Perhaps it was the magic of the museum getting to her, but Dylan felt like she would happily surrender her day to Mike. Yes, the living room needed dusting, but listening to a grown man bay at the moon for her benefit was far more enjoyable.
“If we create spaces for children, they should be allowed to be children in them,” Mike said, a forgotten bite of salad stuck to the fork he was holding. “School gives them the rote stuff. I want to provide an avenue for children to explore those ideas through play. But I also want an experience that shifts as kids grow.”
“It’s the difference between children completing a worksheet and the space being a worksheet.” Dylan leaned over her sandwich, wondering how he managed to make his enthusiasm this infectious. She wasn’t sure she had a passion for experiential learning, but by the time her stomach had started growling in the Seattle Art Museum, she was convinced he was on to something big with Crescent. The question was how to get donors to buy into his vision. It wasn’t as if she could convince every one of her parents’ collectors to spend a day at the museum. She could ask Tim . . .
Dylan dismissed the thought almost as soon as it crossed her mind. She couldn’t even get the guy to send an email, and when he did “follow directions,” the end result stayed in the news for days, so why would she inflict him on Mike? That would be like giving someone a parakeet for the holidays. Cute, but way more work than they signed up for when they agreed to the office white elephant. Tim was not the answer to this problem. There had to be a better solution. She just needed a little time to think on it.
“Right!” Mike waved his fork around and seemed to notice it for the first time. “Anyway, I don’t know if you could tell—I get worked up about this stuff.” He laughed. “But no more. Tell me, what’s new with you?” he asked, finally eating the bite of salad.
“It’s been busy. But good!” For a small second, Dylan thought maybe she sounded less obtuse than she felt.
At least, until Mike quirked his eyebrow over the rim of his iced tea. He took his time finishing a sip, then answered, “Go on.” He leaned back with the good-natured smile of someone who could wait all day for her to speak.
“Well, work has been challenging, but I expected that,” she conceded, finishing off the last bite of her sandwich and picking up her napkin. She took a moment to watch the smoky clouds roil by and decided they had about an hour before it started to rain with intention. “My attempt at convincing Tim to be decent is still trending on social media. So there is that.”
“Yeah, I was trying not to ask about it,” Mike admitted, taking another sip of his drink and leaning forward conspiratorially. “What happened?”
“You are a gossip, Mike Robinson. You should’ve just come out and asked.”
“Me? Never. Being a gossip requires me to turn around and tell someone. I plan on telling no one. So what’s the deal?”
“It was bad. But what made it worse was, he was genuinely trying to make it better,” Dylan said, dropping her napkin on the table and throwing her hands up. “We had a whole chat about moving the coffee stand back to the lobby. Then, BAM! Diet off-brand pop. I mean, what the hell?”
Mike shook his head, his now-dark eyes fixed on her. “That’s not ideal. Do you know how you are going to fix it?”
“Beyond demanding he run his next cockamamie idea by me? No. Besides, by Kaplan standards this is a relatively cataclysmic failure. I’ll be lucky to be employed come Monday.”
“Cockamamie, huh? If I’m a Capri Sun–wielding soccer dad, you are someone’s grandmother.” Mike’s smile was gentle. “But really, I don’t think you’re out on your ass over this.”
“Well, that’s kind of you, if not unrealistically optimistic,” Dylan said, taking a big gulp of her latte. “The share prices did dip on Friday, after all.”
“No, really, if they were going to dismiss you, I feel like they would have done it by now, if for no other reason than to find a scapegoat to stem the blood flow and restore investor confidence or whatever. But everyone knows Tim is difficult, so I suspect the powers that be don’t think sacrificing you is the answer.” Mike looked at her like this was the most obvious conclusion, then started to crunch the ice in his glass like his parents hadn’t paid for braces.
“I think you might be giving the wheels of bureaucracy too much credit. But since it’s reassuring, I’ll take it.”
Mike laughed. “Fine. So outside of work, what else?”
“What else?” Dylan repeated, drumming her fingers on the table, dredging up the visit she had almost forgotten. “My boyfriend is coming to Seattle.”
Dylan watched Mike’s eyes narrow briefly when she mentioned Nicolas. A small part of her mind cracked with disappointment, even if being honest was for the best.
Mike’s expression recovered quickly, and he said, “That’s exciting. When?”
“In a week. His ticket is part of my benefits. Don’t want to waste free airfare.” Dylan wondered if the amount of perky she was pouring on was too much.
“It’s nice they give you a visitor ticket while you are working away from home. Any big plans while he is up here?” Mike took the opportunity to crunch another piece of ice.
“He hasn’t met my parents or sisters before. I’m hoping he’ll change his mind about being outdoors and we can hike with my family. I’m sure you remember my dad flyering your house over the Olympic National Forest.”
“Ma had a cow.” Mike smirked. “How long have you all been together?”
“We met in college.” His head quirked up fast, the skepticism rolling off him. “But we didn’t start dating seriously until four years ago. Lived together for three,” she rushed on, watching his head move slowly back to center, his eyebrows still near his hairline. “What I like about him is that he understands how important structure and routine are for me. Like, once I mentioned how having to run across town to pick up this dress I’d had altered for his firm’s holiday party was going to throw off my entire schedule for the day. He just went and picked it up for me. Didn’t even mention it—just texted me a picture of him holding the dress at the tailor’s shop.”
Mike leaned back against the seat cushion and nodded affably. “That’s nice. But I’m hung up on the fact that you’ve lived together for three years and he hasn’t met your parents. That seems . . .” Mike paused, searching for a word as he studied the remaining ice in his cup. “Unusual.”
“Well, yes. But if you think I work a lot, you should see his schedule. He’s a divorce attorney.”
“That would keep you busy. Do you usually spend holidays in Texas?” Mike’s forehead relaxed, but he managed to hold on to the quizzical expression.
“Mostly. His family is there, so it’s easier to skip the whole airport thing. They are big fans of cruises to the Caribbean.” Dylan shivered. She could probably live the rest of her life without setting foot in the Galveston port again.
“And you want to go on the same cruise every year?” Mike asked, the twinkle returning to his eyes.
Dylan waited a beat to answer, squirming in her chair. “Okay, no. I hate cruises. They are like giant, roving, highly orchestrated germs.” Mike’s chuckle seemed to fill up the entire restaurant. “Don’t laugh. They’re weird.”
“Have you ever considered telling him you hate cruises?” Mike said, his lips maintaining a hint of a smile as he crunched more ice.
“God, no,” Dylan said, but she regretted her honesty as Mike tilted his chin at her. She began to circle her hands as she worked through the crashing explanations in her brain. Years of being lost in foreign countries while her parents drove on the wrong side of the road should have made Dylan appreciate a cruise. However, it had had the opposite effect. Worse, Nicolas had no framework for understanding her boredom. He’d probably take it personally, so instead, she spent one week a year trying to convince herself to like cruises. It mostly worked. Looking up from her relationship analysis, Dylan found Mike still waiting. “Meh, it’s not worth the fight.”
“If it works for you, I can’t judge. I’m not seeing anyone, let alone living with them. But I didn’t live with my last girlfriend, and I still met her parents.” Mike sighed, shaking his head and smiling. “In fact, they took the breakup harder than she did. They still send me Christmas cards.”
“If my parents could get it together to send Christmas cards, which they can’t, I suspect none of our exes would make the list.”
Mike fixed his gaze on her. “Before we take apart your parents’ holiday traditions, I want to go back. What do your parents think of him finally visiting? Have you informed Henry he won’t be hiking?”
“Let’s not talk about Bernice’s feelings on the capitalist-industrial divorce complex or the fact that my father may be planning to throw mud at him.” Dylan was pleased to see Mike chuckling at her blatant attempt to change the subject. She laughed, but the thought of trying to get her parents to behave with Nicolas was more terrifying than trying to get Nicolas to book his ticket to Seattle.
“Back to our mission,” Dylan said, rubbing her hands together for extra emphasis. “I have some ideas for getting this sensory room funded. I have a former client who was big into facilitating stock gifts. I can connect you to him. Also, have you thought about a live text-to-donate drive at the fundraising gala?”
CHAPTER TEN
Dylan pulled into the office at 7:15 a.m., determined to answer a few of Jared’s emails before she dealt with Tim’s panicked messages. She was impressed the meme hadn’t reached Tim’s consciousness until early Sunday, limiting the number of URGENT emails he could send. Dylan had considered writing to him that applying the little red exclamation point to his email and adding READ ME to the subject line was overkill and part of his perception problem. Instead, she’d simply answered that she was aware of the meme and that they would take mitigating steps on Monday. What those were, she had no idea.
“Morning, Charlie,” Dylan called, breezing through the heavy doors. “Can you do me a favor and give me a call when Tim comes in?”
He arched his eyebrow like she was asking a trick question. “I don’t think it’s against any of our policies. Is it?”
“If it is, I won’t tell.”
Charlie’s manner eased. “In that case, I’ll do it. Although do you really want to be the first person he sees after, you know . . .” He shrugged in place of saying the meme.
“He’s gonna have to see someone first—may as well be me. Talk to you soon.”
“Bye.” Charlie’s voice floated into the elevator bank as she pressed the floor button with the corner of her laptop case. Sure, she had spent her weekend covering herself in little-kid germs, but that didn’t mean she needed to get everyone else’s germs too.
Exiting the elevator, she ran through her plan for the day. Step one: head off any high-pitched emails from Jared. Step two: cut Tim off before he could try another diet-soda stunt. Step three: stay employed long enough for steps one and two. Kaplan was notorious for removing consultants over the weekend and replacing them on Mondays, so she’d decided Mike was probably right when by Sunday evening no one had called her about getting a ticket home.
“Still, there is a first time for everything,” she said under her breath, waiting for her computer to boot up. As expected, she had no fewer than seven emails from Jared, the previews for which all read something like:
Dylan: Things are out of hand . . .
Tipping the last of her coffee back, she scrolled through her unopened emails, trying to decide which of Jared’s missives to answer first, until an email from Barb Maisewell caught her eye. She wouldn’t email gossip. Barb was way too savvy for that. But really, what other interaction did she and Dylan have beyond the occasional tabloid article about their favorite guilty pleasure cooking reality show?
Hi Dylan,
I hope you are enjoying your time at home! Quick question for you. Has Jared been up to Seattle since you got there?
Thanks,
Barb
Dylan was disappointed that Barb didn’t include an article from EW or something but decided answering a work email from Barb was better than dealing with Jared’s. She hit send on a quick “nope” email, complete with an In Touch link on the reality chef’s latest dating exploits, as her desk line rang.
“Hi, Charlie, is the eagle on the move?”
Without missing a beat, Charlie answered, “Ten-four. Be prepared. He looks rough.”
“Thanks for the heads-up.”
“Good luck.”
The click on the line gave Dylan a jolt. She didn’t have a plan or even the semblance of a plan. Despite having spent an impromptu Saturday with Mike, she wasn’t ready to call herself a fan of improvisation just yet. She walked to the elevator doors, silently thanking her maker that Tim was in early enough that other people weren’t around to see her trepidation.
Whatever comfort the silence of an empty office provided dissipated the moment the elevator doors opened. To say Tim looked destroyed would be an understatement. If that hoodie had less than a week’s worth of dirt on it, she would be shocked. After a moment’s hesitation, Dylan stepped into the elevator.
“Hi, Tim,” she ventured. The weight of the elevator bearing them upward was almost as heavy as the silence, and Dylan stifled the impulse to check on her chignon, look at her phone, or do anything other than count the seconds until she could get out of the metal box of misery she was riding in.
Finally, Tim grunted something that could not be construed as a word in any language. She decided to take it as an opening. “Let’s talk about Friday.”
Tim took a deep breath, shaking his head and jamming his hands into his filthy pockets. “I don’t get it. What do people want from me? Based on everyone’s reaction, you would think I shot someone. I swear people were nicer to that soccer dude who ran over someone with his Porsche.”
Dylan bit her lip instead of pointing out that it was actually a baseball player who’d tried to crush fans at the supermarket with his Lotus. Tim was looking to vent about someone who drove a more obnoxious car than him, and she could understand that. Sort of.
“Tim, why the diet pop?” It was all she could manage as the elevator doors chugged open.
“Your document said people missed the coffee cart. Coffee equals caffeine. Give the people caffeine.” Tim’s voice had gone up about six octaves as he unlocked his office and stopped short. “Fuck.”
Dylan peeked over Tim’s shoulder into his office and cringed. In a decade of studying terrible corporate leaders, she had never seen anything like this.
Dixie Cups everywhere. Full of diet soda. The cups were lined end to end on the carpet, bookshelves, and all the chairs. They’d even managed to balance them on his computer monitor. Whoever had pulled this off must have spent all weekend carefully filling tiny cups and placing them on every possible surface. They’d avoided the space where the door opened, but that was it. She almost laughed until she caught sight of Tim, who was misting up.
“I’ll go get a garbage can.”
“Can’t we call maintenance?” Tim sniffled at his sneakers.
Dylan paused. She wanted to be delicate, but he’d earned this one.
“No, Tim. We need to clean this up ourselves. The cups and the reason for them.” Tim’s shoulders sagged as he rubbed his eyes, while Dylan retrieved a small wastebasket. “Before we start, take a picture. This is a practical joke, and we need to make sure you laugh at it.”
Tim stopped rubbing his eyes long enough to look at her like she might be possessed. “This is not funny.”
“Well, it’s going to be when we get you on track. Think of this as future laughing.”
“That doesn’t even make sense.”
“Take the picture, damn it.” Dylan was pretty sure she had never cursed at anyone she worked with, let alone a client. She took it one step further and shook the trash can at him. “Now, get to gettin’.”
To her surprise, Tim pulled out his phone and took the photo. Glancin
g at the screen, he changed angles a few times and snapped more pictures.
“Okay, it’s not a photoshoot.”
“If I’m gonna laugh, I want it to look good,” Tim said, taking the can from her and walking as far into his office as he could before crouching down and looking up at her expectantly.
Dylan looked down at her dress and realized that the pencil cut was going to be problematic as long as she was wearing her heels.
Slowly, she stepped out of one shoe and then the other and stooped to hide them as close to his office wall as possible in the hope that no one else would see her crawling around on the floor without shoes. Jared could never say she didn’t go the extra mile for the client. Sitting next to Tim, she picked up a sticky cup of flat pop and dumped it into the trash can before stacking it into another empty cup.
“This sort of feels like a waste,” Tim sighed. “Do you think we could put the cups in the staff kitchen for water or something?”
Dylan stopped dumping flat pop out to look at Tim, waiting for the punch line.
“What?”
“Tim, that is the kind of thing that gets your office filled with cups in the first place. Ask yourself, Would I want to use a stale, soaked-through, diet-soda-covered cup? If the answer is no, then don’t do it to your staff. Even if it saves money.”
“It was just a question.”
“No, it wasn’t. Be honest: if I hadn’t called you out, would you have done it?”
“No.” Dylan arched an eyebrow, and Tim amended, “Probably not.” When the second eyebrow went up, he shrugged. “Maybe.”
“Gross.” Dylan wrinkled her nose, picking up the next cup and tossing the liquid before fixing Tim with a stare. “Explain this logic to me. I’m trying to understand how I could give you a document outlining that people here feel underappreciated—taken advantage of, even—and you’re wondering how to reuse paper cups.”
“Does it matter?” Tim shrugged and adjusted his stance slightly to take advantage of the additional few inches he’d cleared. Noticing she had halted dumping cups again, he stopped trying to make himself comfortable. “I built this place. Money was tight for so long. They don’t know that.”
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