Her mouth drops open, and her gum almost falls out. I’m so close to laughing that I have to press both hands over my mouth and bite on the fleshy part of the inside of my middle finger.
“Uh… wait. What? I mean, what are you talking about?” she sputters. “Th… this isn’t the military. It’s a privately owned company. I mean… I d…don’t understand.”
Suddenly, Jude pours on the charm. “Now, Lezlie. You’re a clever girl. Surely, you understand what’s happening here.”
She narrows her eyes and sniffs, crossing her arms over her chest. “Maybe you should help me understand a little better, Jude.”
He shrugs, tossing the paper he’s holding onto the table in front of him. “Well, obviously we could hire someone local there to do the administrative work, but your transfer would solve two problems at once: your sagging workload in Chicago and our need for an administrative assistant at the new branch, where your workload would increase threefold. Either way, your job in Chicago is about to become—how shall I say this?—redundant. We thought you’d be glad to have a soft place to land.”
“In Bismarck?”
“It’s better than no job at all, wouldn’t you say?”
“No! I wouldn’t!”
Jude frowns and rubs his eyebrow. “Right.” He stands, placing his hands in his pockets. “Very well. I’ll, uh, let Gary know your decision. Wanda’ll have some leaving paperwork for you to sign—”
“How soon are we talking about here?”
“Pardon? Oh, immediately, I’m afraid. But no worries. You’ll qualify for unemployment benefits, I’m sure.” He leans forward and smiles encouragingly, but I can see there’s no smile in his eyes. He looks absolutely ruthless.
“You’re an idiot if you think I don’t know what’s going on,” she spits.
His smile fades, his eyes widening innocently. “I’m certain I have no idea.”
“I’m certain you do,” she says, mocking his accent.
“Reorganization is sometimes not very pretty,” he continues benignly. “We were trying to make it as painless as possible, but you’re right; we can’t force you to stay with the company.”
Ignoring him, she persists, “I know this is about you and your crazy little girlfriend. This is your way of getting back at me for reading those stupid emails.”
I stiffen at the word “crazy,” but I resist the urge to defend myself.
Jude’s face hardens. “You really shouldn’t talk about that, Lezlie. Someone—like Gary or Wanda—could hear you. Then you’d be looking for a new job with a black mark on your CV. Let’s try to remain professional, shall we?”
“Professional, my ass. This is all your plan to get rid of me. I’m sure you jumped at the chance, knowing that Gary would go along with anything you said, because he’s pathetic and has some kind of man-crush on you. It’s disgusting.”
“Leslie?”
All three of us flinch at the sound of Gary’s voice. Irrationally, I pull my knees up and rest my forehead against them, closing my eyes.
Nobody says anything for what seems like forever, then Gary asks, “Jude, mind catching me up on what’s going on?”
Jude clears his throat. “Ah. Yes. Right. Well, I’ve, uh, explained the, er, situation regarding the acquisition in Bismarck, and Lezlie there has turned down our transfer offer.”
“I see.”
I chance a peek in time to see Gary move closer to Leslie and mirror her crossed-arm pose. “I’m sorry to hear that, Leslie,” he says sincerely. “I hope there are no hard feelings. When I walked in, it sounded like maybe there were?”
Her bright red lips slice through the air in the middle of her pale face as she shakes her head. Her voice falters when she tries to talk, but she clears her throat and says, “N-not at all. I was just telling Jude that Bismarck’s not really my kind of town. Plus I have family here, and I’d hate to move so far away.”
Gary nods. “Understandable. Yes. Well, we wanted to try to be fair and give you the first swing at the job there. I trust that Jude’s explained to you that we’ll be eliminating your position here as part of the reorganization?”
A pleading note enters her voice. “But Gary, what about Libby’s position? It’s open now, right? Why can’t I just slide into that?”
Gary scratches his head. “Oh. That. Well, we’re not replacing Libby. Her resignation came at a pretty fortuitous time and saved us some tough decisions. We’re only keeping two admins in the Commercial Division. And we went strictly by productivity numbers to come to our decision about who to keep here and who to send to Bismarck. But if you don’t want the position, I’ll let HR know to advertise locally for someone. It’s not ideal, but what can we do?”
The resolution on the picture makes it difficult to read exact expressions, but I can see in her face that she’s about to reverse her decision. She bites her lower lip and glances from Jude to Gary. But then the opportunity passes when Jude says hurriedly, “Right, then. Well. It’s getting rather late here, so if we’re finished…”
Gary turns completely away from Leslie. “Oh, yeah. Sorry about that, Jude. Thanks for staying late on a Friday to help me out with this.”
“Not at all,” Jude replies graciously. “Have a good weekend.” He reaches for the remote.
“Got any big plans this weekend?” Gary asks genially. He never was one for taking a hint.
Jude sighs and smiles. “Nah. Pipe and slippers, I suppose. You?”
Leslie stalks out of the conference room. Gary glances over his shoulder at her retreating form, then returns his attention to Jude. “God, I thought she’d never leave,” he mutters. “Coupla buddies and me, we’re going to hit the links tomorrow. But we’ll probably spend more time at the nineteenth hole, if you get my drift.”
Jude grins. “Absolutely. Well, have fun. I have a patient girlfriend waiting for me, so…”
“Oh!” Gary
