Page 15 of Mistlefoe
“It’s what you do, Conor. You always point out everything I do wrong and throw it in my face right when it’s going to be the most embarrassing for me. I’m surprised you didn’t shareall yoursuggestionsfor my presentation in front of Richard just now.”
He scrunches up his entire face. “When the hell have I ever done that?”
“The tennis shoes presentation?” I start, hugging my warm laptop tighter. “How about the TV commercial pitch? Or the radio jingle.”
“You critiqued my ideas in return.”
Heat creeps up my neck because that’s true. “Maybe but there’s a big difference between us, Richard always sides with you. He worships the ground you walk on and if you truly don’t know it, you’re a fool. Having to work so hard at competing against a fool would piss me off even more.”
“Oh, so that’s it. You’d rather keep up this nonsensical cutthroat competition with me and screw us both over just to prove your—by the way, completely wrong—theory that I have it out against you?”
“It’s not wrong?—”
“Yeah, it is.” His brow darkens. “You’re conveniently forgetting that I critique the others just as much as I critique you, and they do the same in return.”
“You’re so much nicer to them, though!”
“Yeah, because you intimidate the shit out of me!” He, a 6 foot 2 wall of muscle who used to be a professional hockey player, releases this collection of words from his pretty mouth that make no sense. “You glare at me like I hurt your puppy. I breathe and you snap. You sit as far from me as you can as if my smell were nauseating, or something. How the hell am I supposed to treat you the same way as I do everybody else? What if it makes it worse? What if being nicer to you just makes me seem weaker enough so you can go for the jugular?”
It’s as if a donkey had kicked my chest. Suddenly I can’t breathe and it’s hard to stand up straight, yet all I can do is stand there gaping at him.
Conor throws his hands in the air. “Fine, keep hating me. I’ll plan this damn party on my own if I must.”
He yanks the door open and leaves me standing in the storage room as still as the shelves. They keep me company as I examine my own actions and find myself very firmly in Santa’s list of people who only deserve coal.
CHAPTER 7
CONOR
Ihave no plan for how I’m going to tackle the work day or even the Christmas thing with Sierra, which is shitty after spending the better part of last night agonizing about it. I stretch over to grab my backpack from the passenger seat and catch a glimpse of my face in the rearview mirror.
“Whoa.” I do a double take.
Is that a zombie or is it me?
Dark circles frame my eyes and speaking of them, they’re red. Apparently, I also forgot to comb my hair this morning. At least that I can fix relatively easily with my hands. It’s straight but springy and since I didn’t put on any product, it’s going to spend all day with weird cowlicks all over.
Whatever. It’s not like I’m part ofSPORTY’s calendar of hot athletes.
Sighing, I drag myself and my backpack out of my pickup. It feels drastically colder today, like maybe it could snow soon. Closing my eyes, I inhale deep and feel a faint note of ice. Or I could be hallucinating because I’m running on little sleep and lotta coffee.
I hoist my backpack and weave through the parking lottoward the entrance of the building. With one hand, I fish through my pockets until I locate my ID in my joggers’ left pocket. The stream of employees narrows at the entrance where everyone has to badge. I recognize one of the sales guys and tip my head in acknowledgement.
“Dude, you look like you either had a great night or a really bad one.”
I offer a Mona Lisa smile. He can think whatever he wants. I don’t have to broadcast to the whole company just how truly uncool I am.
“How’s Linda?” I ask about his wife, to direct his attention away from me.
“So pregnant, dude.” He shakes his head in something like awe. “Due around Christmas.”
“That’s awesome, man. It’s going to be?—”
“Conor?”
A different voice sounds behind me and I snap my mouth shut. Slowly, as if this was a horror movie and not a random Wednesday morning, I turn to face the scariest person in the entire building. Except Sierra’s in a brown coat and a beige beanie that matches those chunky boots women love in the winter. Not really axe murderer material.
More importantly, her expression looks normal. And by normal, I mean everyone else would think she’s glad to see me.
