“Anyway… where was I?”
I glance down at my thumbnail, examining the regrowth. It’s time to visit my girl, Natasha, for a new set. “You were giving me more responsibilities to reward my good work so far,” I remind him with a saccharine smile. “Instead of, like, a title change or a raise.”
He picks up on the sarcasm in my tone, and his eyes narrow. They flick up to my hair briefly, and as his mouth tightens around the edges, I fight the urge to smile. I was genuinely expecting a speech about my fresh dye job along the lines of, “Green hair just doesn’t project the kind of professionalism we strive for here at SmarTech.”
It’s 50-50, really: he’s either building up to it or he went full chicken-shit and had HR send me a warning so he doesn’t have to handle the confrontation.
“Uh… It’s only been 90 days—company policy prohibits big changes like that before that critical six-month mark, but we can revisit in a few months and make sure you’re on the right trajectory. I assure you, it’s not personal; it’s business.”
That one almost makes me snort. Sure, they can always change your job responsibilities and squeeze more out of you, but they can’t adjust pay or title accordingly. Corporate America bullshit. I can’t wait to leave this place in the fucking dust.
“Anyway, I hope you’re excited about this opportunity. Hector has all the details, and your training starts next Monday. Other than that, we love the work you’ve been doing and expect to continue to see great things. You’vegot a ton of potential,” he assures me, the praise somewhat undercut by the fact that he’s already looking at the work chat again when he says it. “That was really all I had for our one-on-one. Do you have any questions for me?”
My phone pings, notifying me that my fix is live. Finally. A shiver of a thrill shoots up my spine, and I laugh to myself. This timing is perfect—I love a dramatic exit. “Well, this meeting could have been an email. Or, like, a kiss on the forehead.” I consider what I’m about to say next, then add, “Maybe a fistfight.”
He laughs, but it’s a staccato, barking noise, like he’s too confused to know what else to do. “Maddy—”
That nickname is nails on a chalkboard. “Fredward,” I cut in, matching his tone.
That stops him in his tracks, and the laughter abruptly dies on his lips, shriveling his smile with it. “What? That’s not… Fred isn’t short for… My full name is Frederick.”
“I quit, Frederick.”
Nothing turns a middle-aged guy in a suit into a blustering old white man like hitting him with the unexpected resignation. Instantly, he goes from cool and in-control to thrown off and scrambling. “W-what? Are you serious?”
“You get a lot of people quitting on you as a joke?” I challenge.
“No, but you… I mean, just like that?” he sputters. “Is this because of the raise and promotion thing? ‘Cause maybe I could talk to HR…”
“So, now it’s a possibility before thatcritical six-month mark?”I chuckle at his wide-eyed expression. “No, thanks. I’m in a really good place about this decision—emotionally, spiritually, and as soon as I get the hell out of here, physically.”
“What about your career?”
“What about it?” I ask, tilting my head. “You think I want to sit in an office and sell this company the best years of my life? Yeah, no thanks.”
“Why did you take this job?” he demands, his tone effortlessly swinging back to accusatory.
I resist the urge to kick back and put my feet up on his desk, like a villain revealing my master plan. Unfortunately, I don’t think my short legs would reach. Story of my life.
“I’ve been using this company’s fine software to encrypt my data since I was 16. One of several layered solutions, obviously. But that last big update introduced a bug with some pretty serious—if esoteric—security risks. It was killing me. So, I fixed it.”
“You’re kidding,” he says, his voice flat. “You applied for a job at SmarTech just to fix a bug? That’s… ridiculous, Madison. Insane. Why didn’t you call customer service?”
“You’d think that would be easier, wouldn’t you?” I ask rhetorically, wagging my finger. “And in my defense, I did try. But in the three times I called, I was on hold with customer service for a combined total of nine hours, and no one could even find the problem to fix. So… I decided to take a look at your hiring page to see how easy it would be to just get in here and do it myself. Anyway, now that it’s fixed, I don’t really see a reason to stay.”
I’ve already been here way longer than I wanted to be. The resume I made up just for this job only earned me a low-level desk in data entry. I toiled away there for a month and a half until I showed the right person a few tricks that convinced him I could handle more complex projects. Then, in true large-company fashion, the request for access had to make it through three redundant levels of management approval, which took another month. Then, I had to wait for IT to upgrade my machine to something more powerful, and get me all set up with account access and passcodes…
Honestly, it was a whole thing. But once I was finally in, finding the bug and implementing the fix took me about three days.
Well, two and a half days. More than enough time to scrape and copy a bunch of confidential files to my secret, smuggled-in portable drive.
“Don’t be rash. There are plenty of good reasons to stay. I wasn’t kidding—you’ve got so much potential. You could go far here,” he says, like I should take it as a compliment. Like hemeansit as a compliment.
“Potential to do… what, exactly? Put more money in Craig Pinsley’s pocket while he cuts everyone’s bonuses?” I snort. “Pass.”
When I rise, he stands, too. He towers over me, even at his painfully average height. “Madison, wait! I just told Craig I’d have him those reports you’re working on by the end of the day,” Fred admits.
It’s the first time he’s revealing his hand instead of trying to frame it like he has my best interest in mind. He wasn’t even going to tell me it wasmywork he was taking credit for on the phone right in front of me.
