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The morning was dragging, and I sat there staring at my screen, feeling more defeated than I usually did. I had felt unsettled since the elevator incident, which is what I was labeling as my run-in with Dr. Grant earlier that morning.
I’d done what I always did when I felt troubled; I buried myself in my work and allowed myself to be consumed by it. It must have only been around 10:30, but I was dismayed to find I’d already finished my assignments for the day. This was not an unusual occurrence, although I did usually make it until lunchtime before I ran out of work. What I would normally do is seek out Mr. Bentley and he would make some joke about me being a human dynamo and then assign me some more work to keep me going until the end of the day.
I glanced over at his office, but I could see he was embroiled in a meeting with someone I didn’t recognize. I hated sitting around idly, and I aimlessly straightened the few meager personal possessions on my desk. I liked my workspace to be as uncluttered as possible. I touched my mom’s photo, and my mind went back to our last day together. I’d just come back from Colorado, and we’d enjoyed a glass of wine together out on our back porch.
I thought of our lovely house on the leafy street and the fragrance of her expensive lavender soap that you caught a whiff of whenever you walked through the front door. It had been my little nest of security for so many years, but now that too was gone, just like everything else in my life.
I often went through the events of that day and wondered if I would have done or said anything differently if I’d known. I guess everyone feels like that when they lose someone.
It had been the end of my intern year and I’d come home for a break. Mom had wanted to take me to one of her favorite swanky restaurants to celebrate my return, and I had insisted on driving my old Honda Civic rather than taking her Mercedes.
“Seraphina, I’m not even sure that car will get us there. You haven’t driven it in months,” she had complained.
“Which is precisely why I want to drive it tonight,” I had countered. “She needs a good run. It will be fine. I’ve got Triple A, we’ll be okay if we break down.”
“I wish I could share your confidence.” She had climbed tentatively into the passenger seat of the Honda Civic, looking as if she might find a dead rat under the seat. She’s looked so out-of-place sitting in my old wreck in her beautifully tailored clothes, I’d almost laughed.
“Come on, Mom,” I’d chided. “Look at it as an adventure.”
“No, Seraphina. An adventure is meant to be exciting. This feels more like a death wish.”
I shuddered when I remembered those words. “God, if only I’d known,” I whispered to myself.
I tried to pull myself back to the present moment and could hear Kendall’s voice droning on in the cubicle next to me. I don’t know who she was talking to, but I could tell it definitely wasn’t work-related. In fact, I would estimate that around seventy-five percent of Kendall’s day was not work-related. She used the time to plan her social life, make beauty appointments, and generally gossip about anyone she deemed unworthy.
I had done my best not to get into conversation with her after our discussion on my first day, but whenever I was forced to, I found myself stumbling over my words. It was as if she enjoyed seeing me struggle to get my sentences out and tried to lead me into conversations I had no chance of mastering. She asked me about celebrities I’d never heard of and television programs I’d never watched. She did it all with a fake, sickly smile, and I was astute enough to know there was a cruel streak concealed beneath that careful veneer.
I could have asked Mr. Bentley if he would be willing to move me to a different cubicle, and I’m sure he would have obliged, but that might have been seen as special treatment, and I went out of my way to avoid that kind of thing. So, instead, I put up with Kendall and her constant attempts to try and make me look stupid.
I could see that Mr. Bentley had finished his meeting and I stood up with the intention of going to his office, but before I could reach him, he took a phone call. I slunk back to my cubicle in frustration, considering an early lunch. I was just picking up my purse when he appeared at my workstation, looking quite flustered.
“Seraphina. I’ve just got off the phone with Alex Winters.”
I looked at him questioningly. I had no clue who Alex Winters was, but it seemed that I should know.
“He’s the director of human resources,” he told me, cluing in on my look of confusion. “He wants you to go up to the top floor for a meeting with him and Dr. Grant.”
I heard Kendall drop something heavy in the adjoining cubicle. She was clearly privy to this conversation, and the mention of Dr. Grant’s name always had quite an effect on her.
“Do you know what it’s about?” I asked him, trying to keep my voice as low as possible. If I was in trouble, I didn’t want it announced to the world by the gossip in the adjacent workspace.
He shook his head. “No. I thought you might know something about it.”
A thousand thoughts flew through my head at once. The only connection I had to Dr. Grant was that brief meeting in the elevator. Maybe I’d annoyed him by not engaging in his little joke. “I met Dr. Grant in the elevator this morning, but it couldn’t be related to that.” I looked at him in a panic. “I don’t want to go. Tell them I’ve gone home sick. I think I might be sick, actually.” Sweat was forming on my forehead, although my hands were as cold as ice. “I probably have the flu.”
Kendall could not restrain herself any longer and jumped up out of her seat, glaring at me accusingly. “You never told me you met Dr. Grant in the elevator,” she said in a harsh tone.
“Kendall, please!” Mr. Bentley interjected. “This is supposed to be a private conversation.”
She threw herself back into her chair with a huff, but not before she’d added. “Well, if she doesn’t want to go and meet him, then I will.”
Mr. Bentley rolled his eyes and lowered his voice. “I don’t think you have any choice in this, Seraphina. When you get summoned to the top floor, you go.”
“Okay,” I said miserably. “I’ll go then.”
As I grabbed my purse to leave, I noticed Kendall’s head pop up above her cubicle. She reminded me of one of those Whack-A-Mole games and I had to bite back a laugh.
In reality, this was no laughing matter. Being summoned by the director of HR could only mean one thing, and I was convinced I was about to be fired. As I walked towards the elevator with Mr. Bentley, I wondered if they’d found out about my brain injury and if they could fire me because I hadn’t disclosed it. It seemed unlikely, and it also seemed illegal to do that to someone, but these big corporations were tricky and they knew all the loopholes.
Mr. Bentley shot me a sympathetic smile as he pushed the call button for me. “Perhaps they’ve found out how good you are at your job and they’re going to give you a pay rise,” he suggested, but even he didn’t sound convinced.
I smiled weakly as the doors slid closed and I felt the elevator rise. It reminded me of the glass elevator in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and I thought maybe the elevator would burst through the top of the building. I chided myself for my overactive imagination. I couldn’t be that lucky, I mumbled to myself.