The walls shifted to a cautiously hopeful pale pink.
“I should go,” she said.
“Cassie.”
She paused at the door.
“You’ll be brilliant.” He still wasn’t looking at her. “You always are, when you stop telling yourself you’re not.”
She left before she could say something that would ruin the moment.
The presentation was flawless.
Cassie stood in front of the executive team—seven people in expensive suits who held her career in their professionally manicured hands—and delivered the best pitch of her life. Her voice didn’t shake. Her slides were perfect. She answered every question with the kind of calm authority that she usually only dreamed about.
Dana sat in the corner, visibly seething, which was the cherry on top of an already delicious sundae.
Afterward, her boss pulled her aside.
“Impressive work, Cassie. Really impressive.” He was smiling, which he almost never did. “We’ve been talking, and we’d like to offer you the Senior Manager position. You’ve earned it.”
She floated back to her desk on a cloud ofpure vindication.
Senior Manager. SENIOR. MANAGER.
She wanted to call someone. Wanted to share this with?—
Her phone buzzed. A text from Diane with a photo attachment.
OMG DID YOU DO THIS
The photo showed Derek’s Porsche. His precious, midlife-crisis, “I deserve nice things” Porsche that he’d bought six months before leaving her for Brittany.
It was pink.
Not just pink.Barbiepink. Cotton-candy-fever-dream pink. The kind of pink that could be seen from space and would definitely void any self-respecting car’s warranty.
Cassie stared at her phone.
She hadn’t… she couldn’t have…
But she remembered this morning. The confidence. The pep talk. Thinking about how Derek had always told her she wasn’t ready for leadership, wasn’t promotion material, wasn’tenough.
And apparently, while she was busy proving him wrong, some part of her magic had decided to prove a point of its own.
Another text from Diane:
He’s LOSING HIS MIND. Brittany is crying. This is the best day of my life.
Please tell me you did this
Please
I need to know magic is real and karma is pink
Cassie pressed her hand over her mouth to muffle the sound that came out—something between a laugh and a sob and a scream of pure chaotic joy.
She typed back:
