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“Okay, maybe not forty,” I admit. “But definitely fifty hours. If you let us buy the team, I will cut back to only fifty hours a week.”
She laughs. “Oh, honey. That’s not going to happen. There’s just no way you add something this time-consuming to the portfolio and end up working less.”
I sit back, frustrated. “What can I do to make you say yes? The financials are solid—”
“This isn’t about the financials, this is aboutyour life.” And then she cocks her head, her face alert. She looks like that whenever she’s had a big new idea.
I tense. This is either going to be really good, or really bad for me.
My mom studies me. “When is the sale happening?”
“I reached out to a contact. They’ll be taking bids at the end of the month.”
She thinks. And then she nods, decisively. “Fine. You have a month to show me that you’re serious about making a real change and prioritizing your personal life. And then you need to keep it up for six months.”
I blink. “Why six months?”
“Because I know you, and if you do something for six months, you’ll stick with it for life.”
“I don’t...”
She gives me a look. “Darts. Coming into work early. Weightlifting. That dinner thing you do with your friends.”
She has a point. “Okay. What do I need to do to prove I’m prioritizing my personal life?”
She sits back in her chair. “That part’s up to you. But I smell bullshit, I’m yanking the rug on our deal. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” I say.
We share a smile.
She opens her notebook. “Right. Back to Swiberg Telecom.”
We go back to our meeting, but part of my brain is already whirring, trying to figure out what the hell I can do to show my mom I’m making a good-faith effort to have a life.
* * *
As I walk backto my office a half hour later, I’m no closer to an answer. I could get a dog? No, I’m at the office too much. That’s not fair to the dog. I could take up a hobby?
Except I don’t want a fucking hobby. And even if I did, I don’t havetime.I’m not a workaholic just for shits and giggles. This is the definition of a demanding job.
A long-term relationship would probably work, but as my mom so aptly pointed out, mine never seem to last more than a month. And even if they did, a girlfriend is even more of a time-suck than a dog or a hobby.
I turn the corner and see Violet sitting at her desk.
She startles when she sees me, accidentally knocking her slushy off the desk. The crushed blue ice is stark on the white carpet as it inches toward my highly polished oxfords.
I grit my jaw, not even surprised at this point. The woman’s a walking catastrophe.
“Sorry!” Violet leaps from her desk and tries to scoop the neon-blue ice back into the cup, but it’s too late. The damage has been done.
Maybe hiring Violet counts as proof of a personal life,I think. After all, she’s slowing down my work significantly, and I hired her to help out a friend. She even turned a simple networking event into a fake-dating farce.
I freeze.
Wait.
That’s it.
