54
Robyn
There’s a knock at my office door. Before I can answer, Carla walks in carrying yet another bunch of flowers. This one is some kind of giant arrangement of peonies, lilies, and roses, all stuffed into a large glass vase.
“This is getting silly,” I tell her. “Give them to the nurses for their?—”
“No. Ridge sent them to you, so they’re going in here.”
“Where? I already have five bunches of flowers. He sends me one every day.” I gesture around my office, where every flat surface is covered with a large arrangement of beautiful flowers. There’s a vase on my filing cabinet. Two on the windowsill. One on the corner of my desk.
“What a terrible problem to have.”
“It’s not that I’m ungrateful. It’s just that I thought he’d given up on us.”
“You said ‘us.’”
“I meant me. Don’t read into it. I preferred it when he was quiet.”
“You talk shit. I’ll find a spot.” Carla scans the room, and her eyes land on the bookshelf by the door. She moves a stack of medical journals to one side and plonks the arrangement down. “There. Perfect.”
“It’s not perfect. And I preferred it when he left me alone.” I sneeze for emphasis. “See? I’m developing hay fever. I’m not even allergic to flowers, Carla.”
“He’s trying to apologize.”
“He did that already. I don’t want flowers. I don’t want anything from him.”
“This one has a card.” She plucks a small white envelope from between the stems and waves it at me. “Do you want me to read it?”
“No!” I yell.
Carla laughs. “Okay. I’ll leave it here on your desk.”
“Leave it there.” I point at the filing cabinet on the other side of the room. “I’ll get to it when I’m?—”
She walks over to my desk and props the envelope right next to my keyboard. “There you go.”
“I don’t want it.”
“I’ll see you later.” She gives me one of those infuriating smiles.
“Carla, I swear I will fire you if you?—”
“No, you won’t.” She’s already at the door.
“I will!”
“You can’t fire me. I’m too good at my job.”
She closes the door behind her, and I let out a growl of pure frustration because, honestly, the woman is impossible. Completely and utterly impossible.
Except, no. I love Carla. That’s the worst part. I love her even when she’s being a pain in my ass.
I get back to work.
I’m not going to read the card. Absolutely not. No way. I have far too much to do today, and a stupid little white envelope is not going to derail me. I have payroll to approve. I have three vendor contracts to look over. I have a meeting with HR at two, and another one with the board at four, and somewhere in between, I need to call back the supplier who has been leaving me messages since Tuesday.
I pull up the first vendor contract on my screen.
