Good Pet

She looks over at Vanacore, and then back at me.

“But I’m not the woman with the job to offer. I’m just here to make it official if it’s to happen and offer my perspective.” She sighs, looking over at Vanacore again. “The rest is up to her. It is up to whether you satisfy those needs she has or not.”

“Well, Tommy,” says Vanacore, clearing her throat. “I already said I liked you. I already said that you have a lot of things that people your age just don’t seem to have any more.”

She licks her lips again, but this time I feel something more behind it. Something a little less to do with any dryness she may have there, and something more to do with ideas or plans lying elsewhere in her head.

“But since there are particular ways these things get handled, I suppose I have to say it.”

She hangs her head, as if thinking. It isn’t long. I get the feeling it’s just enough for the “show” of it. A few seconds later, she brings her head back up and finds my eyes.

“Would you like to work with me, Tommy? If offered you the job, would you take it?”

Her eyes suck out all the air in my lungs. For a moment, I can’t breathe or speak. All I can do is sit there and stare at her.

Then, it hits me.

She offered me the job. Me. After everyone else on the legal assistants’ floor said she was impossible to please and super picky, she offered me the chance to work with her!

Come on, brain! Come on! Work! Say something!

Vanacore laughs good-naturedly as if she finds me as dorky as she does cute.

“Cat got your tongue, Tommy?”

“Yes,” I say, not realizing that I’ve actually just answered her most recent question and not the one about the job.

I shake my head out, like a computer program malfunctioning.

“I mean, yes, yes, ma’am — I’d like the job very much. If you’re offering it to me, I’d like the opportunity very much to work with you, Ms. Vanacore.”

I bring my head up and down quickly, not sure what to do or what I’m supposed to do. Never in my wildest dreams did I expect that she would be this interested in me, and this ready to offer me such a position.

Though part of my rational mind says that it probably has more to do with something other than my qualifications, I bat that thought away.

“Thank you, ma’am. Thank you so much for the generous offer,” I say.

“The pleasure is all mine,” she says, and I feel something sharp on “mine.”

It feels dangerous, though my mind won’t let me go all the way to that. It stops me short of it, just as Vanacore reaches out her hand to shake mine.

“When I was your age, a man in the business of law gave me a similar opportunity, and I’ve been waiting forty years to return the favor.”

She claps her fingers around mine, giving them a vigorous shake. She doesn’t seem to notice or care about the sweat on my palms.

Her hands, by comparison, are dry, smooth, and faintly perfumed — with sweet booze or Cologne, I can’t tell.

Her grip is a firm one — steadying, but also dominating.

“I consider this my opportunity since I have finally found the young man worthy of such a blessing.”

At some point during this, she lets go of my hand. The reason I don’t notice this right away is because of the impression her hand leaves on mine, both literally and metaphorically.

“Thank you, Ms. Vanacore, ma’am,” I say. “I’ll give you my best. I’ll give you my all. I promise.”

Vanacore’s eyes shine.

“I know you will, Tommy,” she says. “I know you will. You are just that committed.”

An odd shiver goes through my stomach and down my back at this, but I brush it away.

Charlotte pushes some papers my way with a smile.

“If you sign these, Mr. Radner, I can get your pay rate change set up with payroll,” she says, handing me a really fancy pen. “If you sign these, we can complete this interview, and you and Ms. Vanacore can get to the rest of your morning.”

“Yes.” I nod. “Fine.”

With that, I sign the paperwork, still unable to believe I’ve done it.

I’ve gotten the promotion I’ve been looking for and with a boss that no one else has been able to impress.

Again, some parts of me aren’t entirely sure I’ve earned it for the reasons I think I do.

Some part of me begins to pipe up and remind me that it seems like Ms. Vanacore might be looking at me for more than just my accomplishments and my recommendations, but again I push it away. I push it aside.

I’m just glad to be signing my name on the dotted line to my future right now.