Stay Mad, Sweetheart

by Heleen Kist

  I nodded, still unsure what the point of this was. ‘My adviser moved to Cambridge shortly after I got my grade. I suspect my thesis was tossed out with the rest of the papers he didn’t need.’

  ‘Now, before I get too excited,’ Suki said. ‘One more question. In any of the upgrades you’ve developed at Empisoft, did you use the discoveries and algorithms in your master’s thesis?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m an employee. Doesn’t Empisoft own all the IP I’ve created while working for them?’

  ‘Yes, but if you used your thesis... you’ve again based the work on something they do not own.’

  ‘That doesn’t sound good. Why are you so excited?’

  Suki drew lines with her finger between the two cups and the vase on the table to explain. ‘Because, my dear, due to this mistake, you actually still own a lot of the IP that sits at the core of the products Empisoft sells its clients. IP that PeopleForce think they’re going to own. Your current lawyers, at the last minute, have figured out this assignation is missing. And they want you to sign a new one.’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Ha! You’re not seeing it. This acquisition rests on you signing this document. Suddenly, you hold all the cards.’ Suki leaned back in her chair, her arms outstretched. ‘Here’s the crux: do you sign this paper and let Justin walk all over you and get away scot-free, or do you play your hand?’

  My pulse pounded in my ears. I’d finally understood. ‘What did you have in mind?’

  Suki searched for her phone ‘I want to set up a meeting with PeopleForce the minute it’s morning for them. You, me and them. Don’t worry, I won’t screw up the acquisition. I promise. It’s a long shot, but given their recent problems, I think it’s going to work.’

  52

  ME

  I pressed the bronze-plated doorbell of Madainn Finance, its ding-dong exactly like I’d expect an old-world bell to sound. A clean-shaven twenty-something man opened the door with a welcoming smile and motioned me onto the yellow carpet.

  ‘I’m Laura Flett.’

  ‘I’m Doug. Suki is expecting you in the boardroom,’ he said. I noticed an Aussie accent. Long nails on his right hand suggested he played guitar. Was he here for the festival?

  He pointed up the long corridor as if I was supposed to know where to go.

  ‘It’s my first time here,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, apologies. Let me take you.’

  We walked past two offices. Sunlight streamed through the sash windows onto the rows of unoccupied desks. It was eerily quiet. Where was everyone?

  A bit further up, he opened a thick mahogany door into a space furnished as though it was still a Victorian dining room. Brick red wallpaper lined the walls; twin-masted boats sailed inside thick golden frames.

  Suki stood with her back to me.

  ‘Thanks, Doug,’ I said.

  Suki spun round, her face beaming. ‘Yes, thanks, Doug.’

  I walked to her side. She fiddled with various cables. ‘I’m setting up the video conference. We’ve got four minutes before PeopleForce come on.’

  I picked up the square control panel from the sideboard. ‘Anything I can do?’

  ‘No, we’re good to go. Can you sit in that chair, please?’ She tweaked the camera to focus on me and the empty chair beside me. I hated seeing myself on screen.

  ‘You think we actually have a shot?’ I asked.

  She crossed her fingers. ‘I’d wanted to try this angle before, when we were looking for fairness in the growth options. I wasn’t sure it would work. Having the IP assignation as a back-up is great. I’d rather not use it because I don’t want them to think this is a shakedown.’

  ‘Fair enough. I’ll let you do the speaking.’

  Suki held up two plastic bottles. ‘Water?

  ‘Please.’

  The screen popped to life. I twisted the cap off my drink.

  ‘Here goes nothing,’ whispered Suki.

  Two forty-something men sat on the other side of the world, their walls modern and colourful. Both had similar short haircuts, similar tans and similar polo shirts. One was a little older than the other. The only thing Scotland and Silicon Valley had in common right now was the branded water we drank.

  One of the men was mouthing to someone out of sight and an icon on the screen confirmed their microphone was still muted. Soon they both smiled at the screen and their voices came through, ‘Hi.’

  Suki wrote their names and job titles on a notepad for my benefit, in the order they were sitting. I looked at the paper. It took a moment to digest that here I was, speaking to an actual director and vice-president of the Peoplesoft.

  She started with, ‘Thank you so much for taking this call at such short notice. It’s nice to finally see you both in person after all the email to and fros.’

  ‘No problem,’ he said. ‘Our CEO is already in the air. He waited until the last minute to make sure everything was in order and it wouldn’t be a wasted trip.’ I felt Suki bristle at my side.

  After mutual introductions and a few weather-related observations, Suki went straight to business. ‘It’s been a lot of work and I am delighted that we will be completing — and celebrating — the acquisition tomorrow. But given your staff’s walkout last week, it’s important to have complete transparency with regards to gender equality at Empisoft.’

  The men’s tans faded instantly.

  Hardly surprising. It had been all over the news that PeopleForce suffered an unprecedented walkout by their employees at HQ when word got out that not one, but two senior executives had left with multi-million-dollar packages following sexual misconduct allegations against them. The protest had spread to their offices all over the world, to condemn claims of sexual harassment, gender inequality and systemic racism at the company. They were working round the clock to repair the damage to their reputation.

  The VP, in the red shirt, cleared his throat while the other guy glugged down half a bottle of water. The no doubt air-conditioned room would prevent their sweat from showing, but there was no hiding their discomfort.

  Suki had explained to me that part of the reason they’d ultimately picked Empisoft over its competitor — and it had been a tight race up to the end — was because Empisoft gave them a stronger PR opportunity at a sensitive time: a female co-founder and a forty percent female data science team, set in a cute country that everybody liked, where men wore skirts and women led government.

  ‘There is no mention of any issues in the disclosures,’ said the younger man, stony-faced.

  ‘Indeed.’ Suki replied. ‘We are here primarily to rectify your possible impression of the management team. Particularly, since you’re about to appoint Justin Travers as Global Director of Digital Labs.’

  Both men leaned forward.

  ‘You see,’ Suki said. ‘The brains behind Empisoft is this woman here. And whilst Justin might be the face, we’ve established through in-house analysis that Laura is in fact the number one influence behind its ongoing success.’

  The director, in the blue shirt, scratched the base of his neck ‘Not that we are challenging this in any way, but what analysis are you referring to?’

  ‘It’s the Network Impact tool. A small R&D project in the pipeline,’ Suki replied.

  Blue shirt said, ‘Isn’t that experimental? My understanding is that this hadn’t even been tested properly.’ He raised his palm in defence, the Californian political correctness coming out again. ‘Not that we are in any way suggesting we don’t believe you.’

  ‘The information you received about the R&D roadmap shows it as being at concept stage,’ Suki said. ‘However, things have moved on extremely rapidly in the last week. Laura, would you care to explain what happened?’

  Suki scribbled on the notebook.

  Lean in. This is your moment.

  I beamed my largest smile to California. ‘While I was playing around with the Network Impact tool on an unrelated database scraped from Twitter, it accidentally ran on Empisoft’s inte
rnal communications.’ The VP’s frown unnerved me and I quickly added, ‘It was a minor failure in a security protocol, which I can assure you has been —’

  He interrupted by raising his hand. ‘You ran your tool on Twitter data? Did it work?’

  ‘Well yes,’ I said, my nerves on edge. ‘The point is Network Impact worked full stop. If you remember, its purpose is to find the hidden—’’

  ‘The hidden heroes and villains when it comes to influencing groups,’ he said. ‘Yes we know. We’ve been very interested in this concept, which we thought hadn’t been proven yet. Are you telling me that a) it works and b) it works on Twitter?’

  ‘We’d certainly want to run some more tests. And —’ Suki elbowed me. I got the message. ‘Yes. Yes it does.’

  ‘Give us a minute.’ The Californians muted their microphone. Suki and I looked at each other and muted our own.

  ‘What do you think is going on?’ I asked.

  ‘I think we might have hit on a goldmine without realising it,’ Suki raised a mischievous smile. ‘Let’s see how this plays out.’

  We watched as the men nodded at each other.

  The director reached forward to press the button to restart the conversation. ‘Okay. We’re interested. Very interested. The Network Impact tool add-on for our client companies is neat, but the real value of what you’ve got is in the ability to run it on social media. This is a whole new ballgame. Marketing companies will do almost anything to identify true influencers. It could transform the way brands choose where to spend their advertising dollars.’

  After a second’s hesitation, Suki sat up extra straight. ‘You see why Ms Flett is more important than you had initially anticipated. Not only is she the most important influencer of Empisoft’s performance, she’s a technical visionary able to take the company in valuable, new directions.’

  I wanted to hide. Casting my eyes down. Suki’s hands were pressed against the table, her knuckles white. She was improvising. Bluffing?

  The VP squeezed his eyes into small slits. ‘What are you looking for?’

  Suki put on an innocent voice. ‘You see, the gender issue we wanted to raise was that Laura has been cheated by her trusted co-founder out of some growth options. Nobody wants to delay the deal due to a historical injustice — or, God forbid, stop it from going ahead. The thing is, Laura might not be terribly motivated to develop this any further. And half of it is in your head, isn’t it, Laura?’ Her eyes instructed me to go with it. Stand firm. ‘All she wants is what she rightfully deserves, and should get from a company like yourselves, committed to stamp out gender discrimination: equality with her co-founder. Is that something we can agree to?’

  I remained straight-faced. Suki had these two men sputtering in agreement, almost competing to confirm their complete and unrestrained alignment with the feminist agenda.

  Suki took notes as she began listing demands. ‘We’ll forget about the inequality of the past and focus on the now. Seems fair to me.’ She theatrically drew a line — across nothing. ‘All we’re asking for is the equivalent of the moving expenses you agreed to pay Justin, in cash, as a golden hello. From recollection, this is fifty thousand dollars.’

  ‘Done,’ the VP said.

  I gasped. I hadn’t expected this. It would more than pay for Mum’s wedding.

  Suki squeezed my knee under the table. ‘And clearly a small uplift in valuation is in order, now that you now understand the full extent of the opportunity of what Laura has created... Three million dollars.’

  I couldn’t believe Suki’s audacity.

  . PeopleForce were paying one hundred million dollars for the company already. What was she playing at? I worried the allure of money had distracted her from our goal.

  ‘Just a minute.’ The men muted their side again. If only I’d learnt to lip read.

  Their head jerking morphed into small nods and Suki cursed under her breath, ‘Fuck. Should have asked for more.’

  The VP said, ‘Done. We’d be happy to have the lawyers quickly make that change. It’s not an amount of money we need CEO approval for. Just as well, as he’s out of reach. Before we agree to this, we need some assurances.’ He twirled his pen. ‘First, we need Ms Flett to agree to fully document what’s in her head. Since she is staying with us for what?’ He looked over at his colleague who raised two fingers. ‘Two years. We trust that she will be motivated to lead the development of this new product.’

  Suki jumped in. ‘And she’ll expect an increase in remuneration commensurate with the role.’ She flashed a smile. ‘The same salary you’ve agreed to pay Justin.’

  The blue-shirted director, who was probably on a similar salary, grumbled.

  His superior shushed him. ‘Done. Lastly, we need absolute certainty that the IP for this sits within the company. Because you made it sound like modifying the Network Impact to run on Twitter was a little side project, Laura.’

  A side project? How could they call my quest for justice for Emily a ‘side project’?

  ‘Funny you should say that,’ Suki said before I could comment. ‘Turns out there was a missing IP assignation from the time of the company’s inception. But I’m proud to say we caught it on our side while making sure everything was perfect for you. We wouldn’t have wanted you to be the victim of a historical oversight. And Laura will gladly sign a backdated document which would also cover the Twitter work.’

  ‘Good. Then it’s all sorted.’ The VP looked at his own notes. ‘Fifty thousand dollars sign-on bonus for Ms Flett. A valuation of one hundred and three million dollars for tomorrow’s acquisition. And you will provide us with the IP assignation today.’

  I nodded and Suki said ‘Perfect.’

  ‘Expensive call,’ the VP quipped.

  ‘Ha! Funny you should say that also, because there’s one more thing we want — but this will actually save you money.’

  While my stomach did somersaults, they agreed to that request, too.

  53

  ME

  ‘It’s down this little street,’ I said as I guided Claire to the Fragrant Orchid for dinner. The chippy on the right was doing a roaring trade, a swarm of men in tracksuits pressed inside, backs against the window wet with oily condensation.

  We reached the lotus-lanterned restaurant. ‘It’s so cute,’ Claire said.

  Suki’s mother welcomed me with arms thrown wide, even if I would never be the daughter-in-law she longed for. She cast an approving eye over Claire and led us to the best window-side table for dinner. The drinks swiftly followed.

  ‘Cheers!’ We clinked our Siam Marys together.

  ‘I hope Suki won’t be long. I’m starving,’ said Claire, eyeing the colourful menu.

  ‘She must be tying up some loose strings in the office after our video call with PeopleForce,’ I said. ‘You should have been there, Claire. Suki saw an opportunity and went straight for it. A master negotiator. I could tell she was nervous, but she exuded nothing but confidence to the other side. We got everything we were going for and more — and never even had to use our trump card. She made it all sound like we were doing them a favour.’

  ‘Do tell.’ Claire rested her chin on her clasped hands.

  Towards the end of my update, Suki showed up. She collapsed onto her chair and waved at her mum, who came over to give her a drink and a kiss. Such a close family. I thought of my own mum. Thanks to the golden hello Suki negotiated, I could look my mother in the face again; give her the wedding I promised.

  ‘I hear you kicked butt, Miss Aksornpan,’ Claire said. ‘Remind me to hire you to negotiate whenever I want to buy a flat.’

  ‘Oh my God, that was the best.’ Suki glowed. ‘I’m still buzzing. And then, once I’d finished updating the documents for tomorrow, I went to tidy up my cups in the kitchen and I overheard Diane and Angus squabbling. Argh, that woman.’ Suki bit into the shrimp that hung from the side of her cocktail and chewed with fire in her eyes. ‘Anyway, as I was on a high, I thought “Fuck it” and cor
nered Angus. That’s why I was late. Guess what?’

  ‘What?’ Claire and I asked at the same time.

  Suki shimmied her shoulders and rotated her fists around each other in a disco dance. ‘Heads are gonna roll.’

  When she told us what they’d agreed, I couldn’t have admired her more.

  ‘Miaow,’ Claire joked, holding out claws.

  ‘It’s only fair.’ Suki winked.

  Forever attentive, Suki’s mum brought two fresh cocktails. Bless, she probably thought she was being discreet in signalling to Suki that Claire was quite nice-looking. Suki waved her away.

  I thought my stomach would pop as we were presented with enough food to feed a small army. But we needed the ammo while the three of us plotted the culmination of all our efforts. Justice at last. Claire took notes; she was so organised. There wasn’t much left for me to do. I sank back, imbued with a little too much alcohol and a perfect dose of righteous satisfaction.

  The dessert was a glistening lychee sorbet that melted on the tongue in a prickle of ecstasy. Suki insisted I should suck on the mint leaf first, to make it tingle more.

  Claire licked her spoon, eyes downcast.

  ‘What’s wrong, Claire?’ I asked.

  She smiled faintly. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Come on. Spill,’ Suki said.

  ‘I’m thrilled at all this, I am... I just feel we’ve forgotten someone. Darren.’

  Saliva flooded my mouth at the sound of his name.

  ‘Good shout,’ said Suki. ‘We’re not finished. Let’s think. What is it that he treasures most?’

  ‘I’d thought of something before, but I couldn’t do it — until now, until your chat with PeopleForce. But it may be a big ask from you, Laura.’

  ‘I’m in,’ I said.

  ‘I haven’t even told you —’