“I respect your work ethic, but it’s illegal for us to compel employees to work without compensation,” he said.
“I know, sir. I made it strictly voluntary.”
“They logged that kind of time for free drinks and football tickets?” he asked.
He knew about that?
He studied my face as I groped for an answer.
“They didn’t stay because Mike picked up their bar tabs,” Dennis said. “They stayed because they respect you. They respect you because you protect your employees and give more than you demand from them.” He settled back in his chair and studied me over steepled fingers. “You could have explained Mike’s requisition error and gotten an extension.”
He knew about that too? He was scary.
“I promoted you because you have an admirable amount of common sense and an extraordinary work ethic. Don’t allow the second to outweigh the first. You have maintained a demanding pace here over the last twelve months. I’d like to see you dial back your hours, although I can’t stop you from working off the clock. I would feel better knowing you’re no longer hurtling toward burnout.”
That confused me. Didn’t everybody want self-starters on their team? Was I supposed to be average now?
Reading the distress in my face, he said, “Your value to me is your ability to see the bigger picture when you examine a problem, to understand that you have to look at more than numbers to find solutions. I’m selfish enough to worry that if you lose that perspective, I’ll be reading a lot more of these.” He nodded his head to indicate Craig’s huge report.
When I smiled, he laughed. “That might be the first crack I’ve seen in your work armor. Look, we don’t have quarterly taxes due for several weeks. I’d like you to consider taking some time off. Start today. Consider the rest of the day a comp day for all the overtime this week. Give everyone who worked with you a comp day next week.”
“Thank you. That’s generous.”
“Don’t give one to Mike,” he said, smiling.
When I started to defend Mike, Dennis held up a hand. “Don’t worry. I respect someone who will put the time in to fix his mistake, but I’m not giving him a day off for screwing up in the first place.”
I swallowed my objection.
“Take your day off and do nothing,” he continued. “I need you fresh for a hairy project coming up in two weeks. You’ll curse my name before you’re even two hours into it.”
“Sounds fun.”
“You have no idea. I’m putting your team on support for Apoor’s project right now. Get out of town for a few days. Apoor won’t require much more than autopilot. It’s so routine, it’s Mike-proof.”
“I won’t be going anywhere. I don’t have plans or anything,” I said. “But I promise to cut back to forty hours.”
A reluctant smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Since the only other way I have to keep you out of here is to fire you, I accept your compromise.”
Compromise. I was in the position to make a real one with Ben now, ready or not.
They say to be careful what you wish for because it might come true. That goes double for prayer. A big, fat answer had just dropped in my lap.
* * *
Katie had already gone on her well-deserved lunch break when I left Dennis’s office. Mike sat in her desk instead, lulled into a Zenlike state by the drone of the paper shredder.
I stopped and waved my hand in front of his face to snap him out of it.
“Jessie! How did it go? Did we save more than Craig with our proposal?”
“When you really look at the numbers, yes. Dennis loved it,” I said.
He looked relieved. “Craig came through here a while ago talking like he ran circles around you.”
“Mmm, he almost had it right. He did run around in circles, which is different.”
“Dude, that guy is such an idiot,” he said.
“At least that dude caught the test data, so maybe we should keep the gloating to a minimum. Comprende?”
“Got it,” he answered, looking humbled. “So did Dennis find out about the data switch, or do I still have a job?”
“He does know about it, yes, but you have a job.” His expression mirrored his relief.
“However,” I added, “you’re the only one who pulled overtime this week who won’t be getting a comp day next week.”
He nodded, clearly resigned to this slap on the wrist. “I deserve that. Does Craig’s team get comp time?”
I shook my head, and he grinned. “They didn’t have to work over a hundred extra hours to fix their reports,” I reminded him.
“Ouch.”
“Take your forty hours and be glad you get to work them at all,” I advised him. “I don’t know how he found out about it, but I think it’s pretty generous of Dennis to keep signing your paycheck.”
“It’s actually a computer generated signa—”
“Mike!”
“I’ll shut up and shred now.”
“Good idea.”
I continued to my office, growing lighter with every step. I didn’t have to eat lunch at my desk today. I didn’t have to eat dinner there either. I could have my breakfast at home tomorrow instead of grabbing a plastic-wrapped muffin from a street vendor on the way in. When I flipped on my computer, I would not wade through yet another audit report on a long-forgotten timesheet. I could catch up on interoffice e-mail or work on some of my own miscellaneous filing.
Yeah, awesome. I was so not into that. I picked up the phone and punched Sandy’s number in.
“How did it go?” she demanded as soon as she answered.
“We smoked him,” I said.
“Yes! I knew it.”
“Care to have a celebration lunch with me?”
“Sure. Let me tell Susan I’m leaving. I’ll meet you at your office.”
“Sounds like a plan,” I said and hung up. Instead of finding some busy work for the next five minutes while I waited, I spun around to stare out the window—and did nothing at all.
“I’m not interrupting anything, am I?” Only one person could inject his tone with such complete condescension. I took a deep breath and prayed for patience before I turned to face him.
“What can I do for you, Craig?” I asked.
“I wanted to make sure you’re okay,” he said.
This should be fun.
“I’m great. Thanks for asking.”
He wandered in without an invitation and perched on the edge of my desk. I hate when people do that. I’ve never been in the habit of parking my behind in anyone else’s personal space, so I didn’t understand the comfort level there. But with Craig, it was probably some kind of alpha-dog territory marker thing.
“Have a seat, Craig. It’s a comfortable chair,” I offered. He took it and then, crossing his legs, prepared to make himself at home.
“That’s nice of you,” he said. “I thought you might be mad.”
“About . . . ?”
“You know, how the meeting with Dennis went this morning.”
“And how was that, Craig?”
“I definitely compliment you for being able to generate a report after your oversight on the test data, but come on,” he said.
“Yes?”
“I hope you weren’t embarrassed by the inequity between what I produced and your little slideshow.”
“Right, that.” I leaned back in my chair, amused. I studied him for a moment, noting the way he propped his wrist on his knee to display his watch to full advantage. His posturing should have annoyed me.
But I didn’t care.
I didn’t care that he sat there thinking he had bested me. I didn’t care that his silence cost me hours of overtime. I didn’t care that he probably had a plot hatching at that very moment, designed to thwart me again. I didn’t even care enough about beating him to muster the energy to set him straight on his “win.” With perfect clarity, I could see that we would replay variations of this scene, sometimes with m
e ahead and sometimes with him, ad nauseam.
With the genius of hindsight, I could see that Dennis would have granted me an extension without any penalty, tangible or otherwise, if I had gone to him and explained our screw up. He had enough faith in my judgment to allow me the time to reach my own interpretation of the data. He would have disciplined Mike, but Mike deserved it and was already serving his sentence anyway. The pressure I felt to complete the audit by the original deadline wasn’t Dennis’s fault. I couldn’t even blame Craig that I took his bait every time.
I prided myself on not making the same mistake twice, never mind the half dozen times I’d already butted heads with him in the two months since my promotion. That gave me a choice: I could level Craig with a rundown of his report’s analytical reasoning flaws and then refuse to ever engage in a round of schoolyard one-upmanship again. Or I could smile and let him win, this time and every time, and simply not care. I could focus on the job I did and that my team did and direct all my energy to that outcome instead of dividing it between my results and Craig’s.
What an easy choice.
I chose to let Craig sweat.
Delivering a courteous smile, I reached across the desk and offered him a handshake. Confused, he accepted it.
“Your team did a great job,” I said. “You deserve all the recognition Dennis gave you.”
His perma-grin showed signs of suspicion. “Thank you. I find Dennis responds better to cold, hard facts.”
“You’re so right about that,” I agreed.
His suspicion grew. Before he could probe further, Sandy interrupted from the doorway.
“You ready to celebrate?”
He turned to her, confused. “Celebrate?”
Noting my frantic headshake behind Craig’s back she said, “Yeah . . . because it’s Friday.”
“Yep. Love those Fridays,” I said cheerfully. “If you’ll excuse us, Craig, we’re going to go grab some lunch.”
He looked unsettled. “You don’t mind if I discuss the audit findings with Mike, do you?”
I could tell he wanted to rocket out to Mike’s cubby and interrogate him.
“You better wait, Craig. He has a lot of shredding to do right now, and I don’t want you to distract him.” I escorted him to the door. “You should get out for lunch today. It’s not good to spend all your time at your desk.”
He gaped at me, dumbfounded by this bit of wisdom from Jessie, goddess of overtime.
Sandy moved out of the doorway to speed his exit. “Bye, Craig,” she prompted him.
“Bye,” he said grudgingly as I gathered up my purse and black peacoat.
As the elevator doors closed, I could see him loitering near my office, staring after us, probably wondering what had put such a bounce in my step. When we started down the eight floors to the building lobby, Sandy burst out laughing. “He doesn’t know you beat him?”
“Nope.”
“You’re a strong woman to resist rubbing his face in it,” she said.
“It’s not strength. It’s exhaustion. It’s too hard to keep up with his garbage,” I responded.
She studied me thoughtfully. “So you’re done with him?”
I shrugged. “Dealing with him is not part of my job description. He can be Dennis Court’s headache. So, yeah. I’m done.”
“Hallelujah!” she said. “Lunch is on me!”
I smothered a smile. “Control yourself, woman. They have a security camera in here somewhere.”
“Oh yeah? Look me in the eye and tell me it doesn’t feel amazing to deliver a better presentation and break out of that vicious cycle you two have had going on, all in the same morning.”
“It does feel amazing.”
“Show it, girl!” she urged me.
“Yay?” I said.
She snorted. “You’ve risen above the Craigness. Give me something worthy of that!”
Grinning, I dropped my coat and purse, threw my hands in the air and did an endzone dance, which is how the head of purchasing found me when the elevator doors dinged open on the third floor. I dropped my arms and tugged on my blazer to adjust it then folded my hands neatly in front of me. Shooting me a bewildered look, Mr. Li scooted inside the elevator, but as far from me as possible. I hedged closer to Sandy to give him more room, elbowing her in the ribs to stop her from shaking with laughter. We rode the remaining three floors down in silence, broken only by suspicious squeaks from Sandy, who was still trying not to laugh.
When the doors opened into the lobby, Mr. Li scurried out, not returning my sweet, “Have a good afternoon!”
I glared at Sandy. “Are you done?”
“Are you kidding me?” she asked. She grabbed my stuff, piled it into my arms, and dragged me toward the exit. “We’re barely getting started!”
Chapter 32
“YOU’RE EVIL,” I COMPLAINED, PUSHING my plate back with a groan.
“And completely unrepentant,” Sandy agreed.
The crumbs of four slices of cheesecake littered our table. When we polished off our pasta and couldn’t settle on a dessert, Sandy had declared that part of our celebration entailed getting any kind of cheesecake we wanted. Insisting we taste all four flavors I had dithered over, she’d ordered the classic New York cheesecake, the Oreo madness slice, and a piece each of the sensuous strawberry and key lime versions. The waiter’s eyebrows had shot up. He was obviously torn between earning a tip on a larger bill and saving us from ourselves, but he warned us, “Ladies, these are large slices. Perhaps you would like to share one?”
Glancing at his name tag, Sandy had purred, “Tony, don’t I look like a woman who should get exactly what I want?”
He had snapped his order pad closed with a smile. “Of course. Four pieces of cheesecake coming right up for the lovely women at table six.”
Sandy had smiled back sweetly and shooed him toward the kitchen and the cheesecake.
And now I slumped in my chair, devoid of the desire or will to move.
“Too much,” I moaned.
“No such thing,” Sandy mumbled, dazed.
“Not even four slices of cheesecake?”
A big sigh. Then, “Yes. Maybe four is two too many.”
“Too many twos.”
“Too many cheesecakes,” she muttered back.
“You ordered them,” I said in accusation.
“Because you couldn’t decide. How come you can’t be as narrow-minded about cheesecake flavors as you are about other things?”
I struggled to sit up straighter. “What am I narrow-minded about?”
“Working versus socializing, for one,” she said.
“What else?” I demanded.
“Tofu.”
“You can’t win an argument where tofu is your defense,” I said.
“Fine. Then I default back to working and socializing.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked. “I’ve socialized more since New Year’s than I have in months.”
“I’ll give you credit for the first three weeks. But the last two? Not so much. No Ben. No sharing Ben’s e-mails or texts or phone calls. I’m mad at you.”
“Me! Why?”
“Who am I supposed to live vicariously through if you’re blowing off Ben for work again?”
“I see. This is about you,” I said.
“Yes,” she said lazily. “Me, me, me. But I’m buying lunch today, so be nice.”
“I’m only going to be nice because I’m too full to do anything else,” I said.
We both subsided, reserving our energy for digestion.
After a while, I roused myself to speak. “I’m seeing Ben tomorrow, you know.”
She cracked an eye open and stared at me. “No, I didn’t know. I wondered if you had dumped him for Craig.”
“Ha.”
“Well, you’ve spent a lot more time focused on him than Ben lately,” she said, no apology in her tone.
“That’s true.”
Her other eye opened, and sh
e narrowed them both at me, confused. “You’re not going to argue about that either?”
“No. You’re right. But in my defense, it’s Ben’s fault.”
“Wait. It’s Ben’s fault you’ve been spending so much time at work?”
“It’s his fault we haven’t been talking. He didn’t want me to call him until I finished this project. And the only thing I’ve heard from him is a text message wishing me good luck today.”
“That was thoughtful,” Sandy said. “So are you going to call him now?”
“I can’t.”
“Because you hate happiness? Sure you can. I’ll show you how to work your phone.”
“Very funny.” I filled her in on the Ben ultimatum. I’d intentionally neglected to tell her any of it before because I knew she’d nag me to no end, wanting to know what I would do. Sure enough, she laid into me as soon as I explained the arrangement to show up for dinner on Saturday night.
“Ben’s leaving in a month?” she asked.
“Yeah. He told me last week. His contract’s almost up, and he’s going back to Arizona.”
“He said that?”
“Pretty much. It’s not like he’s going to stay here for me.” I knew I sounded defeated.
“For a take-charge girl, Jessie, you sure are letting him call all the shots. You should shake it up,” she said.
“Like how? Not show up tomorrow?”
“No. I mean, why not go over there tonight instead? Put this back on your timetable while still meeting his terms. You’re done with your project, and you’re ready to talk. Why wait for tomorrow?”
“Because I’m not ready yet, for one,” I objected.
She rolled her eyes. “It’s been two weeks since you saw him. How long is it going to take you to be ready?”
“Calm down. I meant, I’m not ready to talk to him tonight. I need to think about what I want to say. I’ll be ready by dinner tomorrow.”
“But what’s to think about, Jess?” she pressed. “Are you going over there to profess your undying love or something?”
“No!”
“Then how hard do you have to think? You show up and say ‘I figured out Craig was a total time-suck, and I’m ready to date you now. I’m cutting back to forty hours. Kiss me, Ben!’” She pressed her wrist to her forehead, Scarlett O’Hara style.
Twitterpated Page 21