“Coming,” I say just as I add pineapple fried rice to my cart on the app. I pad across the original hardwood floors barefoot and brush my hands on the cotton shorts I changed into when I got home. I open the door, expecting to see a solicitor or maybe my neighbor Marjorie, a thin, smiling older woman who is always offering me veggies from her little garden. I am not expecting to see Damien.
I blink twice, but sure enough, Damien is standing on my steps still wearing his too-dark-for-this-weather suit and his notorious furrowed brow.
“Oh,” the word escapes my lips and evaporates immediately in the dry heat. It’s the only reaction I seem to have because my boss in his high-end suit is the last thing I thought I’d see on my rundown doorstep.
“Can I come in?” he asks, and I realize that my mouth is open.
“Yes,” I nod, stepping aside. I close the door behind me, and Damien proceeds to simply stand like a statue, his headnot moving while his eyes slowly survey the room. “I was just cleaning up,” I say after a long, awkward moment.
“For me?” he asks, and I can’t tell if that was a joke or not. I find it hard to tell at all when he’s joking.
“Would you like some wine?” I ask. His facial expression hasn’t changed, but his eyes are very alert as they sweep over the room again. The old leather couch I found at an estate sale. The bright red and purple rug covering most of the living room floor that I got at a flea market. The funky lamps and array of random art hanging on the walls that the landlord let me paint. Peacock blue. The kitchen cabinets were without a doubt handcrafted in the fifties. Not to mention all the houseplants I have miraculously kept alive.
“Not right now, thank you,” he answers. I, on the other hand, am in desperate need of the glass of wine I just poured and snatch it off the counter, taking another sip before the world’s most unnerving house visit continues. “You have…a lot of plants.”
I can’t tell if he’s making small talk or criticizing me. Now that I think about it, I’ve noticed that about him. Unless a conversation is business related, his small talk tends to sound a lot like criticism. It makes me wonder if he doesn’t have a lot of friends outside the office.
“I guess I like taking care of things,” I answer.
He nods stiffly and only once. “Cactus though? Don’t you see enough of them outside?”
I study him for a moment, and my lips quirk in the corners. He is out of his comfort zone, and it is wild to watch. At the hotel, Damien is in charge. Every inch of every floor belongs to him, designed by him, creating a habitat that suits, well, him. But here, in my little rental home that I am over a hundred percent sure is a far cry from his own luxurious home on the other side of the city, he doesn’t know how to function.
It’s kind of funny.
“Well,” I say as I reach for my phone. “I was about to order Thai food if you’re hungry.”
“I’m not staying,” he quickly answers. “Not for long.”
I nod slowly. “So, why are you here?”
“I never read your application,” he says, and it’s a foul ball to the head. Of all the things to fly out of his mouth, I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting that.
“I–”
“Or your resume,” he cuts me off. Then he rakes a hand through his hair. His eyes are darting around the room, only meeting mine every couple of seconds. None of this makes sense. Why would he come here instead of calling? Why is he just now admitting that he knew nothing about me when he hired me? Why is he a man who never gets even the slightest bit anxious about literally anything, and yet, right now, he looks like he’s about to crawl out of his own skin.
Then it hits me, and my heart drops from my chest into the pit of my stomach.
He found something in my resume he did not like, and now he’s going to fire me. I set my phone down without completing the order. I’ve lost my appetite, and I can physically feel my face flush.
“Listen, Damien,” I start in, sitting down at my dining room table. “I know the last few years of my work history are…less than great. But my life hasn’t really allowed me to have the kind of job I used to. The upper end of the hotel industry doesn’t care how hard your life is at home–”
“Tell me about the job you had before,” he cuts in as he pulls out a chair.
I take in a deep breath. Not because it’s hard to talk about, but because it’s something that hurts every time I think about it. “I was working at the Suerte Hotel. It wasn’t one of the besthotels by any means, but it’s no continental breakfast kind of place either,” I say with a smile, but his mouth stays slack. “They accepted interns, so I figured it was a good starting point.”
“You went to college,” he says, and I’m a little surprised. Has he even looked over my application or is this a test?
“I did. Marketing and business. Double major.”
His eyes dilate ever so slightly as surprise flashes over his typically unshakable face. It’s a small victory for me getting any kind of rise out of Damien Graves. I pocket it and go on.
“From there I was hired for their HR department, which I didn’t love. But it showed them my PR skills. From there, the advertising department was where I began to move up the ladder at a rather nice pace.”
“And what happened?” he interrupts again. “Why did it stop there?”
I chew on my lip for a moment while turning my glass in a circle on the table. This time I am the one who can’t make eye contact. “I got…involved…with a man in my department. He was a new hire at the time, and I was sort of his mentor.”
