Grumpy Boss

“I’m going to call Desmond,” I said, shaking my head, and holding a hand up to forestall Jack’s response. “I want to talk to him. Even if we’re not going to become best friends again, and it probably won’t fix anything, I have to try.”

Millie looked more hurt than angry. She shook her head like I was making a horrible mistake. And maybe she was right—reaching out to Desmond wasn’t going to solve anything, and it might only make it worse.

I still had to try. We were on the brink of failing, and failure was not an option, not for me. I wanted Millie to make her money, hell, I wanted all my investors to get filthy rich, and it would be nice if I earned a little bit extra myself.

I left Jack’s office with Millie on my heels. She caught up with me in the halls, but didn’t say anything, only match my stride. I knew what she was thinking already, and didn’t have to say it out loud. I shut my office door and she turned to me, arms over her chest, as I walked over to my desk and sat.

“This is a bad idea,” she said.

“Convince me,” I said, gesturing for her to sit.

She hesitated, making a face like she’d rather do anything else, but she sat down, her back straight. She looked at me like I was a judge in a court room—and I saw the lawyer inside of her, struggling to get out. From all the time we’d spent together, I knew she’d make an exceptionally good lawyer, and that she was absolutely not going to fail if she put herself out there and took a chance. All she had to do was try—and maybe I could convince her to take that final step once all this was over.

“Think about how this plays out,” she said, holding a finger up in the air. “Most likely, he’s not going to do what you want. That’s true, right?”

I nodded slightly. “I’ll conceded that. It’s unlikely he’ll listen.”

“So if he won’t listen, then calling has a non-zero chance of making things worse, won’t it? Imagine if you lose your cool and you two start arguing, and he only doubles down. That’ll make this whole thing even more impossible.”

“True,” I said, nodding along. “You’re not wrong.”

“And even if he doesn’t do that, calling him shows that he’s winning. Even getting a taste of victory might make him fight even harder. For all we know, he’s about to give up on his own, without our help. Maybe calling might galvanize him into action all over again.”

“You’re not wrong,” I said, laughing, shaking my head. She was a damn smart girl, seeing, this issue from all sides and extrapolating the likely outcomes. I couldn’t argue with her, not really, but she didn’t see the one fact hat mattered above all else.

“So why do it then?” she asked. “If the chances are pretty good that this is going to backfire, why would you take the risk?”

“Because we used to be friends, and I wish we still were.” Once the words left my mouth, I knew they were true. I was fucked up, and a little pathetic, but I missed my friend.

She deflated and lowered her hand. She blinked at me, and her lips pulled down slightly, and I felt almost sick—the pity in her eyes was disgusting, and I hated myself for being that vulnerable. I had to look away from her before I saw just how weak I’d become.

“You really miss him?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I said, hedging a little, afraid to truly open up.

“Come on, it’s okay if you do. I just didn’t really realize… from what you told me, I thought you two were just colleagues.”

“We were good friends,” I said, still not looking at her. I squeezed my eyes shut in an attempt to get some courage, but that didn’t help. I opened them again, and looked at the blue sky above the glittering glass buildings. “We’d work all day then spend most of the night together, drinking at the bars around town. Alvin would hang out, make jokes, we’d all get drunk and discuss what to do with the company next, how to grow it. When we became a legit organization, we’d do the same thing, but in the conference room at night, with six packs of craft beer and boxes of pizza. We did that constantly, every day, for years.”

I let out a slow breath, remembering those days, when we were young and building something, and so sure of ourselves, unable to imagine that we couldn’t succeed. If we were given a chance, of course we could build a company that could compete against the big guys, because we were smart and idealistic. Desmond and I were close, which was why it felt like such a betrayal when he left, and why things remained so fraught between us. That wound never healed, only festered.