by B. B. Hamel
“I can handle it.”
“I’d feel a lot better about this if you’d just show me what you have,” I say.
She shrugs. “I don’t care if you feel better or not. This is my project.”
I bite back a retort. She’s being so petty and frustrating and I just don’t know how to break through her icy exterior.
“Fine,” I say, voice clipped. “I’m trusting you.”
“Good.” She turns back to her laptop.
I hesitate a second, lingering in her door, but I quickly walk away. That’s an average interaction these days.
The week passes slowly, molasses and honey. I check in with Remi daily, but she keeps blowing me off.
There’s nothing else to do but wait, and when Friday finally rolls around, I’m on the edge of my fucking seat.
I’ve never felt this nervous at work before. Blair shows up in the morning, right on time. I expect her to appear with an entourage of company people, but she’s alone like always, wearing all black and peering out at me through her bangs.
“Hello, Justin,” she says in her strange, flat voice. “I’m looking forward to the meeting.”
“Good. Remi has some really great stuff for you.”
She nods once. “Let’s go.”
I take a deep breath and lead her back toward the conference room. Remi’s been in there for a half hour setting up, so I have to just assume that she’s all prepared and ready to go.
I’ve never put so much control in someone else’s hands before. It’s actually kind of terrifying. If Remi screws this up and it goes poorly, Blair could walk and my new job may be dead before it really gets going. I wish I could be more actively involved, or at least aware of what’s going to happen today. Instead, I’m as much in the dark as Blair is, and it’s terrifying.
We step into the conference room and Remi smiles what I think is the first genuine smile I’ve seen from her in at least a month.
“Hi, Blair,” she says as we shuffle into the room. She glances around and gives me a pointed look, and I just shrug: It’s only her today.
The conference room is clearly set up for a whole team, but Blair doesn’t seem to notice. “Hello, Remi,” Blair says, sitting down in a chair up toward the front of the table. There are bottles of water, a little spread with bagels and cream cheese, and some cracker snacks, but Blair ignores it all.
Remi takes it in stride. “I’ve got some great ideas for you today,” she says. “I’ve been thinking a lot about what you said, and I hope I can make Spine exactly what you want it to be.”
Blair nods a little. “Okay. Show me.”
Remi clears her throat. I sit down next to Blair. It’s fucking game time.
Remi launches into her presentation. “When people think of Spine, they imagine immersive, incredible worlds…” She clicks a button and the projector shows a still shot from one of the Spine games, a large, expansive lake region. “They think of magic, mystery, immersion. They want to be there.” She clicks another button, more beautiful landscaped.
“But Spine products exist in the real world, too. I don’t think you need to sell your virtual worlds. They sell themselves. As soon as someone steps into the Spine world, they’ll see what all the hype is about. What we need to sell is the Spine hardware itself.”
Remi clicks a button and a picture of the current hardware appears. It’s mostly black plastic, plain and simple, almost boring. It’s clunky, clearly not streamlined for aesthetic purposes. In short, it’s utilitarian. It’s boring.
She clicks another button without a word, and mockups of the hardware start to appear. It’s sleek, smooth. It comes in all different colors, shapes, sizes. It has personality, the kind of stuff people would want to actually wear out in public, if this stuff weren’t the sort of thing you kept in a closet or in your bedroom.
“Beautiful objects sell better,” she says finally once she’s done. “Blair, I want to make these a reflection of who you are and who your company is, but I don’t want you to be the face of it anymore. I want to show your beauty, everything that’s interesting about you, through your products. Once we accomplish that, we’ll branch out into other areas and bring the Spine brand into every single home in the country.”
I sit there, completely stunned and horrified.
Remi starts to flip through her presentation, talking the whole time about media buys and brand strategy. She talks about more traditional ad agency roles and activities, but I’m too busy thinking about that intro.
Advertising agencies don’t redesign a company’s product. We just don’t. We take that product and we spin it, we sell it. We make people see how amazing it is.
But we don’t redesign it. That’s just so far beyond our normal scope, and I can’t believe Remi would ever suggest something like that.
I glance at Blair but I have no clue what she’s thinking. She’s inscrutable, as always, and she listens patiently. Meanwhile, I’m freaking the fuck out, because Remi just suggested something absolutely insane.
She either lost her mind or she’s trying to sabotage me. Either way, I think we’re fucked.
Remi finally gets to the end of the presentation. There were some good ideas in there, the insane opening aside, but I could barely pay attention. I’m sweating bullets. If I had known about this, I would’ve put a stop to it.
Obviously, this is why she hasn’t been including me in her plans.
“And that’s it,” Remi says finally. “That’s the whole strategy, start to finish. I know it’s a lot, and it’s aggressive, but I believe in what you’re doing, Blair. I believe we can make it even better.”
Remi smiles at her. Blair slowly stands up.
“No.”
One word. Blair says one word, and Remi’s whole face slowly collapses.
“I’m sorry?” Remi asks.
“No,” Blair repeats, with a little shake of her head. “Try again.” Without another word, she turns and heads for the door.
I jump to my feet and follow her. “If there’s an issue, we’ll fix it.”
“Try again,” Blair says. “This time, you must be involved.”
That stuns me. “I was… I was involved.”
“You weren’t. This is all her work. I can taste it.” Blair strides through the office. Remi lingers in the doorway of the conference room, watching as we leave.
I don’t know what to say. Clearly, she’s smarter than she appears. “I’ll do my best,” I say finally.
“Try again.” She nods at me once and steps into the elevator. The doors slide shut, and she’s gone.
I have no clue what just happened. I turn away from the elevator, trying to figure it out as I slowly walk back to the conference room. Remi’s back inside, cleaning everything up.
“I guess she didn’t like it,” Remi says.
I softly shut the conference room door before turning to face her. “What the hell were you thinking?”
Remi raises an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”
“Redesigning her products like that? Are you insane? We don’t do that. She didn’t ask for it.”
“She asked for a new vision for her company,” Remi says softly. “I gave her that vision, and she didn’t like it.”
I clench my jaw. “Because you did it alone.”
She shakes her head. “No, because she’s insane.”
“Remi,” I say more forcefully than I meant to. “Stop.”
She stops fussing with her laptop and looks at me, mildly surprised.
“You went way over the line,” I say to her, anger getting the better of me. “I get it, you hate me, you think my family ruined your life, whatever. I can’t even argue with that. But if you want to work here and you want to stay on this project, no more bullshit. No more ignoring me, keeping me away from everything. You’ll work with me, or you won’t work here at all.”
I stare her down. She blinks.
“Is that what Blair said?” she asks finally.
“She knew I didn’t have anything t
o do with this,” I say. “She saw through it all.”
“I don’t know how that’s even possible, unless you told her.”
“I didn’t. I was way too embarrassed to admit something like that. She just knew.”
Remi shakes her head. “I can’t do it.”
“You’re going to do it. I’ve been letting you jerk me around, but that has to stop now.”
She hesitates, watching me silently, before a little smile passes over her lips. “I’m almost impressed,” she says. “I didn’t think you’d stand up to me.”
I sigh and walk closer to her. “No more of this bullshit. You took your shot and you missed. Blair’s letting us try again, which is more than we normally get. No more messing around.”
She watches me, chewing her lip again. For a second, I forget how pissed I am at her, and wish I were the one chewing that lip.
“We’ll see,” she says, picking up her stuff.
“No, Remi. You have a choice to make.”
She watches me silently, and I can’t read her expression at all. I have no clue if she wants to stay here or if she’s still set on storming out of this place. I don’t know if she hates me so much that the thought of working with me overrides her desire to succeed at this project.
I have no clue what I’m doing, but my fucking god, I want her so badly it almost hurts.
“We’ll see,” she says again, and leaves the conference room.
I’m left standing there, so angry. I want to follow her back to her office, push her skirt up over her ass, and spark her skin red.
Instead, I grab a bagel and head back to my desk, fuming the whole way.
9
Remi
I squeeze down hard on a stress ball and watch the rubber stretch between my fingers. I do it over and over, clenching my jaw, trying to keep myself from standing up and screaming.
I’ve never been so humiliated in a meeting before. I’m so livid, I could quit right here.
But I don’t want to give Justin the satisfaction. I don’t think he needs me anymore to keep the team together. It’s been long enough that I think people are on board with the new changes, and even if they aren’t, turnover will be minimal at best. He can get rid of me now and take over the Spine account himself if he wants.
Although I doubt Blair will let him. She specifically said she wants us both.
I made a mistake. I never should’ve redesigned their products, and really, that wasn’t my intention. I wasn’t trying to say they should do that, but rather showing Blair how a cohesive vision can affect all of her materials, including their hardware.
I can see how it came off, though. I didn’t notice at the time because I figured it was just such a small part of my presentation, but Justin really gave it to me. I hated standing there, getting scolded by him. I was tempted to tell him to fuck off and storm away.
Instead, I’m going to stay and prove him wrong. He thinks I can’t make this work, but I know I can.
He doesn’t deserve the job he has. Quitting and running away now is just going to allow him to keep it even longer. If the board has no other good options, they’ll just stick with Justin as long as he wants the position. But if I’m around, I can always slip into his role if he ever falters.
Leaving the company now would be throwing away all the hard work I’ve put in. As much as I hate to admit it, I need to stick around and see this one through, if at least to finish this Spine project.
So instead of giving in to self-pity, which is really tempting, I get to work. I throw out everything I had before and start fresh. I spend the afternoon brainstorming the basics, trying to come up with a new vision for the company.
All I keep seeing is Blair looking at me from under her bangs and saying one single word with that flat, affectless tone of hers.
It’s hard to shake that image. It stung me, deep down in my gut. I don’t think I’ve ever been rejected so clearly before in my life.
No. That one word hurt more than any other word I’ve heard in my life.
I’m staring at my computer screen, wondering how the day just slipped past when someone knocks at my open office door. I look up as Justin steps into the room.
I lean back in my chair, crossing my arms. “Come back to scold me some more?” I ask him.
He frowns. “Not at all.”
“Look, I’m working, okay?”
“It’s after six,” he points out. “Everyone’s gone home for the day, pretty much.”
“And yet here you are.”
He grins at me. “I guess I’m as much a workaholic as you are.”
“Or you just have nowhere else to go.”
He winces a little bit and I feel bad for my sudden attack. “That might be true, too.” He walks a little closer, something held outstretched in his right fist. “Here, I wanted to show you this.”
I cock my head, trying to see. I have to stand up and come around the desk, the smile returning to his face.
“I found it on eBay the other day, couldn’t resist myself.”
It’s a small, purple egg. At first, I think it’s an Easter egg, but as I get closer I realize it has a tiny little LCD screen and three little yellow buttons underneath it.
“Is that what I think it is?” I reach out tentatively.
“Sure is.” He holds it up and I slowly take the little Tamagotchi from his palm.
I can’t help but laugh. It’s smooth and looks almost brand new. When I hit a button, the thing turns on and the strange little creature stares out at me, waiting for me to take care of it.
“I can’t believe you found one,” I say with a laugh. “I mean, we used to spend hours with these stupid things.”
“We each had our own,” he says. “Mine kept dying so we just played with yours.”
“That’s right.” I grin at him. “You were awful at it.”
“I didn’t care about it, except when you were around.”
I shake my head, laughing. I stare down at the little purple egg, and I can remember all the time we spent on this stupid little game.
We were little kids back then. I think we were probably six at the time, and everything’s a little hazy, clouded in the way all childhood memories are. That was almost exactly twenty years ago now.
Although the memories are hazy, the feelings aren’t. I remember being really invested in this tiny little Tamagotchi, almost obsessed. We’d play with it down by the creek, sitting on a big rock while our dads sat in the backyard nearby, drinking beers and typing at laptops. In retrospect, I realize they were writing the movie together, but we didn’t know it at the time.
We didn’t care. We were kids in our own little world, best friends for as long as I can remember.
“Keep it,” Justin says. “Consider it an apology gift.”
“Apology?” I quirk an eyebrow.
“I was maybe a little harsh with you.”
“No.” I hand the toy back to him. “You weren’t.”
He doesn’t take it. “Look, Remi. The rest of that presentation was really good. I know Blair turned it down, but if it were any other client I think it would’ve been a home run.”
“Doesn’t matter,” I say, finally pulling the Tamagotchi back reluctantly when I realize he’s not going to grab it from me. “She still turned me down and here we are.”
He sighs and takes a seat across from my desk. I hesitate a second, standing there next to him, before I move around and sit. He gives me an almost sad look, which is actually confusing.
“Clients like Blaire are the worst kind,” he says. “Honestly, sometimes it’s better just to let them go and not go through all the trouble trying to please them.”
“You don’t have that option though.”
“No, I really don’t. If this weren’t so important, I’d consider just dropping her entirely. But I’m stuck with this project, and I think you’re stuck with it, too.”
“Why? I can leave whenever I want.”
“Yeah, you can, I
just don’t think you will.” He leans toward me, a devilish smile on his face. “I think you want to prove me wrong and succeed.”
I stare at him for a second, annoyed that he can see through me. “You think I can’t pull this off?”
“Not alone,” he says. “I think you need my help. I don’t think Blaire is ever going to accept any work from just one of us.”
“You’re probably right,” I say softly, looking down at the toy in my hand. “Where’s that leave things?”
“It means we gotta swallow our pride and work together.”
“Not my strong suit,” I admit.
“Same. It’s not easy for me letting you take lead.”
I watch him quietly. I can tell this conversation is as difficult for him as it is for me. He doesn’t like being reliant on someone, especially when it comes to his job. He hates that I have the power to screw him over.
And I hate that he has the job I deserve.
“Thanks for this,” I say finally, putting the Tamagotchi on my desk.
“Yeah. Sure.” He stands up. “Anyway, I’m going to start doing some work on the account. I want to go over it together tomorrow.”
“Maybe.”
He nods. “Good enough. Have a good night, Remi.”
I watch him leave my office and for a second, I’m tempted to follow him. I don’t know why. I just have a feeling he’s going to go back to that bar, sit there with a beer for an hour or two, and do even more work.
He’s a lot like me in that way. I’m never sitting still, either.
Instead, I pick up the little plastic toy again and stare at it. I let the memories it draws out of me wash through my mind, little snippets of watercolor-hued images mixed with more immediate emotions. It’s funny he remembers this thing, all these years later. I was only obsessed with it for maybe one summer at most.
That tells me a lot about how much he remembers about me, and it’s almost frightening. I figured he forgot all about our friendship, considering the way he used to act toward me as we got older and all that shit between our dads happened.
I sigh and pack my bag. Before I leave, I slip the Tamagotchi into the front pouch, not able to leave it alone.