by R. S. Elliot
“It’s just that every woman in the office seems to love him.”
“He’s handsome, he’s rich, he’s single, and he loves kids,” Olivia said with a shrug. “Objectively, he’s a catch.”
“And he’s got those scold-me-Daddy-I’ve-been-bad eyes,” Sonia said wistfully, half lost in her own fantasy. Olivia swatted her, shooting me a scandalized look.
“You’re on the job, Sonia.”
“Hey, at least I’m honest. Am I wrong?”
“That’s not up for discussion. Let’s talk about something else. Luke would have a fit if he heard this.”
“That sounds good to me,” I put in, feeling a little relieved. While I liked to gossip, I was still getting used to Sonia’s forthrightness. I got the sense that she was a hard nut to crack, but if she decided she liked you and invited you into her social circle, she was no-holds-barred about speaking her mind.
“Fine, fine,” Sonia said. Then she nodded to the glossy leather handbag Olivia had brought with her into the kitchen, the one patterned with black and brown checks. “Let’s talk about that new Louis bag. Is it the Neverfull?”
Olivia’s face lit up in pure girlish joy, and she took up the bag and held it to her chest. “Yes! An early birthday present to myself. I have the larger one, but I thought the medium size would be perfect for everyday use and look! I got the Rose Ballerine interior. Isn’t it such a pretty color?”
Sonia nodded her approval. I had been struggling to memorize the little logos that gave away the designer goods so many of the women wore to work and gushed over with each other like hunting trophies. But the Chanel and Gucci symbols were still too similar for me to tell apart, and so were Louis Vuitton and Yves Saint Laurent. Even worse, I was sure that if I tried to pronounce any of their names, I would butcher them. Better to keep quiet then, and not admit that I hadn’t been raised in a household where anyone would ever consider spending three thousand dollars on a bag, even if we had it.
Part of me still felt that investing so much money in an accessory was ridiculous, but another part of me knew that I should probably put more effort into my presentation. There had to be a happy medium somewhere between my patchy drugstore eyeshadow and flimsy Rue21 tops and Sonia’s vintage designer boots, or Olivia’s rotating wardrobe of Calvin Klein dresses. I just wasn’t sure how to find my way there. My mother hadn’t been concerned with her outward appearance, favoring functionality over fashion. She wore a plain suit to work most days. I taught myself to shop by the lowest price point, not by quality. Self-consciously, I glanced down at the tight knit dress I was wearing. The hem was work appropriate, but the material was paper thin jersey that probably was better suited to pajamas, and my blazer, boxy, and one size too large was rescued from my mother’s closet.
Olivia must have caught me looking at myself because she stopped gloating about her bag and set it on the counter again, looking a little pink in the cheeks.
“Of course I never would have bought something like this when I was first starting at this job,” she said, probably more for my benefit than for Sonia’s.
“Oh yeah, of course,” Sonia said, catching her drift and following her gaze over to me. “Hey, Emily, your shoes are really pretty!”
“Thanks,” I mumbled. I was terrible at taking compliments even when it didn’t feel like they were being given as a consolation prize. These dark cherry lacquered slingbacks had been a high school graduation gift from my grandmother. Somehow, the compliment stung more, knowing that I hadn’t picked these shoes, much less bought them, myself.
“Learning how to dress for a new job is always hard,” Olivia said soothingly. “Every office is different, and it isn’t always clear from the interview what you need.”
“Yeah, I don’t think at first I…” I gulped tea to soothe my nerves. “Really realized how formally people dress around here.”
“It’s not your fault; It’s Luke’s. Tech startups are notoriously casual, so it’s okay if that’s more what you were expecting. Luke is just... he likes things done to the nines. And he sets a sort of example for us all to follow.”
“I’m learning that. I’m just not that into clothes, you know?”
This wasn’t strictly true. I saw dresses in shop windows that took my breath away every day and was just as enchanted by beautiful color, a swirl of interesting fabric, or a sharp cut of tailoring as the next person. I just never let myself try them on once I saw the price tag, and I convinced myself that Goodwill and the clearance rack at Target were good enough for a college sophomore with an absurd amount of student debt.
“There are some great thrift shops in this part of the city where you can get really nice pieces at a discount. You’d be surprised at how far a couple of basics can get you! You can never go wrong with neutrals, either; they never clash.”
I smiled weakly at the fashion advice. It was good advice and given kindly, but I hadn’t asked for it, and it felt uncomfortably close to my supervisor telling me to put in a little more effort.
“I’ll check it out, thanks.”
Sonia looked at me sympathetically and opened her mouth to say something, but then the door to Luke’s office flew open. From our vantage point in the tiny kitchen, we could see across a row of cubicles to Luke’s corner office, and he could see in here as well if he thought to glance over.
“Shit,” Sonia swore and dropped into a crouch. Olivia followed a heartbeat later and tugged me down after her. I wasn’t expecting any of this and ended up collapsed into a heap on the floor.
“What’s going on?” I asked in a hissed whisper. The back of my calves burned from squatting down in high heels.
“Just avoiding the wrath of Thorpe,” Sonia said. “He doesn’t like it when we burn company time gossiping, but I would argue they should include it in the mental health section of our benefits package.”
Olivia pushed herself up just a bit, casting a glance around the room before ducking back down again.
“Doesn’t look like he’s out hunting for either of us. He just went into the CFO’s office.”
“Poor Carl. Do you want to write his obituary, or should I?”
Sonia and Olivia both devolved into giggles and snickers, and I wondered, not for the first time, how in the world I had gotten myself into this.
Chapter Five
Luke
I didn’t bother with pleasantries or greetings when I let myself into Carl’s office.
“Tell me you have good news for me,” I said, tossing a folder down on his desk. “Do not tell me you made me get up from what I was doing and come all the way over here for bad news.”
Carl looked up from his computer, a little startled. Like Oliva, Carl had been with SkyBlue since the earliest days of the company, and I appointed him my CFO when we were still just two kids sleeping in a dorm room and trying to scrape together enough money for ramen noodles. He always believed in my work and was loyal to a fault, but he moved a little too slowly for me. From idea to idea, from place to place, from our shared bathroom in the morning when I needed to shave and get to work. He was annoyingly fond of face-to-face interactions over more efficient emails or texts and always asked me over to “pick my brain” or “run things by me” in person.
“Hi to you too. I feel like I haven’t seen you all week. You alright? And what are you talking about? All the way over here? You work three doors down.”
“Close enough. You’ve got five minutes. What’s up?”
Carl leaned back in his chair and took his reading glasses off, agonizingly slowly. He was only two years older than me, and he was getting prematurely farsighted from staring at tiny data points all day. Otherwise, he still looked the way he did when we were in college: square New England accent, tousled reddish-brown curls, and a smattering of freckles that somehow didn’t make him look childish. His brown eyes were far too kind for his own good. Between the two of us, people usually preferred talking to Carl and generally introduced themselves to him first. Something abou
t my demeanor being “cold” and “off-putting.” But they also tried to wheedle him with sob stories or press him for a bigger cut of the budget, and worst of all, he often heard them out. I had never been able to teach him how to cut people off before they could ask for something.
“Listen, I’ve been thinking about this new partnership, and how it might affect our five-year plan as a company.”
“Sounds like this conversation could have been an email.”
“Just one minute, hear me out.” Carl steepled his fingers and fixed me with a weighted look. “I’ve been thinking about a subscription service.”
“A what?”
“A subscription service. Everyone’s got them now, and they’re doing gangbusters.”
“Carl, we’re a car company, not a box of useless shit that gets delivered to your door every month.”
“No, no, that’s not the kind of thing I’m talking about!” He waved my words away like they were smoke and leaned forward across his desk. I could tell from the gleam in his eye that he might be on to something, the lightning insight that came to him after he mulled things over for a month or two. So I let him go on. “What’s the biggest problem in the tech industry right now?”
“God, do you want a list?”
“I mean from the consumer perspective. Your average Joe on the street with a smartphone. Come on; take a guess.”
I thought it over for a minute.
“Planned obsolescence?”
Carl slapped his desk in triumph.
“Exactly! You buy a phone, and it lasts two years before it starts fritzing out on you; you buy a car, and it lasts five years, maybe, if you’re lucky. The higher tech something is, the shorter its lifespan because software systems go out of date, replacement parts are pricey, and people stop being trained to service whatever has gone out of style. Makes tech manufacturers a ton of money. Everybody knows we do it; nobody knows a way around it.”
I wasn’t entirely following at this point. I crossed my arms and furrowed my brows.
“The way around it is to downgrade your purchases, buy a new phone, or trade in your car. We make a lot of money on those trade-ins as you said, and at any rate, tech advances too fast for anything to stay relevant for long. iPods were revolutionary a decade ago; now look at them.”
“Exactly. So what if there was a way to keep people from downgrading to cheaper cars and ensuring that they signed on to the newest SkyBlue release while saving them money in the long run?”
“You know I hate rhetorical questions; tell me or don’t.”
“I’m thinking about introducing an exclusive package deal that customers can opt into when they purchase a vehicle equipped with SkyBlue technology. This subscription service would give them advance access to the newest SkyBlue models at a discounted price, and, most importantly, give them yearly tech upgrades in their current vehicle at no additional cost. No more losing your GPS because it’s not compatible with new operating systems or swapping your car because suddenly the automated driving functions are outdated.”
“Doesn’t that seem a little generous to you? I feel like we would lose money. What would our margins be on a model like that?”
“Very cushy. People are paying for security and convenience. It doesn’t cost us anywhere near the subscription fee to upgrade the vehicles. And more than that, it creates brand loyalty. It shows we’re committed to keeping our customers up to date with the best. You’ve seen the satisfaction numbers same as me. People are afraid of signing on to such new technology, and they’re afraid it will get outdated just as soon as they’ve become comfortable with it. We can’t rely on sales to early adopters forever. Eventually, we need to attract soccer moms and suburban commuters and parents looking to get a safe car for their college freshman.”
I ran my hand over my well-trimmed stubble, thinking intently. I was aware I was probably scowling, which was one of my most common expressions, but Carl wasn’t deterred. I had never been able to intimidate him, which was one of the reasons he remained so valuable to me. Carl was the real deal, even if he annoyed me like no one else.
“You’ve got reservations,” he noted.
“A few,” I admitted.
“Let’s hear them.”
“I would have to see specs. And numbers. I want to know the exact cost of rolling out a service like this, and the cost if it fails.”
“Oh, I know. I’m already having the boys in R&D draft something up to send to you. What else?”
“Carl, this is a luxury company. By nature and design. We offer the best of the best to people, and I’m not sure how something as mass-market as a subscription service would affect our company image.”
Carl sighed heavily.
“All you ever did in college was talk about how you wanted SkyBlue automation to be available in every car in the country and accessible to any buyer with money to spend.”
“I still do,” I said defensively. “I think self-driving cars are the future. They’re safe and practical and—”
“I’ve heard the spiel, and I get it. You know I believe in it too. So why are you so afraid of losing that luxury status? We won’t, Luke, the products speak for itself. And to be quite honest, we still price out most buyers. Reaching down into the middle class a bit will not hurt us. If you really believe in accessibility, you have to be willing to make things accessible. End of story. And to be quite frank with you, our sales are plateauing. We’re on track to start losing money in three years if nothing changes. I think this is a great way forward.”
I straightened my cuffs, brows still furrowed in deep thought. I remembered being ten and being bullied by the bigger boys in my neighborhood because my shoes came from Walmart and had filthy frayed laces that desperately needed to be replaced. And being fifteen, ogling my neighbor’s refinished muscle car when I knew I didn’t have enough money for a bus pass. I worked so hard to not only become rich but appear rich, learning how to dress and speak, sip wine, and listen to conversations about the stock market. Everyone already knew I was new money, and the tiniest slip could expose me as nothing more than a ratty, poor kid from the Queens with a bloated bank account. But that was my damage, my issue. I couldn’t project that onto my company, especially not when it went against the ethos that underpinned my mission here.
“I’m not saying yes. But I’ll think about it.”
“Good,” Carl said, sighing out the word with relief. “I’ve got plenty for you to go over, but I know you’ve got a full week. Thursday work alright for you?”
“Send it over whenever you like, I don’t care.”
Carl arched an eyebrow.
“You sound more irritable than usual. Is everything alright? Olivia said you haven’t been sleeping.”
I gave him a withering glance and reminded myself to let Olivia know exactly what I thought of her discussing my personal life outside the office later.
“Olivia needs to keep her opinions to herself. I’m fine, Carl.”
“Talked to your brother-in-law lately?”
“I don’t know, have you talked to your ex-wife? Or are the two of you still just estranged? I’m assuming they’ll award her custody of Lisa.”
The words came out acidic, more biting than I meant to be with an old friend, and I knew Carl had been right about the stress getting to me. A shadow passed over his face, and he put his reading glasses back on, turning from me slightly to look back at his screen.
“You’re an asshole,” he muttered, half-hearted because he had told me so many times.
“I know,” I said. What else was there to say?
Carl didn’t glance at me when he spoke again.
“As I said, I’ll have something sent over. Sorry for taking up so much of your time.”
I wanted to do something, to rewind the last five minutes and steer the conversation towards more productive waters, but instead, I stormed out of his office and into my own without another word.
I spent the rest of the day in a rotten m
ood, irritated with every new email that popped into my inbox and snapping at Olivia about her mouth when she came in at two pm with my afternoon espresso. She icily told me that my two thirty appointment was waiting and that she would not be waiting for me after work for our planned happy hour with Carl. This did not improve my mood.
I wanted not to care. I wanted to turn on that machine personality that everyone in the press insisted I had and plow through Carl’s feelings, and Olivia’s. They had irritated me, after all, and should know better than to interfere with the tight ship I liked to run. But there was a tiny voice in my head reminding me that these were my friends, two of the oldest and most loyal ones I had, after the boys from the neighborhood where I grew up. No one understood SkyBlue like them, or my vision for the company, or my eccentricities as a CEO. There was being an asshole as expected, and there was isolating the people closest to me when I needed them most. I felt that I had, potentially, blurred those lines a little too much that day.
I stopped by Carl’s office after I clocked out for the day. He was still at work, crunching numbers while the sun set behind him. I knocked twice and didn’t bother waiting for a response before poking my head in.
“Hi,” I said, a little quieter than usual.
Carl glanced up, then saw who it was and looked back down at his work, the corners of his mouth tightening.
“Need something, Luke?”
“Are you coming out? It’s six thirty.”
“I don’t think so. I’ve got a lot on my plate tonight.”
“We all do. Come on; we only do this once a month. Let me make it up to you with a drink.”
This got his attention, no matter how much he wanted to look calm and unaffected.
“Make it up to me? Is the impassive Luke Thorpe actually apologizing for something?”
“Of course not. I’m offering to buy you a drink. That’s all. Take it or leave it.”
Carl sighed heavily, but a small smile appeared on his face. At the end of the day, we were the closest thing to brothers each other had.
