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After we finish, for a moment, she doesn’t say anything. She just leans against her desk with her head in her hands. She’s massaging her temples, and I have to keep from massaging mine. They are beginning to feel tense and tender.
When she addresses me again, hollowness pervades in her voice and eyes. “Thank you for bringing this horrible incident to my attention, Melissa. Please rest assured that we will take this seriously. This company supports its employees in any and all circumstances. We value diversity and will make sure that anyone who works for us who bullies others will no longer have a place with us.” Her expression hardens. “I’ll be in touch with you in a little bit. I’ll call up to your desk when I need your phone, and we’ll go from there. Okay?” Already, she’s moving a mile a minute. Making notes and plans of who she’s going to talk to first.
“Okay,” I say. I put my phone back into my skirt pocket, feeling empty or spent.
“I’ll be in touch, Melissa,” Charlotte says again as I walk toward her door and open it.
“I know,” I say, my thoughts wandering to Tommy. Whether he’ll tell his boss what happened or not. Whether Vanacore will find out about it as a matter of course, as a result of me coming to Charlotte or not. As I think these thoughts, I’m not sure how I feel about them. All I hope is that Tommy can get some work done today. I hope he is able to focus on something other than the fear and anger, probably running rampant in him. The shadowy beast I saw getting ready to jump out at his attackers.
But unlike with the others, I wasn’t afraid. I wanted to pet that monster. Feed and love him, take him away from his tormentors, even if he was angry and wild.
“I’ll make sure they get what’s coming to them,” Charlotte promises.
That makes two of us, I think, and walk back toward the elevator.
It’s just after nine a.m., and already I’m ready to go to war. I’m ready to fight for Tommy, even if that means I have to chuck those assholes out on the curb myself and make sure they never get a job in the city of Manhattan again.
Why stop at Manhattan? I muse darkly, getting on the elevator and riding up to the top. Why not make it the whole United States? Why not make it impossible for them to put food in their mouths anywhere in this country? I shiver at these thoughts, feeling both frightened and excited by the possibility. They deserve nothing less. They shouldn’t be allowed to hide behind their masks like that. Bullies should be hunted down and dealt with. Not fed and praised. Not while good people like Tommy get made into the sacrificial lamb.
Chapter Seventeen
Tommy
After my torture in Cubicle Hell, I spend the rest of the day as far away from there as I possibly can. I immerse myself in my office working diligently on case notes, dictation, and uploading audio files from various lawyer-client meetings Ms. Vanacore has managed to rack up in the short time she’s been here.
I don’t even bother to break for lunch. I just work straight through, knowing I don’t want to take a chance of seeing or hearing anyone from the legal assistants’ floor. Especially if Melissa has made good on her promise and gotten them all in trouble with HR. My former coworkers will be shipped out unceremoniously, and with being the kind of people they are, they would not pass up an opportunity to pay me back.
Ms. Vanacore stops me just before two o’clock. She comes over and touches my shoulder. “Going to take a lunch break at all, son?” she asks. Her tone is warm and concerned. When I meet her eyes, I immediately wish I hadn’t. She’s soaking me in, searching for something. “You’ve been working steadily ever since you came to my office from getting your things on the legal assistants’ floor. Is everything okay, Tommy?”
Quickly, I move my eyes away from hers. “Yes.” I scoot away from my desk a bit, trying to find something to busy my hands with. “Yes, ma’am. Everything’s fine.”
There is a heavy, silky pause between us. “You didn’t run into any trouble down there, did you, son?” Another pause, but this one isn’t nearly as long. It’s for the show of it, and nothing more. “If you did. If anything at all happened that was uncalled for, you can tell me.” The hand on my shoulder grips a bit more tightly. The touch is still warm, but it’s quickly turning hot. “Taking you under my wing is not something I take lightly. If anything happened, it’s my responsibility — my duty — to do something about it. Protect you if necessary.”
