With a wide smile, she closes the box. “You know it. We need good music to get through this. It’s like five hours, so I’ll share it in the group for you to listen to when you get back to work.”
Before I start thinking about returning to work, I need to break stuff.
I cock my head at the washing machine. “So . . . I just hit it?”
“Yup, but this is a talk-and-rage activity. Tell us what’s going through your head while you break shit to your heart’s content.”
The metal bat is heavy in my hand. Standing in front of the machine, I rub my gloved finger over the scuffed paint. The control panel is cracked too, with the door half open, like it’s smirking at me.
Winding up, I feel my body tense, but it releases when the bat connects with the washing machine. The metal caves in almost instantly, buckling like tinfoil, but it echoes like a car crash.
“Whatcha thinking about?” Adri asks after I get in three good swings.
Heavy breaths fog my visor. “I’m worried these two losses will dictate the rest of my career. What if I never get another good chance like this?”
“Garrett Blane will not dictate your future.” Mallory slams the crowbar on top of the microwave. “He was an opportunity, yes, but that doesn’t mean he’s the last one you’ll ever have! You’re too damn good at your job for that to happen.”
“And that won’t be your last promotion opportunity at Permian,” Jo reminds me.
A guttural scream rips out of Adri from her corner of the room, swinging a sledgehammer over her head. “Tell us what you want!”
Swing.“I want to be a good agent!”Swing.“The best agent to my clients!”Swing.“Never letting them down and making sure they always know I’m in their corners.”Swing.
“Already accomplished!” The noises from Jo’s side of the room are deliberate and surgical, each hammer tap landing with precision as she destroys ceramic tiles. “What do you want when you go back to work?”
“I want more respect from my coworkers. I want to be treated like a fellow agent, rather than some stepsister they wish didn’t exist.”
Mallory’s fist blasts through the drywall. “What else do you want?”
“I want to sign a client who people would never expect to work with me! I want to take up space and not care that they don’t like me. I want to speak up for myself. Even if Trevor is my boss, I’m tired of taking his shit, as if I haven’t worked just as hard to get here. All because I’m a woman!”
“That’s my girl!” Mallory hollers. “Kick them in the dick!”
I fling the bat aside and spot the extra dinner plates Ellen gifted us. With every crash of the glass against the wall, I feel a crack inside me start to repair itself.
Cade knew I needed my best friends today. He knew Mallory, Jo, and Adri would do whatever they needed to do to make sure I was not only taken care of, but that I’d feel better by the end of the day.
Life without Garrett and the promotion is hard, but I can’t imagine my life without them.
“I love you guys!” I yell over the racket. “So damn much!”
“We love you more!” they shout in unison.
Static crackles overhead, and we all pause to look up at the speaker.
Then Ellen sighs. “Are you guys taking friendship applications?”
Chapter Forty
I’m a bad bitch.You can’t kill me.
These wise words from my favorite Vine are the only reason I haven’t taken the closest exit and sped back to Clear Lake yet. There are probably more professional mantras I could repeat to hype myself up, but this resonates most with me.
After raging with the girls, I realized I was hiding, and I donothide.
It’s time to go back to work.
My phone has been buzzing nonstop since I let my clients know I was back in the office; a mix of disappointment that I ended my “vacation” a week early and excitement that I’m available again.
