In some ways... he was more clever than me.
Chief Creative Officer
SEVERAL STRESSFUL DAYS went by. I never should have told Nick about our financial problems because, as Mark had predicted... he melted. Nick was forever in a grouchy mood after that. Travis reported that he woke in the middle of the night and could hear Nick type-type-typing, then cursing at his computer.
I felt horrible. We were doomed. Nick was not the kind of guy who dealt well with pressure, which was why he’d always been flaky with his other jobs. Apparently, he would take a coding job only for it to last a few months, sometimes six, but never a year. If Nick didn’t know me and if he didn’t have so much responsibility for the success of our app, he would’ve left months ago.
He was not having a good time. Travis was not having a good time. I was not having a good time. We needed some good news.
Enter: Mark.
Mark had spent almost every waking hour for the past week trying to get on the phone with someone that could help my team. He worked every angle. He called his parents and told them about me and what we were trying to do. It didn’t go over well and they were not pleased that we had gotten back together. He contacted as many companies that his supervisor allowed, drawing upon his marketing firm’s client list to find an investor.
Nothing.
Nada.
Until one day he was given a meeting downtown with a rather large company eager to invest in big data. We were not a data mining operation, but Mark didn’t care. He could bullshit like a maestro and he worked that meeting expertly. Mark didn’t tell me about the meeting until it was already in the books.
MARK STEAMROLLED INTO headquarters unannounced... so something was up.
Suhail was still in the process of moving in—day by day he was falling deeper into my web. I had cleared out the tiny, tiny closet in my room and he had already put a small selection of his wardrobe in there. He hadn’t begun eating at our place—he still only slept there.
But... Suhail had also taken a few days off work and was helping us on our user interface by implementing some of what I referred to as ‘glamour’ buttons.
So Mark came into this focused atmosphere wearing the widest smile—bigger than the one he wore at our ‘prom’.
“What’s up with you?” I asked. Nick was still in a bad mood and I didn’t want to upset him with Mark’s puppy-dog energy.
“I got it,” he said excitedly. “We’ve got an in. I just came from a meeting—” He took off his coat and hung it on the back of a kitchen chair. “They’re interested in your product. I told them money was tight and you needed a temporary lift to stay operational. They want to see the product in action.”
“We can’t put it into operation!” I yelled. “We don’t have enough data!” We’d been working on this for weeks and he knew we weren’t ready to ship.
Suhail clicked away on his computer. “We do have a working prototype,” he said. “It’s not what you wanted, but it does function. Enough to get the general idea across.” He stopped me from arguing. “I know it’s not pretty and I know you want it to be better, but we have a product. We can ship with this.”
“How are you supposed to test this? It doesn’t gather any information. It doesn’t hook into our database!” I pointed at Nick. I didn’t know anything about ‘hooking into the database’ but that was a phrase that Suhail had uttered multiple times over the past few days.
“We can get a prototype off the ground,” Suhail countered. “We have three weeks left.”
“You have until Monday,” Mark said. “I told them you would be ready by Monday.”
Three days.
“Why the fuck would you do that!” I screeched, ready to pull my hair out.
“You need the cash now and these guys are hot for you. If you don’t get this funding, you’re sunk. You’re going to tell your employees—”
“We don’t have to tell them,” Nick supplied, stumbling into the main room from his ogre cave. His eyes were bloodshot and he looked like the walking dead. “We don’t have to tell them anything until it’s over.”
“We owe them,” I stressed. “They need to know.”
“We owe them nothing,” Nick repeated.
“What do we know about this meeting?” I asked, changing topics. Mark had royally pissed me off with this surprise, but now that it had been unleashed, it was just another problem to deal with. I was good at crisis management and would find a way to make this work.
“It’s with an insurance company. They want to develop a program that tracks people’s weight loss and other health-related things and integrate it into their pricing model. The healthier you are and the more you improve your health—the cheaper your premiums.”
I sneered instinctively. If only Mark was teasing, but he wasn’t. Cheaper premiums my ass. This is one cheap-ass money-grubbing insurance company.
“And they want people who understand how to collect data,” he added.
The five of us gathered around the kitchen table and sounded out the implications of what we had to do.
“We can do it,” Suhail said confidently. “This isn’t the perfect prototype for that kind of presentation, but we can modify what we have into a minimum viable product. Maybe.”
My heart roared and blood pounded in my ears.
“I can make prototype patients and store them in our database. I don’t know what the health records would look like—”
“I’ll help with the health records,” I offered quickly. Hell, I’ve been to the hospital so many times I should probably be a doctor by now. “I like doing the creative things. That’s why I’m the Chief Creative Officer.” I even had a small wooden plaque to show off my title.
“You can’t be the CCO,” Suhail countered. “Then who’s the CEO?”
“I don’t know. We do it by committee.”
Suhail was scandalized. Then he glanced at Mark. “Is he serious?”
“Just go with it,” Mark said. “We’ll discuss it later, if there is a later. I promised our buyers the world. They’re going to expect a lot.”
“We have better functionality than last week,” I said. Suhail had made our buttons and our menus work smoothly and intuitively. “You’re supposed to undersell the product. If we had, like, a month...”
“Well, we don’t.” Mark looked me square in the face. “This is the best I could do.”
“Is this meeting why you were acting so weird the last few days?”
“Uh... yeah. I didn’t want to tell you guys until I had something serious. It kind of snowballed in the last twenty-four hours.”
“How much searching have you been doing?” Travis asked.
“Kind of every day. Just looking. I gave up a New York fashion shoot for you guys.”
“Oh, bullshit,” I countered. “You didn’t tell me that.”
Mark insisted it was the truth and I muttered about how we were all grateful for his ‘sacrifice’. I still teased him about his modeling gigs—to me it was the funniest thing in the world. A year ago I would have been distressed about Mark sabotaging his career to help me, but I wasn’t that proud anymore.
“So now we have a direction,” I said while contemplating how jam-packed our schedule would be over the weekend. “Do we have any more guidance? Goals?”
“That’s all I know. They want to make people healthier and they want it simple enough so that a tech-phobic person with a smartphone can enjoy it.”
“We’ll need a walk-through,” I muttered. “We’ll need a product they can download in our meeting and begin using within five minutes.”
“Three minutes,” Mark added.
“Immediately,” Suhail said.
“We’ll aim for immediately, but we have to get it under five minutes. Everything has to be... um, let’s focus on weight and exercise for our example. Can we hook this thing up to a step counter? Fitbits?”
“I can look into the API’s,” Travis said.
What the fuck i
s an API?
“Good. I’ll get my mom’s Fitbit and we’ll test it with that. If we could sync a Fitbit to one of our accounts within a couple minutes...”
“Slave driver,” Nick muttered.
“What was that?” I asked.
“It’s nothing,” Travis assured me. “You do get bossy when we’re under deadline.”
“I do not,” I protested.
“You’ve always been that way,” Travis said. “That’s why people were afraid to be in your work groups in college.”
“They weren’t afraid,” I stressed. “We got A’s. Our projects were always the top ones.”
“I can imagine,” Mark said. He walked behind me and squeezed my shoulders, then rubbed. It felt horrible. “I’ve seen you when you get on a roll.” One of his hands slid down to my torso and pulled me to his body. His chin rested on my neck. “Why don’t we relax for an hour or two? Everybody is really stressed out. Nick? Why don’t we play golf?”
“I don’t golf,” I replied quickly. Mark pinched me and I flinched.
“Golf? Anyone? Our CEO needs to learn how to swing a golf club if he’s ever going to hobnob with the rich and famous.”
“I’m not the CEO! I’m the CCO. I’m in charge of creativity!”
“I’ll get him out of your hair... and we all need to recharge.” Mark looked at Nick again. “Nick, meet us on the links? Travis?”
“Isn’t it a game for four?” I complained.
“Is it?” Mark squeezed me again. “I guess this dummy can be my ballboy.”
“It’s called a ‘caddie’, you dunce.” I rolled my eyes and sighed. “Fine, we’ll play golf...” and waste our time.
My mood shouldn’t have been so far in the dumps. Here Suhail was suddenly talking about the things ‘we’ were going to do. Mark had gotten us a lifeline. Nick was using verbs again.
Mark and I drove home and changed. He forced me into an outfit that ‘showed off my assets’. It felt like I was being objectified and Mark said, “Duh.” He walked down to the storage room and pulled out his clubs.
I remained in the apartment and drafted a quick email:
Hey Team,
We have a make it or break it moment on Monday. We will be presenting our prototype before a group of investors. If we secure funding, we will remain in operation into the foreseeable future.
I apologize for the late notice and for what I am about to ask of you. Our Command Center will be working around the clock through the weekend in an effort to cater our project to the investor’s needs. We will be integrating Fitbit data into the app and making basic ‘gamification’ effects.
I hate that I have to ask you to pitch in this weekend and I hate that I have to make this request so late on a Friday. My dad used to do this to me all the time when I was growing up and I hated it. But here it goes: I would love, love, love if you could remain by your computers as much as possible this Saturday and Sunday and help us polish this project for our potential investors. Some of you have been working on this for six months and I owe you the truth: if we don’t get this right in the next three days, we might not get another chance.
If you work this weekend and we don’t secure the funding, I will pay you for one week after the company closes. If you work this weekend and we do secure the funding, I will give you a week of vacation, PTO, and my eternal gratitude.
Your fearless CCO,
Chris
Mark stomped into the apartment and yelled at me to get down in the car—he had apparently been waiting for me. I let my finger hover over the ‘send’ button, but didn’t press it. I shut the laptop and, against my better judgment, followed Mark to take part in one of the most embarrassing sports-related moments of my life.
Mark acted weird that afternoon, both throughout the drive and while we golfed. I gave him a pass because we were all under a lot of stress. He seemed on edge and at times it was like he could’ve easily swerved and lost control of the car.
He babbled about Suhail having the idea to play golf in order to calm Nick down and about me being the CEO and about bringing Travis along and not being jealous of my friendship with him.
All I could think about was the unsent letter that I felt compelled to share with my lower-level employees. We had to share the news. If we didn’t get this funding in three days, then we were probably toast. I had to tell them. And if I asked for help... well, we needed the help!
“You need to relax,” Mark said, even though he sounded like he had just swallowed a buzzing beehive of anxiety. “It’s all going to work out.”
“You didn’t get this contact from your parents, did you?”
“No,” he said quickly—too quickly. “Would it matter if I had?”
“Mark! Don’t lie to me!”
“I’m not! But I want you to tell me straight up, if it came from my parents, would this be any different?”
“Why would you ask me that question unless you were covering your butt? Quit acting so weird.”
“I’m not acting weird!” he said nervously. Then he blushed.
“You’re such a fucking liar! I told you not to get your family involved. I don’t want to let them down.”
“It’s not from my family! I’m not lying!”
“Well, you’re sure as shit lying about something because you—”
“It’s for your birthday party,” he reminded me. “Just let me have this until then...”
I grunted. “The suspense is killing me,” I said sarcastically while staring out the window. “Just tell me what it is. You’re acting guilty and it’s driving me crazy. You know you want to.”
Mark refused to spill the beans. He changed the subject and reminded me that CEOs need to play golf.
And, in fact, we played golf... but there’s no good news to report back to you on that front. Everyone else played better than me. By the fifth hole I was begging to just be the caddie, but they were having too much fun at my expense. I didn’t die of embarrassment—that’s the best I can say about my first time playing golf.
Later that night I made a comment to Mark: “If CEOs need to play golf, then Nick should be CEO.”
“Nick shouldn’t be anywhere close to a leadership position. You tell me all the time how he melts under pressure.”
“You tell me that. I’ve never said those words. Nick’s reliable... in his own way. And I’m never playing golf again!” I didn’t want to talk about Nick—not after the drubbing he gave me that afternoon.
“Aw... don’t be like that. You were so cute, with your tight little butt and your cute little muscles.” He squeezed my arms.
“Stop it! Leave me alone!”
He tickled me. “You’re too competitive. And you’re so damn sexy when you get like that.” He kissed me until I temporarily forgot how horrible I was on the links. I was so awful—I’m not going to write about it because I was just that bad and it is painful to write about something I suck at... like, I’m so bad.
“I want you to read this,” I said. I handed him the laptop and let him read my e-mail.
“You really want to send this?” he asked. He fixed a typo. “The guys said not to.”
“They didn’t say not to. They said they thought we could take care of it ourselves. I think we need to let the entire team know what’s going on.”
“I don’t know. This isn’t my decision to make,” he said.
“I’m asking your opinion—not to make the decision. Do you think it’s a good letter? A good idea?”
“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “I know you’re a good guy and you care about the people under you, but maybe you care too much. Like the guys said—if you tell them this, they’ll all bolt. Even the ones that have been with us for months.”
They’ve been with ‘me’ for months... you’re the new addition.
I sighed. “It’s the right thing to do,” I said stubbornly.
“Call the CEO and see what he has to say.”
“Don’t tease me. We
do that by committee.”
“Babe, the committee said ‘no’.” He rubbed my leg. “You are the leader of this little team.”
“I’m not—”
“You make the decisions. They go where you say.”
“I drive them too hard. Just like my dad did with me. And I get heated. You heard me in there, barking at them. And, fuck, these are my friends and I’m just yelling at them...”
“You do the same to me,” he said gently.
“Do not!”
“If we have a party, or we’re going out, or when we plan for anything... we always do what you want. We go with your plan. It’s usually the best.”
“I’m not like that,” I protested.
“You are. You keep people in line and you assess what they’re good at and what they can do for you. You see the potential in the guys around you and you try to get it out of them.”
I bit my lip. “But what about this letter. I see potential here. I’d be asking them to give, and I’ll be good to them in return. If they give to us this weekend... they can help us survive.” I whispered the last word with a hammering heart.
“It’s up to you,” Mark said. “It’s your company.”
“It’s not. I don’t want a company... I want the end product. And now we’re selling out for... fuck, just to survive. We’re pimping ourselves out.”
“You’re selling yourself. Look around... who’s good at selling himself?” Mark grinned. “Give me something good to sell and I’ll close this deal for you. You’ll have earned it.” He kissed me on the side of the head.
I picked up the phone and called Travis. I didn’t ask how he was doing or how Nick was feeling or if Suhail was doing more overtime. I jumped right into my problem without caring about all that.
“I’m sending you an email,” I said. “Don’t show the guys.”
“I’m at my computer,” he said. “What’s it about?”
“I want you to read it and tell me what you think. Should I send it? I trust your opinion completely.”
“You’re the boss,” Travis said. “I’m the new guy.”
“Yeah, but I’ve known you forever. I know you have a good sense for what this project needs. I don’t. I’m not a computer guy. Just tell me if you think this makes sense to send. I think we can get some help from our team and I think we’re going to need it.”
The Fiancé (It's Just Us Here Book 6) Page 26