Page 316 of Manhattan Bossholes

29

NATASHA

“Your teeth are chattering,” Stacy said into the phone.

“Because it’s friggin’ freezing down here!” I went across the room to crank up the space heater. The basement workshop was frigid in December, the cold seeping in despite how well I insulated the cracks around the door.

And on days like this, I paid for it. When I got into the zone of working on a piece, I’d forget about the cold…but a phone call was enough to wake me up to it again.

“So, I was talking to one of my coworkers,” Stacy said. She’d called me the moment her shift at the temp agency had ended. “From the props department…for that new show I told you about. The little one. Not the secret Broadway one.”

“Uh-huh?” I said, only half listening as I warmed my hands by the heater.

“And, anyway, he sprained his wrist.”

“That’s…not good.”

“I know! But anyway, they need some set pieces made, and they’re kind of in a bind, and I sort of tossed out your name. I know it’s not your usual level and probably doesn’t pay well⁠—”

“Money is money,” I said. I wasn’t really in any position to be picky with odd jobs. And hey, I could whip up some sturdy, stage-worthy props in no time. “Thanks for thinking of me, Stace.”

“Of course. Thank Benjy for spraining his wrist. I mean, not really…but you know what I’m saying.”

“I do.” I shuffled across the workshop and huddled at my desk.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Scrolling my inbox.” I’d neglected it for a few days, and the junk mail had built up again. Stacy was right. I needed to stop subscribing to things. Holy shit, I thought, suddenly pausing my scroll. Veronica Chase? What the hell was she doing in my inbox? Was this some kind of prank? “Oh. My. God.”

“What is it?”

I hovered over the email, on high alert. “I have sirens going off in my head.”

“Ooo,” Stacy said. “Talk.”

“I don’t know if this is junk mail or a phishing scam—but at first glance, it looks like an actual big name interior designer has just reached out to me.” If this was real, how the hell had she gotten my personal email?

“Wait, you think it’s related to the Fisher thing?” Stacy asked.

“I don’t know,” I mumbled, trying not to get my hopes up as I opened the email. It was only last week that I’d finally realized what it was that bugged me about all the weird 1stDibs customers I’d been getting lately: the ones who kept demanding designs and not commissioning furniture. The problem wasn’t that they’d all sounded the same; the problem was that they were all the same. I’d finally recognized a weird typo that Fisher always made—spelling enviornment instead of environment. So, every email that asked me to design “something that would fit into a luxury enviornment” had been written by him.

“You never told me what happened with that,” Stacy said.

“You mean before or after I almost threw my laptop against the wall?” I had been so pissed at myself for not immediately picking up on Fisher’s bullshit, and for sending him more furniture designs before catching on, that I’d actually screamed myself hoarse. I’d been so desperate for the 1stDibs work that even though I’d known the requests had seemed fishy, I’d never stopped and thought it through for long enough to put two and two together. But the moment I did, it all became clear. Fisher had created all those different account names in order to trick me into handing over my design ideas—designs he could pass off as his own.

“After, obviously. I know you said you screenshotted all the communication you’d had with him and his sock puppets. Did you ever email it to your old boss?”

“Yeah.” I’d sent the whole batch of messages to my former manager at Echo and told them that if Fisher had come forward with similar designs after the dates marked on the communication, then he was committing theft—and the company would be liable as well, if they chose to utilize my work without my consent. I didn’t threaten legal action because let’s face it, I didn’t have the means to take on an established and successful company. But the tone was there, and I’d hoped they would do the right thing.

“And?” Stacy said.

“I never actually got an email reply, but I heard from some old colleagues that Fisher has been fired.”

“Hell yes!” Stacy said. “That’s the least of what that asshole deserves. Too bad it didn’t happen sooner.”

I grumbled. “But you see why this email popping up in my inbox now feels…odd, right? Like, is this Fisher screwing with me, just to be petty?”

“You really think it’s him?”