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“I don’t think it was your fault,” Petra said. “She called you on her own accord, so she must have been up to it.”
I shook my head. “No. He was right. I should have put my foot down and insisted she didn’t need to help me. It’s not like she told me anything I couldn’t have worked out on my own.”
Why I was coming to Neil’s defence, I didn’t know. Maybe it was the honourable intention buried somewhere underneath all that chilling rage.
“Okay. But he still shouldn’t have treated you like that. It’s no wonder the other woman up and left.”
I took a breath. “It’s okay. I can handle it.”
It was more a pep talk to myself than a response to Petra’s concern.
Once I had recovered from Neil’s outburst, I turned my focus to the email inbox on my computer, studying how Christine had sorted and tagged messages in the past, and already thinking up some improvements to her system.
The rest of the morning flew by. I took my lunch break at one o’clock, eating the fruit, crackers, and hummus I had brought with me from home. Petra had gone out for lunch, and Neil had disappeared to another meeting, so I was alone in the office.
From my chair, I could see straight out the window behind Petra’s desk. I watched the sky grow dark and dreary, writing off plans to go for a walk outside after lunch. By the time I finished eating, it began to rain, fat droplets pelting the glass.
My eyes went to the window latches. Unable to resist the magnetic pull of the rain, I crossed the floor and unlatched the window, pushing it open as far as it could go before the safety lock kicked in. The rhythmic sound of the rain filled the room. I spent several minutes just listening, enraptured. If cleaning were my top form of stress relief, the sound of rain came in a close second. I closed my eyes, leaning close to the cool glass.
“What are you doing?” Neil snapped behind me.
I shut the window and swung around, hands clasped together behind me. “Nothing. Just letting some air in.”
He regarded me with narrowed eyes and pursed lips, veins popping.
I tried not to squirm or look away. What was so bad about opening a window? Jeez.
“I need you to do something for me,” he said at last. “Read this and summarise the key points.” He passed me the manila folder he clutched in his grip.
“When do you need it done by?”
“Have it on my desk before you leave today.”
His mobile phone rang. He fished it from his suit jacket pocket and answered en route to his office.
I set the chunky file on my desk and opened it.
A few hours later, I had typed up a document of notes, printed it out, and stapled the neat stack together. At the same moment I stood to deliver it to him, Neil came out of his office. I presented it to him.
“Done already?” He furrowed his brow as he flicked through the document. “What is this?”
“Um, the summary you asked me to write.”
He frowned. “Summary? This isn’t a summary. I wanted a one-pager, not an essay.”
“Actually, you didn’t specify?—”
He flicked to the back page and snickered. “You even included references.”
“I thought?—”
He slammed the paper down on the desk, making me flinch. “This is the business world, Amelia, not school. You might be able to impress a teacher with this, but not me. My associates are busy people. I can’t expect them to sit and read a two thousand word essay. They need bullet points. They need information in a way that’s concise and easily digestible. Can you do that?”
“Yes. I think so.”
“Good.” He tossed the document in the bin. “Now redo it.”
I cringed. I had spent so long writing that summary. It was perfect in my eyes.
