair, startled. His face was clouded in confusion for a split second before reddening. It was as
though he'd been caught stuffing company stationery into his briefcase.

He glanced down at a small pile of business-sized envelopes in front of him before roughly shoving them out of sight under some papers.
Definitely caught doing personal business on company time
, Claire thought smugly.

‘Claire, please,' he said, sweeping an arm toward a vacant chair.

‘Thanks.' Claire went in and sat down at the small round low table, part of the new ‘touchy feely' concept in working environments at Rockford.

‘Did you enjoy your time off? Successful week away with the gee-gees?'

‘Um, yes, not bad. Something I can help you with, Claire? I'm rather snowed under…'

Claire was annoyed. It was all right for him to stand at her desk fiddling with her bits and pieces, but now when the tables were turned she was getting the royal hurry on. Bloody typical.

But she wasn't going to let it get to her – she was on the cusp of two glorious weeks away. Nothing could ruin that now, not even Derek and his double standards. Claire smiled sweetly at him, got up, flapped her leave form theatrically and laid it on the desk in front of him.

‘What's this?'

‘Leave form, Derek.'

‘Yes, I can see that, but you said…' He ran a hand through his hair.

‘I decided you were absolutely right – I need a break. So as of this afternoon, if you agree, of course, you're rid of me for two whole weeks.'

‘Great,' Derek groaned, and closed his eyes.

‘I'm touched by your concern, Derek, but don't worry, I'll be back before you know it.'

‘What a mess,' he murmured, barely audible.

‘I don't know what your problem is, it was your idea.'

‘This,' he said, reaching over to the small pile of envelopes he'd hidden moments before. He removed the top one and handed it to her.

Claire stared at her full name in bold black type: ‘Claire McIntyre'.

‘What's this? Party invite?' she laughed. She looked back up at Derek, whose face was now an ashy shade of salmon. His lips were in a grim line. He nodded to the envelope in her hands and she looked back down at it: the words ‘Private and Confidential' were in large uppercase print and underlined twice, at the top left. How could she have missed it? Claire had seen similar envelopes before, but had never been handed one with her own name on it. She knew what it was but just couldn't seem to grasp it.

‘What is it?' she asked, brow knitted in genuine confusion.

‘You'd better open it,' Derek said with a sigh.

Claire knew if she did her life would never be the same again, just like the night she'd opened the door to the police. She didn't want to do it, didn't want to know.

‘No, I don't want to,' Claire said, sounding almost child-like. Her hands were already beginning to sweat, her vision blurring.

‘Come on, you have to some time.'

No I don't
, Claire thought.
What are you going to do? Hold me down, jack my eyelids open with toothpicks, have me arrested for not opening a letter?

‘It might not be so bad,' Derek offered.

But Claire disagreed. In her experience, good news came in person or by phone and bad news came by mail. Except, she found herself correcting, when it came to really bad news – like the phone call about Jack's accident. Or
really really
bad news – like the police knocking on her door at one o'clock in the morning to tell her that her husband was dead. There were exceptions to everything.

‘You can't fire me, I haven't had any warnings, and my performance…'

‘Claire, just open the damn envelope.'

He was right: she was just delaying the inevitable. There was no way it could be the worst news she'd received that year. Claire carefully prised the seal apart and pulled out the folded sheet of Rockford letterhead. She held her breath as she straightened it.

She sighed at seeing ‘Redundancy Offer'.
Okay
, she thought with relief,
it's an offer
. She tried to scan the following text but her eyes refused to focus. After a few moments pretending to read, she passed the sheet across to Derek and sat back with arms folded.

‘Sorry, no deal.'

‘Claire, this is not a game – you don't have a choice.'

‘Why not?' Suddenly all Claire's experience of middle management had left her and she was just like any other bewildered employee trying to hold on to her job.

‘Claire, you know why not.' Derek was rubbing his face, clearly exasperated.

‘No, it says there “redundancy
offer
”. And I think you'll find the dictionary meaning of “offer” is “to present for acceptance or rejection”.'

Derek blinked twice while he processed what she'd said, and then glared at her.

‘Don't be a smart arse, Claire. It doesn't suit you. And being difficult is really not going to help the situation.'

‘Difficult, Derek? I'll be as difficult as I bloody well like. I'm about to lose my job, my final shred of security. Kick me while I'm down, why don't you?'

‘I know and I'm sorry, I really am.' Derek stared at his fingers in his lap.

‘Not sorry enough to stop this.' She jabbed a finger at the piece of paper.

‘Please, Claire, don't shoot the messenger,' he said wearily.

‘You could have stopped this. I don't know how, but you could have.' Claire's eyes flashed at him.

Derek looked back down at his desk. ‘Claire, for the record, I did actually try. If you'd been on leave like I suggested, you couldn't have been made redundant.'

‘Oh, so it's my fault now.'

‘And if you look at the figures, you'll find the
offer
is well above…'

‘This is not about the money, Derek.'

‘Of course it is, Claire. It's not personal. The new CEO is just making his mark by changing the organisational structure – it's not about
you
.'

Claire shot him an indignant glare.

‘Just sign the bloody letter, take your time off, and then worry about it. You'll have no trouble finding another job – I'll do all I can to help.'

‘And if I don't sign it?'

‘You will be fired. So that's your choice – twelve months pay or two weeks.'

‘Fine!' Claire snatched the piece of paper back, grabbed a pen from Derek's holder, and roughly scrawled her signature. She got up, threw both pen and paper at Derek, and stalked towards the door.

‘Um, Claire?'

She wanted to keep walking and complete her grand exit, but something in Derek's tone made her stop and turn. He was focussed on the desk in front of him.

‘I have to inform management and then you are to be escorted from the building. You have about forty minutes. Go back to your desk and pack your things,' he said, unable to look her in the eye.

Claire sat in her car, panting from the exertion of holding her dignity together while being walked past her colleagues and underlings' workstations flanked by two overweight, middle-aged security men who couldn't have outrun a headless chicken if their jobs depended
on it. She hated being the highlight of their day – possibly year – and especially despised the grim, authoritarian expressions that did little to hide their smugness.

Claire barely remembered the faces which had uttered vague messages of hope before bobbing back down, the acceptable length of time between curiosity and nosiness having expired. As she tramped down the hall, forced to keep the slow pace of the kitchener bun boys beside her, Claire just wished she could disappear.

On the passenger seat beside her was a box of personal items from her desk: clock, phone charger, photo frames, Keith's snow dome. The security staff hadn't stopped her throwing in the stress ball with the company logo – probably figured she'd be needing that.

She knew something major had happened but she didn't understand how. She'd gone into Derek's office to get her leave form signed. She was supposed to be excited about her freedom for the next two weeks, not jobless and terrified of her entire future. Jesus, how was she going to tell her father? Part of her was almost glad he was still unconscious and couldn't say ‘I told you so'. He'd told her so many times that these sorts of people couldn't be trusted, that she was just a means to an end, a way to make them more money. They didn't care about her as a person. And as it turned out, he was right.

Claire left the car park for the last time with a sick sensation of going out into the big scary world. All those management texts said to look at redundancy as an opportunity, the potential start of an exciting new chapter – what a crock of shit! Claire felt a little guilty about the times she'd said these same words, and for those who had left her office looking brighter for them.

At the second set of traffic lights, her attention was caught by a billboard advertising an upcoming reality show: ‘SMILE, YOU'RE ON CANDID CAMERA!'

‘If only,' she moaned.