Page 18 of My Forbidden Boss

I was already inside, heading toward the street side door. Then I was outside and in my truck before another thought could even enter my mind.

Driving home, I tried to ignore Charlie’s drunken wisdom. His intent may have been whimsical, but the effect cut deep. Whatever chasm inside me he had uncovered, I actively ignored it.

Like most twenty-somethings, I had more life laying out in front of me than minutes in the day. As such, I preferred pretending that the gash simply was not there. Rather than taking more than one moment at a time to wonder if the wound could potentially be sutured, I remained both innocent and ignorant of any enduring risks.

As my headlights highlighted the shrubs and stones surrounding my driveway, I was already filling my internal void with thoughts of work. Irritated but committed to my current state of life, I stormed inside and absently darted straight for the kitchen fridge. Without a single thought, I grabbed a cold can of fermented fizz and cracked it open. I sat down behind my mountain of business documents, resigning myself to another subconscious shoveling of my emotions into my mental abyss.

I took a long draught and set about drowning myself in the sea of papers, including the stack of acquisitions and allocations until all thoughts of my own isolation were gone, submerged beneath the buoyancy of my growing company.

Tisha

“Alright, I think that is just about everything I can think of. Is there anything else that you need, or do you have any questions?”

I sat up in my new chair and stopped smoothing my hands across the desk in front of me, trying to feel some hint of the familiarity that I hoped to find there. Looking up and interlocking my fingers, I smiled. “No, not off the top of my head. I think that you covered pretty much everything. If anything does come to mind, though, I know where to find you.”

Alice, my new boss, nodded silently and smiled. She turned back toward my office door, still adjusting the gaudy rings on her knobbly fingers, but looked back just as she was about to reach the hallway beyond.

“So, take the week to get sorted and introduce yourself to everybody. Catch up on where the team is and definitely listen in on the meetings. That way, you will kind of get a feel for how we try to implement changes across the regions together. If you’re able, you can try to get a head start on that efficiency report. I’d like to have it by the end of next week, but it shouldn’t be a big deal if you need to take the weekend for any final touches. It shouldn’t be all that difficult, especially since you say that you have done them before, but I will understand if it takes you some time to work up to the speed we’re used to around here. And remember, it’s just about the numbers. You don’t have to worry about the analysis or coming up with solutions or anything. Okay?”

I nodded, forcing my smile to remain even as other, less positive emotions tried to push it into a frown. I thanked Alice again, watching while she left the room and turned down the hallway. As soon as her stiff, librarian-like figure disappeared from view, I sighed and leaned back. It was annoying to be talked to like a noob, as if I had no idea what I was doing. I had hoped that my reputation as a capable leader would have followed me more than it seemed to have done, especially considering that I was still working for the same company and still doing the same job before I transferred from the Chicago offices. It made me nervous and shrunk my already shaky confidence, causing me to question my own abilities and worry that I wouldn’t be able to cut it here after all.

“Hey, you. I saw Alice heading back through the pit and figured that she was done giving you the old tour and pep talk. You got everything you need?”

I looked up at Brandon, and a smile returned to my face, a more natural one than before. I felt instant relief. “Yeah, she’s… very straightforward. Actually, she reminds me a lot of my boss that had the same position as her back in Illinois.” I leaned forward and self-consciously looked around before whispering. “We called him Tweed Tod. Honestly, I feel like we should set them up on a blind date for the next corporate crossover retreat. For all I know, they’re already married, or maybe they’re brother and sister. It’s eerie how similar they are. No emotion, but not necessarily unfriendly.”

He nodded knowingly. “Ah, yes. This is Alice’s library, and we’re just her little books to be sorted and kept in line. She’ll grow on you, though. You should have seen her at the company Christmas party.” Brandon exhaled dramatically and pretended to wipe his forehead. “I’ll tell you, there is nobody in this office who can throw back some Scotch or sing along, line for line with more Elvis songs than Alice of Accounting.”

I giggled, feeling a little bit more comfortable in my new workspace. My eyebrows were raised in disbelief. “Really? Alice?”

Brandon nodded. “Oh yeah. Just you wait. Things might not be as exciting around here as they were for you in Chicago, but don’t make the mistake of thinking that we don’t have our own sense of personality. I’m sure that you will like it here once you get to know everybody.”

“I think so, too. Honestly, now I’m really glad that you pushed me so hard to be prepared. I have no idea why, but I’m feeling so anxious. I can’t even imagine what it would have been like without you.”

His smile twisted crookedly to one side of his mouth as he leaned against the doorway and glanced over at me sympathetically. “Oh, girl… you have absolutely nothing to worry about. It’s all going to be perfectly alright. Just give it some time. You’ll see.”

I nodded, knowing it was true. “Yeah, I think I just need to get started on something. The trouble is, all I have is this dumb little efficiency report, and Alice wanted me to take the next two weeks to get it back to her. Two weeks?! I’m going to have this whole thing done in two hours!”

“I’m sure that you’re right. Just don’t rush through anything too fast, Tisha. The last thing you want to do is overlook something or make a simple mistake only because you felt like you had to prove something. I’m not saying that you can’t do it, just that you might want to be a little careful at first.”

I shook my head impatiently. “No, you don’t understand. There’s no way that I could screw this thing up. It’s not even a full report. Alice just wants me to do the arithmetic. The numbers are all there already. I don’t even have to do anything to them, really. It’s just grouping them together.”

Brandon looked a little confused. “Oh… Well, um…”

I continued. “Look, I do these reports all the time. I already glanced at it when Alice handed it to me, and it took me two seconds to see where the numbers are good and where they’re bad. But even what I did in two seconds… that’s a step farther than what she is asking me for. I feel like I should just do it the way that I know how to, you know? Show her that I’m not someone she has to wonder about, but I’m not sure. You’re the expert on making impressions. What should I do?”

I looked back up at Brandon, surprised to see him grinning. I tilted my head, my mind flying through the possible explanations.

He righted himself next to the doorway and uncrossed his arms, taking hold of the door handle as he turned toward the hallway. “You already have your answer, honey. Do what you do. Show Alice and everyone else that you aren’t just a pretty face, that you should be running this biotch.”

I smiled and snickered, waving him away as he winked and shut the door, gesturing toward my desk and telling me to get to work.

Hollis

I leaned forward, impatiently waiting for the circle of department heads around the table to finish before cutting them off. Finally, I pulled myself up and walked around, standing behind my chair.

“I’m sorry, but I have to stop you all right there. You aren’t hearing me. I don’t even know my own company anymore. It isn’t that any of you aren’t doing your jobs or something your teams are doing is wrong. I just feel like we’re running in two dozen directions at once. If we’re all pulling at a piece of the business… trying to lead everyone one way or the other, we are each countering what the other is doing across the table. With all these new additions and avenues for expansion, it seems like we are working twenty times harder but making a thousand times less progress. From where I sit, all I see is everyone busting their butts, only to basically be running in place.”

One of the men at the far end held his hands out in a shrug. “Okay, even if that’s true… What would you like us to do about it?”

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