A Very Lucky Christmas

by A Very Lucky Christmas (retail) (epub)

  She slunk in through the door and took a seat. Grumpy was already perched on his chair on the other side of his desk. Perched was an unusual position for him – he normally slouched back, his arms folded, with a scowl on his face. Today, he looked nervous. He was leaning forward, fiddling with a pad and pen, and the skin under his left eye kept twitching. Daisy stared at the little tick in fascination.

  ‘I know what you’re going to say,’ she said, before Grumpy had a chance to open his mouth. ‘And no, I haven’t come up with much yet. But I will. I just need some time to get to grips with it. This is a whole new thing for me.’

  ‘It’s shelved,’ Simon said.

  ‘Shelved? That’s um… er…’ If she said “great”, he’d know she hadn’t wanted to do it in the first place. If she said, “that’s a shame”, or appeared too disappointed, he might decide to unshelve it and give the project back to her.

  ‘Yes, shelved,’ he repeated. ‘You’ll go back to doing what you did before.’

  Not that she’d actually stopped doing what she was doing before, because she hadn’t had much of a go at the musical cards. ‘Oh, good,’ she replied.

  ‘For the time being.’

  ‘The time being?’ What was that supposed to mean? Did they have something else in mind for her?

  It appeared they did. The powers-that-be on the floor upstairs where the accounts and senior managers had their offices, had something quite radical in mind for Daisy Jones.

  ‘We are going to have to let you go,’ Simon said, steeling his hands under his chin (or should she say “chins”?), and looking solemn.

  ‘Go where?’ A trip would be nice, even if it was only for a day. Any old excuse to get out of the office, eh?

  ‘Go, as in, made redundant,’ Simon clarified.

  Daisy sat in stunned silence. Surely she couldn’t have heard him correctly?

  Simon began rabbiting on about severance pay, redundancy packages, and proposed end dates, but Daisy wasn’t really listening.

  ‘There’s been a considerable downturn in the sales of traditional cards since the rise of the ecards.’ He said the last four words as if they were a title of a sci-fi film – “The Rise of the Ecards, coming soon to a cinema near you.”

  ‘We have yet to confirm all the details, and HR will be in touch in due course,’ he carried on, speaking faster, obviously eager for this terrible ordeal to end.

  Caring Cards didn’t have a Human Resources Department – they had a woman called Joyce.

  ‘HR?’ Daisy asked. ‘As in Joyce, from upstairs? Joyce who does the wage slips? That Joyce?’

  ‘Yes, Joyce.’

  ‘When…?’ Daisy swallowed, still in shock. Her hands trembled and she shoved them under her thighs, hoping that sitting on them would stop them shaking. ‘When am I supposed to go?’

  ‘As I said, the date hadn’t been determined yet. It’s TBC,’ Simon replied, almost airily.

  ‘TBC?’

  ‘To be confirmed. It’s not official yet, but I wanted to give you a heads-up, so you know where you stand.’

  Daisy sat for a moment, trying to get her numb mind working. Something Simon said didn’t make sense. ‘Am I, or am I not, being made redundant?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes,’ he said.

  Okay then.

  ‘And no,’ he added.

  Oh? ‘Which is it?’

  ‘Both. Look, I’m going to be honest with you, here. The situation could go both ways. We’re facing a redundancy situation if the market doesn’t improve. Upstairs has given us three to six months to turn things around. If there’s no improvement in that time, then redundancies will have to take place.’

  ‘Redundancies?’ Daisy emphasised the plural.

  ‘It’s not only you who’ll be affected,’ Simon said huffily. ‘Other people’s futures are on the line too.’

  ‘Will you be speaking to Melissa?’

  Simon went red. ‘I expect so.’ He squirmed in his seat.

  Daisy narrowed her eyes. If this was a first-in, last-out thing, then by rights Melissa should be the one sitting in the hot seat and having this conversation with Simon, considering both of them did roughly the same job. Daisy was more senior, and was paid a little more than Melissa, so, on the one hand, it would be cheaper to get rid of Daisy in terms of salary, but Daisy had worked at the company for much longer than Melissa, and any redundancy payment would be more. Daisy had far more experience, and even if she did say so herself, she was better at it.

  Then the penny dropped. Simon had most likely been told to give Daisy the “heads-up,” as he’d put it, in the hope that she’d jump ship before she was pushed.

  Bitterness flashed through her. She’d worked for Caring Cards (or Uncaring Cards, as they should now be called), since she’d left school at eighteen. She’d given them the twelve best years of her life, and look at the thanks she’d got – a vague, undisclosed redundancy package. And that’s why Simon had told her, because they were hoping she’d find another job and leave, so they could save themselves paying her anything. The mean bastards!

  She’d show ’em. There was no way she was going to forgo any redundancy pay-out. It probably wouldn’t be much, but it might be enough to give her the deposit she so desperately wanted. Added to the little she had already saved, she could maybe think about a small semi in Warndon Villages, a series of interconnected estates on the outskirts of the city. She would be one step closer to buying her own home.

  Then another thought struck her. How was she going to get a mortgage without a job? She wasn’t, was she?

  Catch twenty-two.

  Not giving Simon a chance to say anything further, Daisy stood, and said, ‘If that’s all, I’ve got work to do,’ and stalked back to her desk with her head held high, trying not to let anyone see how upset she was.

  Unlocking her computer, she heard Melissa whisper, ‘Is everything okay?’

  ‘No, it bloody isn’t,’ Daisy snapped, immediately regretting her outburst. It wasn’t Melissa’s fault; the other girl couldn’t help that the company decided Daisy was the one they wanted to let go.

  ‘What’s wrong? Has he said something to upset you?’

  ‘You could say that. He told me I’m about to be made redundant.’ Daisy had a fleeting thought about whether she should share the information with her colleague, but Simon hadn’t told her it was confidential, had he? And besides, Melissa had a right to know, because hadn’t Simon said he would be speaking to Melissa too? Though, why would he, when the company couldn’t do without a verse writer?

  ‘Oh Daisy, that’s awful. When?’

  ‘Simon couldn’t give me a date, but he said it’s on the cards.’

  ‘What are you going to do? Look for another job?’

  ‘I think that’s exactly what they’re hoping I’ll do, so they can get out of paying me anything.’

  Melissa gasped. ‘They wouldn’t!’

  ‘They would, but I’ll show ’em. I’m not going anywhere until they’ve paid me what I’m owed.’

  Melissa glared at Simon’s now-closed office door.

  No wonder he hadn’t left it open; he didn’t want to witness any fallout – the coward. Not that Daisy intended to oblige him. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction, so instead of working on the next round of Father’s Day cards as she was supposed to be doing, Daisy Googled job sites instead. It wouldn’t hurt to look, to see what jobs were out there.

  After a while, she sat back, despondent. There didn’t appear to be much call for unemployed greeting card verse writers.

  ‘Daisy?’

  She looked up to see Melissa standing behind her, with a strange almost self-satisfied expression on her face. It certainly hadn’t taken her colleague long to work out that with Daisy gone, they had to keep Melissa on. Daisy didn’t blame her for being relieved that her job was safe.

  ‘Found anything?’ the other girl asked.

  ‘Not really.’ Daisy wondered how long it would be before the news spre
ad around the office. Melissa, bless her, was a bit of a gossip, but at least it spared Daisy from having to explain things twenty different times to twenty different people. No doubt the office would soon be giggling to the news of Freddie’s sexual preference, and Daisy’s coin-swallowing trick, too.

  She sighed and clicked out of Google. ‘Not that I was planning on leaving until they sorted out the redundancy,’ she said, ‘but it looks like even if I wanted to get out of this shitty company, I couldn’t.’

  ‘Shh,’ Melissa said, shooting a swift glance around the office. ‘Simon will hear you.’

  ‘Let him,’ Daisy said. ‘After all, what is he going to do – sack me?’

  Chapter 13

  ‘You’re sacked,’ Simon said.

  ‘Eh? What did you say?’

  ‘Sacked, as in, get your things and leave. You’ll be paid until the end of the week.’

  ‘What do you mean “sacked”?’ Daisy wailed.

  ‘Fired,’ Simon said, leaning back in his chair, folding his arms, and gazing at her with a self-satisfied expression.

  ‘Don’t you mean “made redundant”? We’ve already had this conversation.’

  ‘No, I mean sacked.’

  ‘But you can’t sack me,’ she said, close to tears for the second time that day, and this time she didn’t try to hide it.

  ‘Yes, I can.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘For inappropriate use of the internet.’

  She had no idea what he was rabbiting on about. Was he accusing her of looking at porn?

  Simon noticed her blank expression and explained, ‘For job hunting on company time.’

  ‘It was only for a few minutes,’ she protested. ‘And everyone uses the internet. I have to use Google for my job.’

  ‘For your job, yes, but not for the purpose of changing your job.’

  ‘This is a joke, right?’ she pleaded. ‘Tell me it’s a joke.’

  ‘No joke, you’re to leave at the end of the day.’

  Daisy’s eyes brimmed with tears, and they spilt over to trickle down her cheeks. ‘You’re really sacking me?’ she whispered.

  ‘Yes, I am.’ You’ve contravened the company’s internet policy, which states, and I quote, “no employee will use the company’s internet for personal use”.’

  ‘You booked your last holiday in work, and you’re always on eBay.’

  ‘I’m not,’ he replied, calmly, with no change of expression.

  ‘You are, I’ve seen you.’

  ‘But I haven’t been caught,’ he said, ‘and if you try to make trouble I’ll deny everything. It’ll be your word against mine, and I know who management will believe.’

  ‘You bastard!’

  ‘Calling me names won’t help, not if you want a reference.’

  Daisy, about to call him something far worse, snapped her teeth together with a click. She had to have a reference, she simply had to, otherwise getting another job would be downright impossible.

  Defeated, she got to her feet, turned to leave, then paused and walked back into Simon’s office.

  ‘Can I go home now?’ she asked in a small voice. ‘I can’t stay here another minute.’

  Simon didn’t speak for a moment, taking a quick look at the other staff in the office beyond his own. They were all trying desperately to hear what was going on.

  ‘Okay,’ he said, pretending to be reluctant, but Daisy saw the gleam of relief and satisfaction in his eyes.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, quietly. There was no point in saying anything else. She knew the company’s rules, she’d broken them, and she’d been caught. They had every right to dismiss her. The fact that everyone else did their personal stuff on company time and using company resources, wouldn’t hold any water. She needed that reference.

  It was actually very good of them to provide her with one under the circumstances, because they were well within their rights not to.

  As she slunk out of Simon’s office she wondered if Simon, or another manager had spotted her screen by sheer bad luck, or if someone had shopped her. Melissa had seen what she’d been looking at, but there was no way her friend would blab. It must have been bad luck – one of the pitfalls of working in an open-plan office was the lack of privacy. She’d been so engrossed in her job search that the Queen could have strolled past, and Daisy wouldn’t have noticed. She did, however, have an inkling she might know who had split on her – Stacey, the marketing officer. Her job was to source out new clients, but she fancied herself as being creative, often spouting ideas, hoping someone would take her up on one of them and recognise her talent.

  Daisy had very few belongings at work, apart from her coat, scarf, gloves, and bag. It took her all of thirty seconds to go through her desk drawers to check there was nothing she wanted to take with her. There wasn’t, except for a bundle of receipts she’d stashed in an envelope – reminders of the items she’d bought and not confessed to Freddie (“What? This old thing? I’ve had it ages/Sara gave it to me because she can’t fit in to it/picked it up in a charity shop…”).

  When she lifted her coat off the rack of hooks, Melissa appeared at her side.

  ‘What’s the Grumpmeister got you doing now?’ the other girl asked brightly then hesitated when she saw Daisy’s expression. ‘Is everything alright?’

  ‘Simon sacked me,’ Daisy whispered, not wanting the others to hear, though they could clearly tell that something was up and would find out for themselves soon enough anyway.

  ‘He did what?’ Melissa exclaimed, lowering her voice when Daisy shushed her. ‘Why?’

  ‘Job hunting on company time,’ she replied, wrapping her scarf around her neck.

  ‘That’s terrible. As if he doesn’t do stuff like that all the time.’

  ‘He didn’t get caught. I did.’

  ‘Can he do that?’

  ‘Apparently.’

  ‘Are you going to do anything about it?’ Melissa asked.

  ‘Like what?’

  The question gave Melissa pause. She shrugged. ‘I don’t know’, she said, ‘but there must be something.’

  ‘I honestly don’t think there is.’ Daisy was ready to go, her bag slung over her shoulder, and her coat on.

  Melissa leaned in for a hug. ‘You’ll keep in touch, won’t you?’ she said.

  ‘Of course, I will,’ Daisy replied, hugging her back.

  ‘Promise?’

  ‘Promise.’ Daisy meant it at the time, but once again the gods were about to teach her a lesson – don’t make promises because you never know if you will be able to keep them.

  And for the last time, Daisy walked out of Caring Cards, attempting to hold her head up while keeping her tears at bay, and failing miserably.

  Which was why she ducked back inside and headed for the comforting solitude of the ladies’ loos, to give her time to compose herself and wait for her mascara to stop running down her face.

  Mindful that someone might walk in at any moment, Daisy went into a cubicle, locked the door and put the toilet lid down, then she sat on it and wept.

  First Freddie, then the Christmas Day debacle, and now this.

  What more could go wrong?

  She was about to find out, and by the end of the day she would seriously begin to wonder if someone up there was having a sick joke at her expense.

  At last her crying jag began to abate, subsiding into hiccupping sniffles. She felt washed out, drained, an empty shell of herself, and she leant back, resting her aching head on the wall behind her. At least she hadn’t broken down in the middle of the high street – the meltdown had been in private, and though there may be a few more episodes to come, she had a feeling this was the worst. She hadn’t really cried over Freddie, and she supposed it was overdue. Combined with the terrible news today, it had all become a bit much.

  She gave her nose one final blow, wiped her eyes with a fresh tissue, and took a deep breath.

  Time to face the world again.

  A door open
ed and the click of high heels on the tiled floor made Daisy decided to wait until whoever it was had left. She’s simply couldn’t face any more questions, so she sat there listening to the sound of perfume being sprayed and lipstick being applied.

  Then…

  ‘Hiya, it’s me.’ Melissa’s voice was low and sultry.

  Daisy stopped breathing, hoping her friend didn’t realise she had an audience. Saying goodbye to her once had been hard enough and she didn’t want to go through it a second time in less than fifteen minutes.

  ‘Yeah, she’s gone. I can’t believe Simon actually had the balls to do it.’

  Who on earth was Melissa talking to? Daisy gave a mental shrug – she knew what a gossip Melissa was, and she didn’t hold it against her. Daisy would probably do the same in Melissa’s shoes, and she realised she was going to be the topic of the day for a while yet.

  ‘Nah, meek as a lamb.’ A pause, then Melissa laughed, and it wasn’t a nice laugh, either. ‘I don’t think she’ll make any trouble. I asked her before she left, and she didn’t think there was anything she could do. If only she knew. But thank God she doesn’t.’

  Another pause and Daisy fervently wished she knew who was on the other end of the phone, and what it was Melissa was thankful Daisy didn’t know.

  ‘I know she could go to ACAS and claim unfair dismissal, but believe me, she won’t. She slinked out of here with her tail well and truly between her legs. You’ve heard the last of Daisy Jones.’ This time Melissa’s laugh sounded downright mean. ‘Now, do I get that promotion you promised me, snookums?’

  What promotion? Who was Melissa talking to?

  ‘Okay, I love you too,’ Melissa was saying, her voice breathy and flirty once more. She giggled. ‘I look forward to playing secretary to your big, powerful boss, Mr Dearborn, sir.’

  Too much info, Melissa – hang on, Mr Dearborn? The Mr Dearborn, the new MD?

  Daisy realised she was right, and as soon as she did, everything slotted into place.

  Melissa had ratted her out to the MD because she was having an affair with him, and because he’d offered her an incentive.