“It means do what you paid to do. I didn’t pay you to ask questions.”
I stared at him for a second before taking the paperwork from Denise and walking off.
The tension stayed weird after that.
Around hour seven, things got worse.
A delivery arrived at the wrong place, and everybody started looking around, confused, while the workers stood there waiting for directions.
I looked at the invoice immediately. “This is the wrong material.”
“No, it’s not,” Vaughn said without even checking first.
“Yes, it is,” I replied calmly. “This isn’t what I ordered.”
He grabbed the paper from me, looked over it quickly, then sighed hard through his nose.
“It’s usable.”
“It’s also wrong.”
“Sade, every time something happens, it doesn’t gotta turn into a whole production.”
My face tensed instantly. “A production? I’m trying to do my job.”
“And I’m trying to finish my project.”
“Our project,” I corrected.
That made him pause.
Everybody around us got quiet again.
He stepped closer, lowering his voice just enough.
“You always got something to say.”
“And you are always rushing. We just fuckin’ started.”
He frowned.
For a second, I thought he was about to snap for real.
Instead, he looked away from me and rubbed the back of his neck before speaking again.
“Just do ya fuckin’ job, lady. This ain’t yo’ project. This my shit.”
The way he said it that time irritated me more than if he had yelled.
Like I was exhausting him.
The rest of the day stayed awkward after that.
By the time we wrapped up, I was mentally over it.
I barely spoke while packing my stuff up.
Laila looked at me once we got in the car. “You good?”
