Page 69 of The Fallback

Nadia stood up out of her chair and walked towards Rosie’s door. She turned at the last minute and said, ‘Rosie, it will be OK, you know? You’ve got this.’

Rosie wasn’t sure whether Nadia was talking about the Mitch situation or the Rachel situation but she knew which one was more pressing right at this moment. Rosie had always got on well with Rachel, but apart from the Christmas party, they observed a professional distance. Rosie was a diligent and conscientious employee and she prayed that all of that would help her out of this mess as she stood outside Rachel’s office door and nervously ran her sweaty palms down her trousers. It felt like she was stood outside the headmistress’s office, not that Rosie had ever done anything even approaching naughty enough to be sent to the headmistress’ office. Come to think of it, this might be the first time she had ever been in real trouble at work or school. It did not make for a comfortable experience.

‘Hold on a moment.’ Rachel held one finger up to Rosie and continued to read her computer screen.

Although it could only have been a matter of seconds, to Rosie it felt like hours, but finally Rachel turned from her computer, swept her glasses off her nose and gazed coolly across her desk at Rosie. She beckoned Rosie in.

‘I have to say, this is unexpected,’ Rachel began.

Rosie stared at the floor, feeling more and more like a naughty schoolgirl. ‘I’m sorry Rachel,’ she mumbled.

Rachel continued to watch her, her elegant hands now folded on the desk in front of her. ‘Do you want to explain to me what happened?’ she asked Rosie. ‘Actually I’m going to rephrase that. Tell me what thehellhappened.’

Rosie shuffled her feet and said nothing.

‘We have a real problem, Rosie. That data you sent me? That data that you sentdirectly to BioChem? It’s worthless. Completely useless!’ Rachel threw her hands up in the air. ‘What were you doing in the lab? It was you, wasn’t it?’ She narrowed her eyes at Rosie, ‘You’re not covering up for some useless student, are you?’

Rosie shook her head, ‘No, it was me,’ she mumbled.

‘Did you even look at the results before you emailed them?’

Rosie shook her head again miserably.

‘Unbelievable.’ Rachel sighed deeply. ‘It’s bad enough to send it to me without checking but to send it to BioChem?’ She gestured towards the door, as though there was a long line of BioChem executives waiting outside in the corridor to come in and join this shaming session.

‘They trusted us with this project,’ Rachel continued. ‘They asked for you in particular, and I backed you, I vouched for you and you’ve let me down.’ She shook her head. ‘They must think we’re idiots.’

She smoothed down her crisp white shirt. Academics got a bad press as far as fashion was concerned, all worn T-shirts and ratty jeans under their lab coats. But Rachel had never gone in for the Mad Professor look and Rosie had always admired her for undermining the stereotype.

‘This was supposed to look good for the department, the VC was so impressed with us, withyou.’

Rosie felt a wave of nausea wash over her. The Vice Chancellor knew about this? What was he going to think when he heard how she had messed it all up?

‘The university are obsessed with diversity, with getting more women into STEM and you were the perfect poster girl.’

Rosie hung her head again.

‘Luckily, the VC doesn’t need to know about this.’ A small surge of optimism ran through Rosie. ‘Yet,’ said Rachel, warningly, ‘I can keep it from him for the time being while we sort this out.’

Rosie didn’t like to think how Rachel was planning to distract the VC from finding out about this. Perhaps their affair wasn’t quite as dead in the water as Nadia had told her it was.

‘I’m really disappointed in you.’

Rosie digested those words. For a people-pleasing overachiever, this statement was like a dagger to her heart.

‘I’m really sorry, Rachel.’ She looked up from her shoes and risked looking at Rachel who glared back at her.

‘It’s so frustrating. I mean look at this,’ Rachel waved her hand over a pile of papers on her desk. Rosie couldn’t read the details from this far away but she presumed, given Rachel’s distain, that these were the offending data sets.

‘Completely useless data, two weeks’ wasted lab time, BioChem think we’re idiots and can’t deliver and I haven’t even begun to look at the financial impact yet.’

Rosie felt tears prickling in her eyes. There was a pause and it seemed Rachel realised how close to crying Rosie was because she suddenly changed tack.

She exhaled deeply. ‘It’s OK, we can fix it. I’ve already spoken to BioChem and explained that it was an error on our end, that we sent them an erroneous report by mistake and that we would have some new data for them by the end of next week. That’s doable, isn’t it?’

Rosie didn’t consider this a question, it was an order. And it didn’t matter how doable it was, she would put in as many hours as she needed to get it done.

‘Yes, absolutely Rachel,’ she confirmed.

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