He didn’t have a desk to go to. What would be a normal thing to do with a new employee, that would hopefully involve not interacting with more people? “I’ll show you the kitchen.”
But Carter and Kelly were standing in the kitchen, blocking the shelves. When Morgan had started, Zabloom had gotten fresh bagels on Fridays; one of the ways Morgan could tell Brad hadn’t been doing well enough at attracting new investors was that the free snacks had been downgraded to granola bars and weird chips made out of things chips shouldn’t have been made out of.
“—not really resonating with our ideal customer profile,” Kelly was saying. “I don’t suppose Product has some competitive analysis we could use to build out a SWOT chart? Tim was… but, well…”
They both paused for a moment and Morgan froze. Luke bumped into her. Kelly stared into the middle distance. Carter let the water run, not looking up from the sink. Then he shook himself and continued with whatever they’d been talking about.
“Those are the points Brad says are clicking for investors right now.” Carter scrubbed the coffee pot with more ruthlessness than the poor thing could possibly deserve, his blue and white checkered shirt sleeves rolled up neatly to the elbow, the suds bright against his dark skin. He had a rant about the general cleanliness of the coffee situationMorgan had heard several times already. “Besides, our chief competitors are GreenField and Klick!Me, and from the posts I’ve been seeing on LinkedIn, Klick!Me just did another round of layoffs.”
“Well, we can spend less time on the Klick!Me slide, then. But it’s only competitive differentiation if it’s what the buyer personas actually want,” Kelly had her own coffee cup, from the nice place two blocks away, the one with the fancy pour-over setup. Morgan tried not to wince. Reducing a catastrophe like a mass layoff to gossip just seemed so ghoulish.
“Well, that’s what Brad wanted in the next sprint,” Carter said. “Hwon never would have—”
“Before my time, not really relevant now.” It could have come out mean, but somehow Kelly made it cautionary.
“Yeah, guess not.” He added a spritz of white vinegar. “Hi, Morgan.”
“I wanted to introduce Luke, our new sales intern,” she said, rather than spinning around and walking out of the room like she wanted to. Were they all just going to pretend like business was continuing like usual? But then, business was continuing, after all. “Luke, this is Carter, our CTO. And you remember Kelly, the Head of Sales?”
Luke extended a hand as Kelly’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. For a moment, Morgan worried she wouldn’t take it. But Luke’s eyes glowed again. She blinked, then shook his hand automatically. “Welcome aboard. Sorry it’s at such a terrible time. You didn’t meet Tim in your interview process, did you?”
“Briefly.”
“I’m sure this wasn’t how you were picturing today.” Kelly looked like she was going to say something else andthen thought better of it. “We’ll get you settled in, just give us a little extra time, please. Hayley assigned you Morgan as your buddy?”
Carter’s hands were still covered in suds and he was pouring more vinegar into the coffee machine to descale it. Morgan didn’t know how much scale a coffee machine could acquire in a week, but Carter was determined to ensure it never did. He’d flat-out banned the office manager’s suggestion of a Nespresso cappuccino maker, claiming the milk frother was a germ haven.
Luke gave them an awkward little wave as she steered him back out the door.
“Do you hate all your coworkers?” Luke asked her.
“I don’t hate them,” she said, looking around quickly to see if anyone had heard.
“You very strongly want to not be in the same room as them,” he pointed out.
“Kelly’s my boss and I’m always afraid I’m going to mess up in front of her. Carter’s nice enough, I guess. But he’s been around since the beginning of the company. He’s bought the hype. Kelly’s relatively new, but it’s her job to sell the hype.” She sighed. She didn’t want to talk about Tim right now. Maybe they felt the same way? “They’re true believers. This company is everything to them.”
“And it’s not everything to you.”
She lowered her voice even further. “I don’t want to end up like Carter, whose only joy in life is descaling the coffee maker.”
“Or Tim.”
“Or Tim,” she agreed. “Speaking of which.”
“Everyone!” Hayley called with far too much enthusiasmfor a memorial. “If you could gather over in the kitchen?”
Morgan politely let Ronaldo and Vijay go before her, praying for them to turn their backs so she could make a dash for the phone room.
“Are you ready for your speech?” Hayley chirped.
“Oh, uh,” Morgan said. Behind Hayley’s back, Luke gave her a frantic look. She gestured to her head—could he mind-whammy Hayley again into forgetting she saw them? But Hayley was already guiding her back into the kitchen, now crammed with the other twenty-odd Zabloom employees who were in the office that day. Luke trailed behind. Everyone turned politely toward her.
“I just didn’t sleep very well last night, and I’ve got kind of a headache and I’d rather stand in the back today,” Morgan stammered.
“Oh, you poor thing, of course, I didn’t think,” Hayley said. She snagged a single-serve packet of painkillers out of the first aid kit that had probably been in the drawer since the drawer was installed. She handed that and a fresh cup of coffee to Morgan.
The coffee smelled very strongly of vinegar.
