“Um, is this about what happened between us at the restaurant?”
As I finished, I watched as Gabe’s face twisted into a mask of disgust. He scoffed as he looked up in my direction. “You can’t be fucking serious right now, Fiona.”
Before I could respond, Gabe stood from his chair and started around the desk to walk towards me. Out of instinct, I started to back away from him until I bumped into the conference table, stopping my momentum.
“What?” I said, half-terrified all of a sudden. “What did I say?”
Gabe wiped his mouth with the palm of his hand.
“Fiona,” he growled. “The reason we are discussing this is because you are in charge of a team responsible for a project that could be worth hundreds of billions to this company. Do you honestly think I would let something as trivial as whatever happened between us put that at risk? Do you?”
I didn’t know whether to walk away or run. Instead, frozen in place by fear, I did neither. Gabe stood not more than a foot from me. His entire body flexed with controlled rage as he glared down at me. His chest rose and fell with dissipating waves of anger as he waited for me to respond.
After another second or two, I did.
“No, of course not.”
He nodded for a second or so before he turned away from me and walked back towards his chair.
“Now get out of here and get your fucking team handled. This is not a conversation I want to have with you again.”
I traced his steps with my eyes until he rolled beneath his desk once more.
“Go,” he snarled without looking up. “Now.”
Without a word, I turned and walked out of his office. A few moments later, as I rode down in the elevator, Gabe’s words echoed in my mind. What did he mean when he said, ‘whatever happened between us’? He used past tense. Was it accidental or intentional?
Based on the way he’d behaved towards me recently, I began to realize maybe his choice of words wasn’t an accident at all. Maybe he was tired of me already. If he was, well, I was on shakier ground than I’d realized. Even though I hadn’t relied on our dalliances to shelter me from staff conflicts, the truth was they did. If they were indeed over, I would have to work much harder, not to mention smarter, in order to keep my job.
FIONA
As I exited the elevator, thoughts of my grandmother popped into my mind.
I’d been unable to wake her that morning. She hadn’t felt well enough to eat, and just getting her to take her medications had been a challenge in recent days. Before I left for the office earlier in the day, I stood next to her bed. Reaching down, I slid my fingers between the smattering of fine hairs on her head. With each day that passed, it was as if she had fewer and fewer of them. I did my best to fight off the hard lump in the center of my throat as I looked at her.
Was I wrong all along?
Should I let her just live out her remaining days in any manner she saw fit? Her doctors offered little in the way of assurances aside from tired bromides and platitudes about survival rates.
Who was I kidding?
When her time came, I’d still have to live my life. I couldn’t use her as an excuse for not getting what I wanted. If there’s one thing she’d shown me with all the years she’d fought, it’s that life owes you nothing. And that’s doubly true for people. Angry though he was, Gabe still trusted me enough to see this through.
Somehow I’d have to find a way to deal with them and… myself.
And so it was when I exited the elevator from Gabe’s office, I headed straight for the lab, filled with determination.
Balls.
I managed to make it down the hallway. The entire time, I chanted my mantra in silence… Balls. Balls. Balls.
With a final deep breath, I opened the door to the lab. As soon as I did, a dozen pairs of eyes locked on me and with all the effort I’d used to build myself up, just as quickly it vanished into the air like a harmless puff of steam. They stared at me in collective arrogance, knowing where I’d been.
I swallowed as I entered, allowing my hair to drape around my eyes. I drew my shoulders up towards my ears, clutching the strap of my purse as I meandered between the workstations. I hadn’t done anything to these people. All I’d done was work harder. Do better.
As I continued on, a sudden sound broke the silence as Amanda and Melissa snickered.
“You see,” Melissa began. “What did I tell you?”
As she spoke I squeezed the strap of my purse so tight, it felt as if I could tear it free from its stitching. I froze in place and turned back to face them. Their game was obvious but what they didn’t know was that I held the most powerful weapon of all, Gabe’s blessing.