Remember Me? (20 page)

“Not really!” I say as confidently as I can. “I’m looking forward to it.”

“Well, any questions, you know where I am. Although today I’ll be with James Garrison most of the day. You remember James Garrison?”

Bloody bloody bloody.
Why
does he pick the people I’ve never heard of?

“Remind me,” I say reluctantly.

“He’s head of our distributor, Southeys? They distribute stock around the country? Like, carpet, flooring, the stuff we sell? They drive it around in lorries?” His tone is polite, but he’s smirking.

“Yes, I remember Southeys,” I say cuttingly. “Thanks. Why are you seeing them?”

“Well,” says Byron after a pause. “The truth is, they’ve lost their way. It’s crunch time. If they can’t improve their systems, we’re going to have to look elsewhere.”

“Right.” I nod in as bosslike a way as I can. “Well, keep me posted.” We’ve reached my office and I open the door. “See you later, Byron.”

I close the door, dump my gift bags on the sofa, open the filing cabinet, and take out an entire drawer’s worth of files. Trying not to feel daunted, I sit down at the desk and open the first one, which contains minutes of departmental meetings.

Three years. I can catch up on three years. It’s not
that
long.

Twenty minutes later, my brain is already aching. I haven’t read anything serious or heavy for what seems like months—and this stuff is as dense as treacle. Budget discussions. Contracts up for renewal. Performance evaluations. I feel like I’m back at college, doing about six degrees at once.

I’ve started a sheet of paper:
Questions to ask,
and already I’m onto the second side.

“How are you doing?” The door has opened silently and Byron is looking in. Doesn’t he
knock
?

“Fine,” I say defensively. “Really well. I just have a couple of tiny questions…”

“Fire away.” He leans against the doorjamb.

“Okay. First, what’s QAS?”

“That’s our new accounting system software. Everyone’s been trained in it.”

“Well, I can get trained too,” I say briskly, scribbling on my sheet. “And what’s Services.com?”

“Our online customer service provider.”

“What?” I wrinkle my brow, confused. “But what about the customer services department?”

“All made redundant years ago,” says Byron, sounding bored. “The company was restructured and a load of departments were contracted out.”

“Right.” I nod, trying to take all this in, and glance down at my sheet again. “So what about BD Brooks? What’s that?”

“They’re our ad agency,” Byron says with exaggerated patience. “They make advertisements for us, on the radio and the TV—”

“I know what an ad agency is!” I snap, more hotly than I intended. “So, what happened to Pinkham Smith? We’ve had such a great relationship with them—”

“They don’t exist anymore.” Byron rolls his eyes. “They went bust. Jesus, Lexi, you don’t know a bloody thing, do you?”

I open my mouth to retort—but I can’t. He’s right. It’s as if the landscape I knew has been swept away by some kind of hurricane. Everything’s been rebuilt and I don’t recognize any of it.

“You’re never going to pick all this up again.” Byron is surveying me pityingly.

“Yes, I am!”

“Lexi, face it. You’re mentally ill. You shouldn’t be putting your head under this kind of strain—”

“I’m not
mentally ill
!” I exclaim furiously, and get to my feet. I push roughly past Byron and out the door, and Clare looks up in alarm, snapping her mobile phone shut.

“Hi, Lexi. Did you want something? A cup of coffee?”

She looks terrified, like I’m about to bite her head off or fire her or something. Okay, now is my chance to show her I’m not a bitch-boss-from-hell. I’m
me.

“Hi, Clare!” I say in my most friendly, warm manner, and perch on the corner of her desk. “Everything okay?”

“Um…yes.” Her eyes are wide and wary.

“I just wondered if you’d like me to get you a coffee?”

“You?” She stares as though suspecting a trick. “Get me a coffee?”

“Yes! Why not?” I beam, and she flinches.

“It’s…it’s okay.” She slides out of her chair, her eyes fixed on me as though she thinks I really
am
a cobra. “I’ll get one.”

“Wait!” I say almost desperately. “You know, Clare, I’d like to get to know you better. Maybe one day we could have lunch together…hang out…go shopping…”

Clare looks even more pole-axed than before.

“Um…yeah. Okay, Lexi,” she mumbles, and scuttles down the corridor. I turn to see Byron still in the doorway, cracking up.

“What?” I snap.

“You really are a different person, aren’t you?” He raises his eyebrows in wonder.

“Maybe I just want to be friendly with my staff and treat them with respect,” I say defiantly. “Anything wrong with that?”

“No!” Byron lifts his hands. “Lexi, that’s a great idea.” He runs his eyes over me, that sarcastic smile still at his lips, then clicks his tongue as though remembering something. “That reminds me. Before I shoot off, there’s one thing I left for you to deal with as director of the department. I thought it only right.”

At last. He’s treating me like the boss.

“Oh, yes?” I lift my chin. “What is it?”

“We’ve had an e-mail from on high about people abusing lunch hours.” He reaches into his pocket and produces a piece of paper. “SJ wants all directors to give their teams a bollocking. Today, preferably.” Byron raises his eyebrows innocently. “Can I leave that one to you?”

Bastard.
Bastard.

I’m pacing about my office, sipping my coffee, my stomach churning with nerves. I’ve never told anyone off before. Let alone a whole department. Let alone while simultaneously trying to prove that I’m really friendly and not a bitch-boss-from-hell.

I look yet again at the printed-out e-mail from Natasha, Simon Johnson’s personal assistant.

Colleagues. It has come to Simon’s attention that members of staff are regularly pushing the limit of lunchtime well beyond the standard hour. This is unacceptable. He would be grateful if you could make this plain to your teams ASAP, and enforce a stricter policy of checks.

Thanks.
Natasha

Okay. The point is, it doesn’t actually
say
“give your department a bollocking.” I don’t need to be aggressive or anything. I can make the point while still being pleasant.

Maybe I can be all jokey and friendly! I’ll start off, “Hey, guys! Are your lunch hours long enough?” I’ll roll my eyes to show I’m being ironic and everyone will laugh, and someone will say, “Is there a problem, Lexi?” And I’ll smile ruefully and say, “It’s not me, it’s the stuffed shirts upstairs. So let’s just try and make it back on time, yeah?” And a few people will nod as though to say “fair enough.” And it’ll all be fine.

Yes. That sounds good. Taking a deep breath, I fold the paper and put it away in my pocket, then head out of my office, into the open-plan main Flooring office.

There’s the chatter and buzz of people on the phone and typing and chatting to each other. For about a minute no one even notices me. Then Fi looks up and nudges Carolyn, and she prods a girl I don’t recognize, who brings her phone conversation to an end. Around the room, receivers go down and people look up from their screens and chairs swivel around, until gradually the whole office has come to a standstill.

“Hi, everyone!” I say, my face prickling. “I…um…Hey, guys! How’s it going?”

No one replies, or even acknowledges that I’ve spoken. They’re all just staring up with the same mute, get-on-with-it expression.

“Anyway!” I try to sound bright and cheerful. “I just wanted to say…Are your lunch hours long enough?”

“What?” The girl at my old desk looks blank. “Are we allowed longer ones?”

“No!” I say hurriedly. “I mean…they’re
too
long.”

“I think they’re fine.” She shrugs. “An hour’s just right for a bit of shopping.”

“Yeah,” agrees another girl. “You can just make it to the King’s Road and back.”

Okay, I am really not getting my point across here. And now two girls in the corner have started talking again.

“Listen, everyone! Please!” My voice is becoming shrill. “I have to tell you something. About lunch hours. Some people in the company…um…I mean, not necessarily any of
you
—”

“Lexi,” says Carolyn clearly. “What the fuck are you talking about?” Fi and Debs explode with laughter and my face flames with color.

“Look, guys,” I try to keep my composure. “This is serious.”

“Seriousssss,” someone echoes, and there are sniggers about the room. “It’s sssseriousssss.”

“Very funny!” I try to smile. “But listen, seriously…”

“Sssseriousssly…”

Now almost everyone in the room seems to be hissing or laughing or both. All the faces are alive; everyone’s enjoying the joke, except me. All of a sudden a paper airplane flies past my ear and lands on the floor. I jump with shock and the entire office erupts with gales of laughter.

“Okay, well, look, just don’t take too long over lunch, okay?” I say desperately.

No one’s listening. Another paper airplane hits me on the nose, followed by an eraser. In spite of myself, tears spring to my eyes.

“Anyway, I’ll see you guys!” I manage. “Thanks for…for all your hard work.” With laughter following me I turn and stumble out of the office. In a daze, I head toward the ladies’ room, passing Dana on the way.

“Going to the bathroom, Lexi?” she says in surprise as I’m pushing my way in. “You know, you have a key to the executive washroom! Much nicer!”

“I’m fine in here.” I force a smile. “Really.”

I head straight for the end cubicle, slam the door shut, and sink down with my head in my hands, feeling the tension drain from my body. That was the single most humiliating experience of my life.

Except for the white swimsuit episode.

Why did I ever want to be a boss?
Why?
All that happens is you lose your friends and have to give people bollockings and everyone hisses at you. And for what? A sofa in your office? A posh business card?

At last, wearily, I lift my head, and find myself focusing on the back of the cubicle door, which is covered in graffiti as usual. We’ve always used this door like a kind of message board, to vent, or make jokes or just silly conversation. It gets fuller and fuller, then someone scrubs it clean and we start again. The cleaners have never said anything, and none of the executives ever comes in here—so it’s pretty safe.

I’m running my eye down the messages, smiling at some libelous story about Simon Johnson, when a new message in blue marker catches my eye. It’s in Debs’s handwriting and it reads: “The Cobra’s back.”

And underneath, in faint black Biro: “Don’t worry, I spat in her coffee.”

There’s only one way to go. And that’s to get really, really,
really
drunk. An hour later and I’m slumped at the bar at the Bathgate Hotel, around the corner from work, finishing my third mojito. Already the world has turned a little blurry—but that’s fine by me. As far as I’m concerned, the blurrier the better. Just as long as I can keep my balance on this bar stool.