Nell perched on the edge of the chair Tommy indicated.
“Tell me,” he said, in the manner of a prosecutor, “when did you first find out that Jessalyn Roberts was pregnant?”
Tommy had handed Nell a cardboard box along with the letter of termination. No quiet chance to be escorted in after hours for the collection of her personal items — instead, he’d orchestrated the ultimate walk of shame. As she strode down the hall, chin up and game face on, she could feel herself jangling with fight-or-flight adrenaline and knew that she had hardly any time before she’d lose the fine motor control in her hands and maybe her grip on the box. Melody from Human Resources followed her. “We won’t need to call Security, will we?” the woman had asked with a faux-sympathetic smile. The building’s security staff — mostly retirees who’d taken a five-day basic security training course and passed an exam — were available to provide this kind of escort, for a fee. None of those guys would stand a chance against me.
She couldn’t focus on anything except her desire not to drop the cardboard box she carried, not to show pain or let anyone see her fear and despair. Would she lose her apartment? How would she pay for her training? They’d given her a month’s severance on the condition that she signed waivers and disclaimers — no right to talk about it, no right to sue, no recourse. And she’d signed where they told her to, of course; she’d had no choice. At least the severance would buy her a little time.
She shivered. Why am I so cold?
They reached her office — no longer her office, now — and she stared at the desk. She couldn’t think.
“That mug is yours, isn’t it? Let’s put it in the box,” the HR woman prompted her after a minute. Nell picked it up, looked at the quarter-inch of cold tea in the bottom of it, and drank it because she didn’t know what else to do. Her stomach churned. She held onto the mug with both hands and couldn’t remember what was supposed to come next.
A knock on the doorframe startled her into dropping the mug. It tumbled into the box, dribbling the last drops of tea onto the termination letter, as Eamonn leaned into the room, swinging himself off the doorjamb. “Hey, Nell, do you have—” He froze, his eyes on the cardboard box as she turned toward the sound of his voice. “Oh, shit.”
“They took my phone,” she said. “It was a company phone, but on an unlimited plan, and Tommy encouraged me to use it for everything so I’d have it with me all the time; he didn’t want me to have another. I never thought…” Appalled at how her voice shook, she fell silent.
Eamonn shook his head. “This has to be a mistake. They’d be fools to fire you. I’ll go talk to Uncle Tommy—”
“Please don’t.” She could barely say the words. “He… he found out that I knew Jessalyn was pregnant and I didn’t tell him.”
“What the fuck does that have to do with anything?” he asked.
“Don’t be obtuse. They’ll fire her now so Wildforest doesn’t have to cover her medical care or deal with maternity leave.”
Melody from Human Resources pursed her lips. “I have to advise against that sort of speculation. Wildforest would only terminate Ms. Roberts’s employment if she were unable to fulfill the requirements of her position. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Nell laughed, a hard and bitter sound. “It’s the flipping Dark Ages around here, if you hadn’t noticed. I gather you’re the token HR female they send to supervise females being fired so no one can claim anything inappropriate happened.”
A tinge of pink darkened Melody’s cheeks, telling Nell that her assumption had been accurate. “I hardly think my colleagues’ gender is relevant here, and I’m not a token anything.”
“No? Open your eyes; what they’ll do to others, they’ll eventually do to you. I knew this place was dodgy and I shouldn’t have stayed. I shouldn’t be surprised to find myself canned like this, but… I am.” The wobble in Nell’s voice surprised her, but for once she wasn’t capable of controlling her tone or projecting an assured face.
“Oh, babe…” Eamonn said, crossing the room to put his arms around her. Nell flinched and stiffened, and he looked at her in dismay, his arms dropping to his sides.
“You can’t hug me right now,” she muttered. “I refuse to cry in this hellhole, and a kind touch right now would break me. Just let me tough it out ’til I get out the door, all right?”
He raised his hands in a helpless gesture, then nodded and turned to Melody. “You can leave. I’ll escort Nell out, and you can tell Uncle Tommy that I’m not coming back, either.”
“I can’t. I have to see her off the premises,” Melody said, having the grace to look slightly embarrassed.
“Then be helpful, would you? What would she have that she’d need to take?” Eamonn gave Melody the sort of look that a rock star would give an incompetent roadie.
“A purse? Do you have a purse, honey?” The woman’s voice was almost kind.
“I’m not your honey,” Nell snapped, but she opened the desk drawer where she’d kept her purse since she’d moved to this office. Then she remembered her tea and dug it out of the bottom drawer. “That’s it, I think.” Think. I can’t think. Everything felt numb, surreal.
“I’ll carry your box,” Eamonn said, taking it. “Hold my hand? I want to show them all how lucky I am to be with you, even just to walk out for the last time.”
She remembered telling him that she didn’t want to
