‘Everything’s fine.’
‘I mean, if he’s giving you a hard time you should go to HR about it.’
‘It’s fine Sam, really.’
‘Stern is a bully,’ he continued. ‘He’ll pick on someone if he thinks he can.’
‘It’s fine, okay?’ My fingers spread in front of me like I was pushing him back. ‘I’m sorry. I just don’t really want to talk about Felix Stern right now.’
Sam shook his head. ‘I wish I could do something to help.’
‘Oh, look!’ My voice broke. ‘I said I’m fine.’ The last thing I needed was his sympathy. I wanted to shake it off like a stifling coat. I buried my head in my hands, hiding from his surprised face until I heard him walk away.
I fell off a cliff and woke up with a jolt.
‘Fuck,’ I said, touching my face. My phone was ringing. I leaned over the couch to pick it up. ‘Columbus’ read the name over the dancing phone symbol.
‘I’m outside,’ he said when I answered.
I buzzed him in and sat back on my couch, hugging my knees beneath the rug. The T.V. was on but the sound was off. I must have turned it down at some point. An empty wine bottle lay on the floor. It was too late to hide it. I could hear him coming in.
He stood in the middle of the living room looking around. ‘You’ve done a lot to the place,’ he said.
‘I guess.’
‘I think something’s wrong with your phone.’ His eyes settled on me.
‘Oh,’ I stared at my knees. I wondered if he could tell I'd been crying.
‘Look, we have to talk. I’m tired of these games. There’s obviously something going on with you.’
‘There’s nothing going on. Everything’s fine.’
‘Well, you don’t seem fine. How’s work?’
I fixed my chin on my knees and closed my eyes.
‘You know, a lot of people have a hard time working for CouperDaye,’ he pleaded. ‘You know how I feel about working there. You shouldn’t feel bad if –’
‘I don’t want to talk about it.’
‘You know what? You don’t have to be in control of everything all the time. It’s okay to ask for help!’
‘I don’t need any help!’ What was he going to do? Ride into CouperDaye on a white horse and be outraged on my behalf?
‘God,’ he said through clenched teeth. ‘I’m not suggesting you need help.’ He pinched the bridge of his nose.
The T.V. flashed us silently with a black and white movie. The woman on screen turned away from the man in disgust. But he said something beseeching and her hand fluttered against her forehead until she collapsed into his arms. Was that the only way to make up, I wondered.
‘Jesus, what is that smell?’ He went towards the kitchen.
‘Er, hello?’ I hopped off the couch.
‘How long has this pizza been here?’ He raised the half-empty pizza box on the floor.
‘Is none of your business,’ I spat.
‘Fine. Have all the space you want.’ He dropped the box and bolted for the door. ‘But this is a tacky way to end it.’
‘I’m not trying to end it,’ I shouted as the door rattled shut.
In the morning I carefully broke my position and stretched out the creaks in my body. My apartment looked like an abandoned makeover. Shiny new walls and lumps of packaged furniture waiting to be cut open. I curled back up on the couch and switched on the T.V. A helplessness unfolded around me like a heavy blanket and I sulked beneath its weight.
Another Monday morning meeting came around and BelOpt still wasn’t working. ‘Everything’s going fine. Just finishing up,’ I lied. I wasn’t about to expose something that could be used against me now. Besides, I couldn’t stomach Boris’ fit in front of everyone.
‘Good, good, everyone more or less on track then. Glad to hear it. Because, need I remind you, Jerome Ross is arriving tomorrow for the opening of the CPR Data Centre. So, we want to be ship-shape and shiny.’
‘They’re going ahead with the opening?’ I said, ‘I thought they had loads of problems. Why aren’t they postponing?’
‘Did I mention JR is coming over for the ceremony?’ Boris laughed, ‘Failure is not an option. That goes for project rollouts before the Data Centre move as well. Cameron and Orla you both have deadlines this week so do let me know if you have any issues A.S.A.P. Orla, I assume you’re aware of the Data Centre schedule?’
‘Why should I be aware of it?’
‘Because you’re signed up. You’re supervising the move of our feeds over the weekend and you’re doing a five-minute snap interview with JR. CPR – What you can do for your company.’
‘Fuck!’ I shouted, making everyone jump.
‘Er, the schedule will be on the CPR website. You should probably familiarise yourself with it,’ Boris said.
The doors of the lift closed in my face, its occupants staring over my head. I jabbed the button again and waited for a lift to the next floor. There were stairs but they were locked behind an automatic fire door and chasing up a request with Desktop was not the kind of emergency that would make it open.
I stepped out of the lifts to a luminous sign that read Desktop.
‘Hi, I’m Orla.’ I approached the row of desks recognising Gordon. ‘We’ve spoken before, when I was working on AsiaCap?’
‘Hi,’ he said, straightening in his chair. His hair stood straight up and looked wet with gel.
‘I raised an investigation request to your group last week. Can you tell me if someone has taken a look at it please?’
‘When did you raise it?’
‘Last week.’
‘Well it’s probably going to be allocated to someone shortly.’ His phone rang and he picked it up.
‘Excuse me.’ I insisted.
‘Call you back,’ he said hanging up the phone.
‘I need to know when it will be looked at. I’m rolling out my feed this week and the data is not displaying correctly. I provided your team with a spec weeks ago.’
‘What’s your project? I’m not sure I care for your tone.’
‘Belgium Options.’
He typed some keys, looked at his screen and brought up a list. ‘It’s not on the high priority list and we’re extremely busy, but we will get to it as soon as we can.’
‘But it’s a high priority for me. You can’t just leave it.’ His row of team mates began to turn around. ‘Look, this is just not good enough. On my team if someone provides you with a spec then you make sure you get the job done.’
‘Hey. You can’t just come over here and talk to me like that. Okay, this is happening. I’m going to ask you to leave.’
‘Unbelievable. Muppets.’ I blurted and walked away knowing I had gone too far.
He’ll probably make a complaint, I thought. Guys like that are only good at one thing: covering their arse. I blinked at my screen. My strategy XML file was open next to another project with similar functionality. I was trying to compare layout to see if there were any differences but I might as well have been trying to spot errors in a foreign language.
‘For Christ’s sake,’ I slapped my hand on the desk and then squeezed it into a fist.
‘Easy, tiger,’ Paul from Quants leaned over my cube.
‘Oh! Hey, Paul. Sorry.’ My voice automatically dropped to match his. He always spoke quietly and deliberately as if he wanted you to come into his world. An aura deepened by his unkempt beard and wide sideburns, too scraggly for his young face.
‘You okay?’ His hazel eyes crinkled.
‘Yeah, sorry, how are you?’
‘Good, good. I have some news for you. Maybe this isn’t a good time,’ he chuckled, ‘but you asked me a few months ago about transfers to our team?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, we’ll be advertising a position internally from next week. Thought I’d give you the heads up.’
‘That’s great, thanks, Paul. I’ll look it up.’ I nodded.
‘Cool. Yeah, think
you might like it with us. I know you’re keen to get into algorithmic programming. Obviously there’s a training period as well. You wouldn’t just be expected to hit the ground running.’
‘It’s exactly what I’m looking for.’ I nodded again.
‘So, how’s it going here? Stressful?’
‘You know, busy, as always.’
‘Sure. Well, I’ll leave you to it. Er... you know, we’re not allowed to poach so we never had this conversation.’
‘What conversation?’ I chuckled with him until he was gone and then let my smile drop. I couldn’t move teams while I was on a revision programme. It was one of the rules. I’d totally forgotten about approaching Paul. It was towards the end of METX. With METX and AsiaCap under my belt, I thought I would be in a good position to move into Quants. I stood up slowly and went in to the toilets and locked myself into a cubicle. They’ve won, I thought and promptly broke my record of having never cried in a work place. I was stuck here doing an impossible job I no longer wanted, and if they wanted me out sooner or later I’d give them the ammunition they needed. My forehead fell against the cold hand of the white wall and I stayed there until I felt drained. In the mirror over the sinks, mascara streamed down my cheeks like railway tracks. I splashed cold water on my face and dabbed with a paper towel, pressing it into my eyes. I looked at the face again, puffy and red and unfolded the towel covered in mascara and tears. It was printed with the CPR logo. More like RIP.
Chapter Nine
Jerome Ross seemed smaller in real life. For a man with a large reputation, his arrival happened quietly. He appeared on our floor with his head stuck in a video camera and went around saying ‘Hi, how you doing?’ to people he wanted to film. Into his late forties, he was bald on top with neat white hair in a strip, around the back of his head and a round, well-worn face. Shiny cufflinks flashed as he worked and a wide-collar shirt hinted at his flamboyant side. The cause of his reputation was obvious when he occasionally shouted, ‘I love that. Keep going’, as he caught something interesting for his documentary. Sometimes there’d be a smacking sound that meant a high-five moment. Most people intended to avoid him by taking different routes on and off the R&D floor but some were unlucky, attracting his attention and some, like me, were signed up for a formal interview.
Desktop closed my query. They were correctly processing everything they received. The Exchange confirmed their sample was correct. The problem, still unsolved, was mine.
I carried a sick feeling in my stomach on the way to a Buddy meeting with Boris. He wasn’t alone when I arrived outside the room. Sam was in there too, obviously shouting and Boris was raising his hands in defence. I waited, clutching my folder as Sam flew open the door and stormed out passed me. Boris came out after him. He stopped dead and glanced around the floor. Then he looked at me and went back inside.
‘Sit down,’ he said as I came in.
‘Is there a problem with BelOpt?’
‘Yes,’ I admitted. ‘Some values look incorrect.’
‘Because I had the Desktop manager ringing me this morning saying that you were, and I quote, rude and disrespectful to a member of his team.’
‘Yeah well, we had a fight.’
‘You had a fight? What, you can’t talk to people in a civilised manner now? You opened this request last week.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me about it? The meeting yesterday, you said everything was fine.’
‘I didn’t want to alarm you. I thought I could handle it myself.’
‘So, in fact, you lied to me. I mean, there’s less than a week to your deadline and you’ve put us in a situation where it might all go tits up, eh? This is exactly why you’re on a revision programme.’
I stared at my hands, suddenly feeling hot.
‘You know the spotlight is on us right now,’ he said viciously. ‘Now, I have to get Sam or Cameron off what they’re working on – probably both of them – and get them to help you.’
‘Why can’t I just get an extension?’ My face sneered with annoyance, ‘I mean it’s not as if anyone in Belgium is waiting for it.’
‘Orla, JR is looking at everything we’re doing.’ His voice began to crack. ‘I do not want to have to explain to him why your project is late. I mean, I assume I don’t have to spell out for you, how things will look if he does get involved. I will have to tell them you lied to me.’ I looked up, meeting his round eyes, steadier than usual. ‘I mean, why the hell couldn’t you have told when something was wrong straight away? ‘Oh Boris, I have a problem with BelOpt’, ‘Oh, Orla, thanks for bringing that up. After all, that’s what these meetings are for. Now that you’ve told me, I can do something about it’. I mean, lying about this is just right out of order!’
‘I can’t take this.’ I shook my head.
‘You can’t take what?’
‘Everything is out of control.’
‘Look. I really need you to let me know when there’s a problem, alright? Oh look, em... stop crying, eh? Take it easy, love. This is not a therapy session. Why don’t you go and see the nurse, Orla?... What, now you’re laughing? Why are you laughing? Look, go and see the nurse, Orls. Go and see the nurse.’
I wiped mascara away with my fingers in the lift mirror, on my way down to the canteen. Everyone was going to find out that I couldn’t handle my job. Sam and Cameron were going to have to help me and they would probably discover the problem was something simple that I should have found myself. But... what if they couldn’t find the problem?
In the canteen I poured a cup of coffee with unsure hands and headed for our booth. I wondered where Sam had got to. Had he finally left for good? I stopped before I got to the booth. He was sitting there with his head in his hands. I looked around. Maybe I should sit somewhere else? We hadn’t spoken since the day he did my German code review. I remembered the first time we had a coffee together. He had warned me about taking on METX. I thought he was being patronising – it was my first rollout and he had been helping me with the steps. After writing the upload requests to get the code on the live server we had come down for a coffee, bringing the laptop with us, so we could check the rollout from the comfort of the canteen. It began its gentle whirr on start-up. Sam tapped on the base of it with his thumb and then sat back, letting it run by itself. I still wasn’t used to our altitude and had pressed my head against the window, looking down on the ants below coming and going around the fountain. Everything looked in slow motion.
‘This system is ridiculous.’ I remembered Sam saying. ‘It’s such a cumbersome procedure rolling anything out. This’ll take about half an hour to be completed. Always make sure you double check afterwards.’ I remember noticing how many times he said ‘you should always double-check afterwards’.
‘So... what does happen if something goes wrong?’
‘You’d be fired.’
‘What?’
‘They’d assume you were trying to sabotage the company and fire you on the spot. You wouldn’t even have time to collect your things.’
‘You’re joking.’
‘Exaggerating slightly. This place is pretty heavy-handed.’ His face twisted. ‘And it depends on the project. The higher the profile, the more they’ll need a scapegoat.’
‘Right.’ I wondered if he was often in trouble for making mistakes. Maybe he just wasn’t good at his job.
‘It’s a blame culture. Comes from the top down. Only thing they know how to do. Bunch of clowns.’
I wanted him to stop talking. I’d find out for myself how to handle working here and I didn’t want someone else’s negative experience bringing me down.
The laptop beeped then and he typed in the commands for us to remote-login to the live server.
‘Half the files are there already,’ he said, showing me the list.
In my head I counted the number of files left to go.
‘It will take a while,’ he said sitting back, ‘so, how are you finding London? Are you here
on your own or –’
‘Yes, here on my own.’ I was thrown by the personal question. ‘It’s a bit overwhelming, London. So much to see.’
‘What do you do on the weekends?’
‘Well mostly house hunting. I’d really like to get my own place.’
‘Where are you looking?’
‘Everywhere. It’s a nice way to get to know London, actually. If it’s on the A-Z I’ve probably been there.’
‘Well, if you need someone to give you advice, let me know.’
‘Oh... thanks.’ It was the first time I had experienced him being sincere. He was usually sarcastic, flippant at best. Did this mean I was accepted?
‘I could check out a place with you if you like,’ he continued, ‘If you need a second opinion.’
‘Thanks, Sam, that’s really nice of you.’
He nodded, puffing out his cheeks with air. ‘Is this all your files?’ he turned the laptop around and pointed at a list of filenames in a white font against a black background.
‘Yes, that’s all of them.’ He wasn’t trying to flirt with me, was he?
‘We have to check the start and stop times for your feed and then we’re done... See those METX files?’ he pointed to another list of files on the screen, ‘that Exchange is getting a major overhaul in a few months. It’ll be a really interesting project, but high-profile, so no one will go near it. That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about. You know the work here is interesting but the politics are so toxic it’s not worth the risk doing anything under a spotlight. You’ll see, Boris will have trouble getting someone to take it on. You should try to avoid it too.’
‘Actually it sounds interesting.’ Something substantial that everyone had their eyes on was exactly what I had been after.
‘No, believe me. You don’t want any part of it.’
‘I’d like to decide that for myself.’
‘Oh.’ My resolution pulled him up. ‘Well, talk to Boris about it. I’m sure he’ll be happy to have a volunteer.’ He went back to typing.
I approached him tentatively now and slid into the booth opposite him. ‘Hey,’ I said, ‘can I join you?’
The I.T. Girl Page 10