Devil in a Suit

I scooped the report off the desk right as her fingertips left it. My eyes skimmed over the top, finding her name. Madison. Now, I remembered Brittany telling me her name. Evidently, she was one of the best and brightest of her class. I wondered if she had the biggest attitude there as well.

I thought that dealing with the last girl was brutal in its own way. I wouldn’t call this interaction with Madison brutal, but it certainly didn’t glide as smoothly as butter. She wasn’t making things easy for me, but I wasn’t about to back down from a little challenge. Taking on challenges was how I got to where I was now.

“Seems like you’re confident in this report,” I commented as I lowered the report to look at her. She had to have some confidence in her work since she put it aside to study. I didn’t realize that we were paying the interns to do schoolwork.

Madison tilted her head up slightly as she folded her hands in front of her.

“I am,” she told me. Her voice didn’t waver.

I scoffed lightly, shaking my head at her. She did have some nerve. She didn’t even apologize for being caught doing something she wasn’t supposed to be doing. There was no politeness in her responses. I felt like I was talking to some rebellious teenager. Again, I wasn’t here to babysit. All I was here to do was to show people what a successful business looked like so that they could run their own one day.

“Well, I’ll take a look at your report personally and let you know if it’s up to company standards,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest and tucking her report under my arm. If she was confident enough to engage in a stare-off with me, she had to be confident enough to let me judge her work.

Madison’s eyes widened slightly, but she only reacted for a second before adopting a normal expression. She sat up more in her seat and nodded.

“I hope you appreciate the effort I put in,” she replied. She sounded as stiff as she looked.

It was a shame. I wanted to make her squirm at least a little bit, but she was defiant. She wanted to appear tougher than she was. In reality, she was just an intern. She was completely replaceable. Yet, she showed no fear. She showed determination, resistance, like she had something to prove.

This had to be coming from what happened yesterday between us. I snapped at her. So what? People became angry. People got upset with other people. If she couldn’t handle a little aggravation from me, she wasn’t going to survive in this business world. However, it seemed like she had learned how to put up a front, how to dig her way under my skin.

Honestly, with anyone else, I would’ve booted them immediately. There was something about her that made me want to keep her around, though. Maybe I just wanted to show her how ridiculous her little tough act was, how I could see right through her. I would see how tough she was after I went through her work.

“Maybe you should put in a little more effort by working instead of wasting your internship time by studying. This is work, not school,” I said with a heavy stare. This internship was a gift to these college students. We taught them, paid them, and recommended them to other professionals. We were precise when we picked our interns. I didn’t know how she slipped through the cracks when other interns would’ve handled this interaction with more professionalism.

Madison didn’t say anything. She merely pursed her lips and nodded her head.

I had to force myself to walk out of her office. Perhaps, I had wanted her to open her mouth and argue a little just so that I could argue back. I could tell that she was holding back quite a few words, and I had a feeling that they weren’t all that kind. I couldn’t blame her. We hadn’t exactly gotten off on the right foot, but who spilled coffee on who?

I walked into my office, putting aside my own work so that I could read hers. I couldn’t help but be intrigued, wondering just how bright she was. Being clumsy or having an attitude didn’t make her dumb in my eyes. She likely could be very intelligent. Maybe it would save her after our rocky interactions. She had to contribute something to my company, or she would be a waste of space and resources. I probably already had enough of that here.

I trusted Brittany, who said that Madison was a good student, but I was going to see if she was a good worker. At the end of the day, college and internships were all about turning students into workers. I had to see if Madison was cut out for this kind of work because it could be cutthroat. There were people out there way harsher than me. Who knew if she could handle them like she tried to handle me?