Company (25 page)

Freddy surveys the new Staff Services department with horror. He hurries into the farm, hoping someone (anyone!) from Training Sales arrived early and reserved a bunch of good desks. He pauses at the coat stand to shrug off his jacket, then realizes his usual hook is taken. Of course, it's not his hook: his hook is (or was) two floors down. But Freddy is peeved anyway. He has so little; now they want to take away his
hook
? He flings his jacket over the top of the one already there.

“Ah, Freddy. Just who I wanted to see.” It's Sydney, in a sharp business suit so black it's like a hole in reality. “Tell me, is that dead pool still going?”

“Yeah, I guess. Why?”

“Oh, no reason.”

“I thought everyone in Training Sales was retained,” Freddy says, alarmed.

“Well, you never know,” Sydney says. “You never know what might be necessary in this new environment.”

“Not Holly. Please, Sydney, not Holly—”

“Who said Holly?” Sydney says, irritated. “I didn't say I was sacking Holly.”

“You asked about the dead pool—”

“Look, forget I mentioned it. I might not sack anybody.” She checks her watch, a glittering gold thing that dangles from her tiny wrist. “If you don't mind, I have an important meeting to get to.”

Freddy stands aside. He watches her wend her way through the crammed cubicles to reach the meeting room, knock once, and step inside without waiting for a response. Then he cups his hands around his mouth and calls,
“Holly?”

Holly pops her head over a cubicle only a few desks away. “Hey, there you are.”

Freddy scurries over. The entire remaining Training Sales department bar Jones—that is, Holly, Elizabeth, and Roger—is squeezed into a single cubicle, leaning against desks or sitting in chairs with their knees touching. Freddy looks around in dismay. “Is this all the space we get? We should call Relocation Services.”

“We
are
Relocation Services.” Elizabeth points at a memo that Holly, her brow furrowed, is now reading. “Or, at least, they're one of the departments we've been consolidated with. They arrived an hour ago and took all the best spaces.”

Holly gasps, her fingers tightening on the memo. “We've merged with Gymnasium Management!”

“‘Merged' is one way of putting it,” Roger says. “We're much more important than them.”

Freddy says, “Um, I just ran into Sydney . . . and I kind of got the impression she was thinking of sacking someone.”

Everyone falls silent. Then Elizabeth and Roger speak at the same time. Elizabeth says, “Why?” and Roger says, “Who?”

“She didn't say. But she asked if the dead pool was still on.”

“Oh, God.” Holly's eyes widen. “Oh, God!”

“Why would she sack someone now?” Elizabeth says.

“I have no idea.”

Roger rubs his chin. “I understand that Senior Management hasn't appointed a manager for Staff Services yet. Maybe the managers of the old departments have decided to elect an interim leader.”

“Oh boy,” Elizabeth says.

“What?” Freddy's eyes flick between Elizabeth and Roger. “Is that bad? What does that mean?”

“Well, it'll essentially be an arm-wrestle,” Roger says. “If Sydney wants the job badly enough, she might offer to sack one of us as a trade-off.” Holly moans. “Or two of us. Maybe all of us, who knows.”

They look at each other. “Well,” Elizabeth says finally. “We can't have that.”

Outside, something is happening to the newly unemployed. At first they were shocked and miserable; they milled around without purpose. Then Jones said
You don't deserve this
and this strange, oddball idea jumped from person to person, spreading through the crowd. Soon naked anger is visible on several faces. An accountant pulls a logo-stamped Zephyr Holdings binder from his briefcase, drops it to the concrete, and stomps on it. People cheer. An engineer has a Q3 High Achiever coffee mug; he smashes it on the concrete. A graphic designer tugs off his shoe and throws it as high as he can. It bounces off a tinted window. A pale, worried face appears at the window, then quickly retreats. The crowd roars.

It is a dull day, but overhead the clouds are darkening; the air is thickening. Jones backs away toward the safety of the lobby. He feels as if he just rubbed a lamp and now a genie is coalescing out of blue smoke: a big one, with rippling biceps and violence in his eyes. He tastes a mixture of joy and terror.

The lobby doors slide apart before he reaches them and Security escorts out a woman with a neat blue scarf and a leather clutch bag. Jones stands aside to watch it in amazement: the mob hurling its fury against the twenty-floor colossus of Zephyr Holdings even as the company delivers a steady stream of new recruits.

On level 11 Elizabeth produces a plan to save Training Sales that is so breathtaking in its audacity and so ferocious in its wrath against Sydney that everyone immediately endorses it. Then Roger says, “Very well, I'll play the main role, then.”

Elizabeth says, “Well . . . I assumed
I'd
play the main part, Roger. Since it's my plan.”

“Oh. I see. Well, if you want to pull rank, that's fine. I was just offering. If it's that important to you, do it.”

“I'm not
pulling rank.
It's just
my plan.
”

Roger holds up his hands. “Forget it. I'm just trying to be helpful. I didn't mean to get between you and your ambition.”

Elizabeth's cheeks darken. “Roger, if it's important to
you,
then come out and
say
that. Just
say
it. Because I really don't care one way or the other.”

“Well, if you
want
me to, I'm happy to do it. But it's no big deal, I don't mind either way.”

“If neither of us care,
why are we having this conversation?
”

“Elizabeth. Please. Can we just make a decision?”

Elizabeth's face flushes. Little beads of sweat stand out on her hairline. She begins to breathe deeply and her hands rhythmically clench and open. Jones arrives at the cubicle just in time to see this and he stops in shock, thinking he's watching a heart attack. “Elizabeth?” Holly says, alarmed.

“Fine. Fine. You do it.”

“So . . . let me get this straight,” Roger says. “You
want
me to do it?”

“Yes.” This is so strangled it is barely decipherable as a word.

“Well, all right, then.” Roger's eyes flick to the sales assistants to make sure they all caught this. “I'm glad we got that settled.”

It's quiet in the lobby, for by now every employee has been either accepted into the Zephyr fold or manhandled outside. The Security guards stand in a line along the glass wall with their hands folded behind their backs, watching. Gretel sits at the reception desk. She feels exhausted and tainted. She feels as if she has executed two hundred people and still has their blood on her hands.

There is a rising commotion from outside, so she gets up and walks over to one of the guards. She peers out the green-tinted glass wall. “Looks nasty out there.”

The guard doesn't respond. His eyes are fixed on the mob.

“Maybe they'll storm the building,” she suggests. “Maybe they'll smash the glass.”

“You're perfectly safe, ma'am.” He still doesn't look at her.

“Maybe the company shouldn't have fired so many people,” Gretel says. She is surprised by the bitterness in her own voice. “Maybe we brought it on ourselves.”

The guard blinks once, slowly.

“‘First they came for the Communists. And I didn't speak out, because I wasn't a Communist.' You know how that ends?”

The guard turns to look at her. Gretel takes a step backward, because the guard's eyes are hollow.

“Please, ma'am. I'm just doing my job.”

“Sorry.” It comes out as a whimper. She hurries back to her desk, feeling the guard's empty stare on the back of her neck. She takes her seat and hugs her arms across her chest.

A few minutes later, Roger knocks on the Staff Services meeting-room door. There's no response. He glances at the others. “Well, here goes.” He turns the handle.

Inside, five managers including Sydney are arranged around a circular table. There's a piece of paper in the center of the table, and when she sees Roger, Elizabeth, and Holly, Sydney reaches out and flips it over. “Excuse me. We're busy.”

Roger frowns at her. Elizabeth has to credit him; he's very convincing. “Sydney, wait outside, please.”

Sydney blinks. “What did you say?”

“Out.” He jerks his head toward the door. “We'll discuss this later.”

Sydney looks lost for words. One of the other managers, a woman with thin, natty glasses, says, “This meeting is for department heads only.”

“Right,” Roger says. “I'm manager of Training Sales.”

Sydney says,
“Pardon me?”

“Sydney is . . . ah . . . ambitious.” Roger winks at the woman. “You'll have to forgive her.”

“
I'm
the head of Training Sales,” Sydney says.

“No, I am,” Roger says. “Have been for months.”

The other managers look at Elizabeth and Holly. They point at Roger.

Sydney's cheeks flush a deep, angry red. “It's on file. Check the files!”

“Well, the network is down, so you know we can't do that.” Roger doesn't even glance at her. He smiles engagingly at the other managers. “I'm sorry for this. But you can't blame Syd for trying, I suppose.”

The managers look at each other. Two have no idea whether Roger or Sydney is head of Training Sales: There are a lot of departments and a lot of turnover and who can keep track? It does seem plausible that the manager is the tall man with good hair rather than the five-foot-one woman. One of the other managers knows very well that Sydney is the Training Sales manager, because she once sent an e-mail, copied to Senior Management, that accused him of incompetence, laziness, and, memorably, alcoholism. He reacts first. “I'm sorry—Roger, is it? We didn't realize.”

“Not a problem.” Roger smiles. Then he looks down at Sydney. “What are you hanging around for?”

Sydney opens her mouth, then shuts it. She looks from one face to another and finds no sympathy on any of them. She stands and walks out.