One Kiss: An Office Romance

Her mouth pops open in utter disbelief. “A thing?” she repeats in a stage whisper. “As in… together?”

I don’t answer. Her surprise is just too delicious. I don’t want the moment to be abbreviated in any way.

“Holy cow, that’s crazy!” she mutters to herself.

Considering the possibilities, she backs away and begins to pace around my conference table.

“I think he’ll make an exception,” I announce, pleased.

“Wow, wow!” she chuckles. “Like, recent? Since his wife passed away? Or like… college? Or like… did they run away and take a train across Russia together or something?”

“Okay, I wasn’t expecting this line of questions. So, are you interested? We will take a bunch of pictures, write up the descriptions, room sizes, the whole thing. Yes?”

I can see there is still doubt in her eyes when she stops pacing and leans on the conference table. She is still on the fence. But finally she agrees that a weekend in Lake Geneva to get the listing for my mother’s eccentric movie star friend is definitely a proper work assignment.

“Oh, hey, hi Clarissa,” Rosemary smiles as she walks in. “Paychecks! Here’s yours too. Saved me a trip to your office…”

She pulls mine out of the stack in her hand, then flips through to find Clarissa’s and hands it to her before swooping back out of the office. Absentmindedly I open the envelope, then take another look.

“Something wrong?” she asks from the other side of the room, tucking the stub in her back pocket.

“No, it’s just…”

Okay, this doesn’t make any sense. I’ve only gotten a few paychecks since I have been here, but this is way too much. Running a list of calculations in my mind, I add my base pay with the commissions for the dotcom startup, the aesthetician, and the—

“Oh, shit.”

It starts to spool out in my mind. I just got a huge commission from the purchase of Isaac Nelson’s new Victorian mansion naturopathy center. And that commission is about twice as much as it should be. Which means…

“Clarissa, I screwed up,” I admit slowly.

Cautiously she stares at me, her body somewhat rigid. She seems to be preparing herself for any of a number of possibilities.

“First of all,” I start, “I need you to know I didn’t do this on purpose. You believe me?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she replies icily.

Shit.

“I meant to add you as the co-broker on the Isaac Nelson deal. I forgot. That is totally my fault.”

Her nostrils flare. I see her jaw square off as she grinds her molars together.

“It happens,” she says through clenched teeth.

“Yeah, well… Whatever. What is accounting’s extension? Oh, I remember…”

Picking up the handset, I press the orange button then dial the four digits that are scrawled on the sticky note next to the old-fashioned phone. The tone chirps twice before the call connects.

In any company, accounting people are perpetually annoyed. There’s nothing you can do to make them happy. They are just always annoyed. I think it is a job requirement. But Anita listens to me patiently, and so I patiently listen to her lecture before repeating myself for the third time and asking her to do what I need her to do.

“Okay,” I finally announce, setting the phone back in the cradle. “They say they’ll have to cut you a check, and it won’t be instantaneous, but you’ll have it in the morning.”

“Cut me a check,” she repeats vaguely.

“I hope that isn’t a big inconvenience,” I reply, stuffing my check back in the envelope. “I don’t know why they can’t just do it today, but she says they can’t.”

Clarissa squints at me suspiciously. After a moment, she tips her head to the side and wrinkles her nose. “Wait… What are we talking about?”