Page 15 of Rebel

“So what am I supposed to do now? Go home and sit around waiting for the police to come knocking at my door?”

“I don’t know, Mark. And I don’t have time to worry about the man who was stealing from my family hand over fist while my father was struggling to hang onto his sanity.”

“Who in the hell do I appeal this decision to?” he said angrily, as he snatched the letter off the table.

“No one. California is an at-will state. I’m legally in charge of the business so I’m well within my rights to terminate whoever I want for whatever reason I want.”

“Fuck you, Lacey. You’re nothing but an overprivileged kid who thinks she can work miracles with this old company.”

I spoke up. “Time to move along, Mr. Shepard.”

“Again,” he spat out. “Who the hell are you?”

Lacey answered, “This is Mr. Benjamin Ross, my new business partner.”

Mark chuckled. “So you can’t run the business by yourself after all. You had to hire a man who actually knows how to manage an electrical company.”

I took a step closer to him and lowered my voice. “I’m a master electrician and was hired to be electrical technician. I know fuck all about running a business. In fact I’m here to learn what I can on that front. That’s what I’m getting out of the partnership.”

“Lacey hired a master electrician? That’s a bit of an overkill for a backwoods town like Griffinsford, don’t ya think?”

I told him in no uncertain terms, “I think it’s about time you hit the road. Lacey has one more employee to talk to and then afull day of work ahead of her, unfucking all the shit you fucked up around here.”

“Fucking fine. I’m done talking to the two of you. From now on, I’ll do my talking through an attorney.”

He walked out the door and slammed it behind him. Lacey shot me a relieved look. “Well, that went better than I thought it would.”

Sympathy welled up in my chest for this young woman. Regardless of whatever axe I had to grind with her, she was holding up like a champ. “Talking to Mr. Shepard was always going to go off the rails. It’s just the kind of asshole he is. You did real good, ladybug. Trust me on that.

“Don’t you start with calling me ladybug too,” she said it with a hint of a smile, so I didn’t think she disliked it as much as she claimed.

The door cracked open, and Sherman stuck his head in the office. “Mark said you’re ready to talk to me now.”

Lacey motioned him in, “Come on in and have a seat, Sherman.”

When he was seated, she launched into his firing speech. “I’m sorry to say that we can’t keep you on any longer, Sherman. I had a look at our records over the weekend and it looks like your complaints tripled over the last twelve-month period, we’ve spent more time fixing your bad wiring than we made from the jobs, and we even lost customers because of quality control issues on the work you did for our company.”

Unlike Mark, Sherman looked like a deer caught in the headlights. “Isn’t there some way I could get retraining and keep my job?”

“I’m not sure this is a training issue,” Lacey told him flatly. “You were doing good quality work when my parents ran the business. The shoddy workmanship only started under Mark’s watch.”

“He kept pressuring us to get the jobs done quick. When you’re rushing, details get missed.”

Lacey sighed. “Yeah, I know that. The thing is, we’re not selling non-dairy creamers here. We’re responsible for wiring businesses and homes. Bad wiring can lead to electrocution and house fires. I can’t take a chance that you’re not going to cut corners when you think you have good reason.”

“Do I get severance pay our anything like that?” he asked hopefully.

“I’m afraid not. Right now the business is operating in the red. Until we fix all the jobs you messed up and somehow get back in the black, there isn’t going to be any money left over. The math doesn’t add up for severance pay.”

“Losing my job out of the clear blue sky is gonna make it hard to pay my bills, ya know?”

“I’m sorry, Sherman,” she said as she slid his termination letter across the desk to him. “I truly am.”

He took his letter and left with what I thought was quiet dignity. Then he slammed the office door behind him.

“That little pipsqueak didn’t have the guts to tell you off, so he stomps around like a toddler.”

Lacey dropped down into her seat. “That was way more difficult than I thought it was going to be.”

---