Page 87 of Where Are You Now
“Don’t panic. I can help you scale the company if you want to.”
“Company?”
“I can work with you to set up an LLC. I can take care of all of it, and you can just design bags.”
“Can I still sew some if I want to?”
“Of course. We don’t have to farm out all the production entirely. But I will need to eventually find you a facility that can manufacture your designs. You could always produce a mass number of bags with your pattern, but also have a couture line and charge more for it. I’ll have to research and build you a starting pricing model. We’ll test different price points and run ads. There’s a sweet spot …” As her mind kicked into gear, Ava realized only then that this was the part of the job she loved most.
“I don’t know if I can do all this by myself,” her mother said.
You’re not finished yet.
The reality of what Ava was planning became clear. Her entire life was about to change, if she wanted it to.
Leaving New York would be a bold move, but she could do it. She’d leave the most lucrative position she’d ever been offered to return home and launch a single handbag line. Even if they were wildly successful, with one start-up, there was no way she’d make the money she’d made in corporate, and there was a chance that the viral post was a one-off, and the bag line wouldn’t make them enough to sustain the business. She’d need at least three to five years of steady growth before she could even take a meager salary.
But everything inside her told her to do it.
Was this the answer to her prayer?
“What if I moved to Nashville to help you?”
Her mother’s squeal on the other end of the line pierced her eardrum. Ava held the phone away from her ear and laughed.
“Yes!” she could still hear from the phone’s speaker. “Yes, yes, yes! Oh, would you?”
“I think I would,” Ava said, excited. “Let me make a few calls, and I’ll keep you posted on my next steps.”
“Okay, honey.”
Right after getting off the phone, Ava got Scott Strobel and Robert Clive on an emergency group video call to let them know she was no longer interested in the new position. She knew the kind of scramble it would take for both their assistants to get them on a call immediately, but they’d managed it. Scott and Robert’s willingness to drop everything was a testament to their support for her, and she felt guilty for not acknowledging that support over the years.
“I can stay and train whoever gets the job, if it’s helpful at all,” Ava said from her living-room desk, the two men on her laptop screen.
Scott and Robert sat silent, clearly blindsided.
“It’s a new position entirely, and we’ll be hiring from within, so you don’t have to stay and train anyone if you don’t want to,” Scott said. “You could spend that time working on getting better.”
Getting better?
Robert’s face filled the screen. “You’ve had a life-changing event. Are you sure you want to make any decisions just now? We’ve said we can give you more time.”
She totally understood where Robert was coming from. He was concerned about her not having anything else lined up. He knew as well as she did that she’d have no salary to support herself in building a single start-up, and from where he was sitting—a perspective very similar to hers before theaccident—he thought she’d lost her mind. But all she could think about was that largemouth bass and the love she’d felt.
“Thank you for your kind offer, but I’m sure.”
She’d make a ton of money selling the apartment, and she had savings. She could live with her mom until she found a little place where she could put down roots. Given the cost of living in rural Tennessee and how much she’d bring with her from the sale of her New York assets, she might not even have to work a corporate job again if she didn’t want to. Ava was blazing a trail into her forever without a plan in the world. She didn’t need a plan. She trusted herself to make something wonderful with whatever came next for her.
“I can’t help but wonder if you’re still under stress from the accident,” Robert said.
She opened her mouth in rebuttal, but he continued.
“Since your current role is no longer available, we could let you go as part of the restructuring and offer a severance package of twelve months’ salary with restricted stock units, extended health benefits, and a continued retirement plan for the twelve-month duration. Just in case you decide you want to come back.”
“That’s incredibly kind.”
Ava wasn’t sure she’d have been that thoughtful were she in his position had she not endured the accident. Robert didn’t have to do any of that, but he was showing her grace, and even though he’d chosen Scott over her, it was clear he truly cared about what happened to her.
