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Once the elevator doors began to open, I straightened my posture and put my practical face back on. It had certainly gotten plenty of exercise the past week and I was sure there was a lot more in store for it.
I strode past the two secretaries who didn’t even look up from their desks and rapped twice on the frosted glass door of his office. The futuristic, stylish looking blinds were all closed, letting me wonder for a minute if he was up to some sort of crazy, billionaire antics.
“Come in!”
Ah, maybe not so crazy then, when I entered, he was leaning against his desk, looking over several sheets of paper. He glanced up and looked me over, looking irritated that I was even there.
“You need something?” he asked, one of his eyebrows raising to his hairline.
“Yes, your meeting that’s coming up, with the other corporate folks-”
“What about it?”
I withheld a grimace at being interrupted. “It’s all set up and ready, but I don’t have anything in my notes for what you need me to do during.” I felt like an idiot asking, like I was supposed to know, but I forced myself to keep my same, straight face.
“Ah right,” he said with a nod, alleviating my worry. “I had assumed that you would have quit by now, so I didn’t plan for you being present.”
“Oh,” not exactly the most brilliant response, but I didn’t know what else I was supposed to say. “Well… I am here.”
“I see that,” he said, and his eyes did that roving thing where they looked over me like he was trying to pick out all of my greatest weaknesses. “Think you can handle taking notes around pointing out all the obvious, or does that take up most of your mental faculties?”
I could take quite a bit of orders, and constructive criticism, but this wasn’t that. He was being snarky at me, condescending even, and before I could stop myself, my mouth was opening, and words were coming out.
“I am perfectly capable of taking adequate notes for the meeting without being distracted by my own presence. But considering that you had to hire someone to do the task for you, perhaps the skill isn’t as easy as we both believed.”
It was like time stood still for a moment, hovering in the air between us. I held my breath, cursing myself internally from head to toe. This wasn’t how I wanted to lose my job and be included in the very long, long line of ex-assistants.
Then it suddenly snapped back into place and Mr. Fitzgerald’s head turned towards me. It took every single bit of will power I had to keep my face a professional mask, looking up at him like I had just asked for the time rather than shot him a fairly unfunny comeback.
“Are you implying that I’m stupid, or that I find you distracting?”
I couldn’t be certain, but there was something in his tone that sounded almost…amused? Surprised? I didn’t know him well enough to put my finger on it, but it didn’t sound like the pure, unadulterated rage I had expected.
His eyes stayed on me, looking right through me again, and I realized that he was still waiting for an answer. Well, he could keep on waiting, because I was going to be certain my voice was steady whenever I opened my mouth again.
“Well, Ms. Viello?”
I swallowed as subtly as I could before repeating what I had said to him the very first day we met. “I’m not paid to have opinions, sir.”
“I see.” And then the moment -whatever that moment had been- was gone and the man straightened up. Goodness, he was so tall. Was it really necessary for him to be so tall? It seemed like humans should be cut off after the six-foot mark. It really wasn’t fair for them to go above and beyond that.
“Opinion or not, if you’ve had time to work on your witty repertoire, then I’m sure you’ve had time to finish all of your work.”
Ah, I knew that tone. I had heard it from plenty of teachers or foster mothers who thought they caught me slacking off. He was looking down at me, that condescending sort of look on his face that I could tell was leading into a scolding.
Boy was he in for something.
I looked up to him with a smile. “Actually, all of your non-essential emails have been sorted and flagged into the categories you wished for. Your spreadsheets have all been appropriately relabeled and uploaded to the servers. I’ve made all of your calls, answered all of your voicemails you needed, and the urgent ones are waiting with corresponding notes in the software system that I was taught to use last week.” Another breath. “Your dry cleaning from Friday is hanging in your closet -I put it there during your walk about with your CFO, and your dry cleaning for this week has already been dropped off. As I mentioned earlier, the meeting room has been set up and I have all relevant files waiting for you there. Your necessary appointments have all been sent and I made sure you had a list of the optional appointment requests that aren’t on your automatic rejection list.”
