Adrianna

At my desk, uncomfortable as always, I tried to maneuver and find a way for my pencil skirt not to cling to every part of my body so I could respire properly. I was fine standing up, but I felt as if someone had a tight rope across my stomach the moment I sat down. I decided to look around to make sure no one was watching, so I could undo my button at the back and breathe without feeling as if I was suffocating. I sighed as my zipper naturally opened as I sat up a bit, and my stomach hung over my skirt.

I closed my eyes, wondering why I kept punishing myself like this. I hadn’t put on a little weight, but a lot of weight, and the refusal to buy new clothes wasn’t an option anymore. This was the only skirt I could fit in this morning; as for the shirt, luckily it didn’t have buttons and stretched over my breasts. As for the matching suit-jacket, it couldn’t close. I didn’t need to close it anyway; I could walk around the office with it open, unlike my winter jacket, which I would wear for only a few moments outside before jumping in a taxi.

I didn’t see Gold’s secretary walking to my desk; I was too busy thinking about whether to go to a store. Any store nearby to find something to fit. Anything. Today was going to be a long day, and it would be even longer if I didn’t get something I could breathe in because come lunchtime, I wouldn’t be able to eat.

“Adrianna, he wants to see you in his office,” she purred as her long pink fingernail stroked along the surface of my desk. She got to the end and lifted her finger as if to check for dust, and I rolled my eyes. Her very presence annoyed me, and her petty actions just wound me up even more.

I was about to get fired. It was a known trait in my office when the big boss called you not by putting an appointment in your calendar or even sending an email. When he sent his little Chihuahua (our nickname for his secretary) to come and get you, it wasn’t good news. Her blonde hair was in a perfect bun, and her square-clear glasses, which she didn’t need (a rumor which I wasn’t sure if it was true because I’d seen her wear them in the office, but never outside.) hung on her square-nose a little too far. Her blue eyes lit up as she stood with her arms crossed, ready for me to follow her. I felt like a lamb being led to be slaughtered.

Hank Gold resided on the top floor; he was old money, his father had passed on the business before him. He made it known he was money, so important, he resided on the twenty-foot building’s top floor. No one could go up there apart from him and his Chihuahua, who smiled at me with her sea-blue eyes. The reason why, after one year of working here, we’d given her this name was because Mr. Gold treated her as if she was more precious than anyone else who worked in this office, and she loved to flaunt it. She enjoyed being followed up to the top floor; it was as if she got a kick out of having the power to see us go.

Well, she didn’t have the authority to do it, but she made us feel small as if she had us at the palm of her hand.

“Mr. Gold doesn’t like to be kept waiting,” she commanded as she faced me and put her finger once again on my desk. I hated everything about Mr. Gold, from the way he sat in his high tower to how he commanded his little pet to come and fetch us. Mr. Gold was a married man, and everyone knew he was fucking her; she didn’t even try to hide it. We knew if Mrs. Gold found out, it would cost him a lot more than this tower.

I counted to three as I tried to squeeze my legs together and pulled down my pencil length skirt, then I zipped it up to the top. It was impossible, to button it up again, because it was too tight. I stood up straight as I held on to the little pride I had left. She looked at me strangely, as if we were friends and I’d done something out of the ordinary.

The only thing I did was smile at her, showing all my teeth, which wasn’t a good idea because I needed to go to the dentist to get my teeth whitened, the hairstylist to get rid of my split ends, and more importantly, the optician to get new contacts. The last one would have to wait; I knew if I got new contacts, everyone would know the green eyes I claimed to be natural were actually contacts.

I pulled my jacket from behind my chair, but no more quick movements in case my skirt split at the seams. Thank goodness I was wearing a blouse and not a shirt today; otherwise, it would be soaking wet from overheating because it would be clutched to my skin, and my buttons would be popping right now. I didn’t feel well. Not one little bit.

Jen, my bestie and only work friend, smiled at me. The kind of smile told me she was rooting for me. But we both knew this moment was coming from last week. The week I spent all night working on the presentation for not one client but two and ended up completely fucking it up. One year of complete loyalty and doing more than my call of duty should have made a difference, but it didn’t. I received an email from him saying he would call me when he was ready, and from the look in the Chihuahua’s eye, I could tell he was more than ready.

I walked past my desk empty-handed, knowing I would need nothing but my pride as I headed towards the elevator. I could hear the whispers. The lack of subtlety in the office was unreal, as others pretended to need to go somewhere, anywhere to tell another what was going on. I was not too fond of the uncertainty and wished I had never signed up for this job. The ad said Marketing Executive when it should have said Slave to The Gold God. I’d done more than marketing since I joined, and when I compared it to a couple of my friends in the same field, they’d said it wasn’t a Management role I was doing, but more of an Executive role on a Management salary. I didn’t complain. No, I didn’t even raise my voice at the idea of it because I knew once I had a couple of years’ experience here, I could go wherever I wanted, and they would say, “You put up with Gold, you need a medal.” The staff turnover here was too high, and Gold didn’t care, all he wanted was results, and he got them.

Carrie, his secretary, had worked here the longest, five years out of all of us, and we all knew the reason for it was her extra activities upstairs.

I took a deep breath as I considered my fate as the elevator doors opened. It was a now or never type moment, and part of me wished it’d be never, but it wasn’t an option I had control of, not at the moment.

Carrie walked in with her five-inch heels and pressed the button to go upstairs, and she was about to put her card in when she snapped, “You coming in or not?”

I nodded as all the nerves started to take over my body.

“Is he there alone?”

She shook her head. “No. HR is waiting in my room. He wants to speak to you alone before letting them speak to you.”

She gave me a strange look as if she was thinking the same thing I did. Usually, everything would be done simultaneously, but I had a feeling it wouldn’t be the case this time, and it gave me something I didn’t think was possible: hope. I didn’t have a chance of staying here, but I had exactly eleven months left to get the dreams I had envisaged from the moment I started here, and I wasn’t willing to give up on those.

Not yet.

It put a smile on my face; I could see Carrie saw it and spun her head around as if to check my reflection was real. Somehow, it put a frown on hers, and I realized she was a bitch through and through. The type who only thought of their own happiness and no one else’s. I didn’t have a bone in my body to ever hate someone; it wasn’t in me. I wouldn’t say I liked Carrie. She reminded me not every woman had the same sense of responsibility in the workplace. We wanted to unite, but women like her didn’t care as long as they got what they wanted.

The doors swung open, and she strode out slowly into the glass hallway. I’d only been up here once, and even then, no one gave me a tour. Mr. Gold congratulated me for doing a top job with a couple of clients. The account should have only been fifty thousand, and somehow, I’d managed to get them to spend nearly a quarter of a million. I was talented, I knew, but I didn’t realize how much until I sealed the deal with the account. I celebrated not only bringing in the additional clients, but the ten grand bonus that came with it.

I smiled, the cool air circulating around my body as I moved behind her. She was in control of her movement, whereas I always felt like my steps would break the glass floor one day. Crazy, I know, but I wasn’t used to walking on glass, unlike Carrie who strutted with her stilettoes as if she owned the place as if she had the power to make the glass break if she wanted to.

I lightly lifted my feet as I walked, which was pretty hard to do when the damn skirt was so tight. Every movement I made, made me feel uncomfortable as I spent more time trying to keep up with her and less on where we were going. The doors slid open, and I knew meant one thing, we’d arrived at his office.

“Ms. Smith is here.”

“Good, send her in.”

Technically, I was already in because as the doors slid open I had followed Carrie into the office.

Once again she smiled, nodding. He wasn’t sitting at his desk, but on the white sofa at the back of his office.

Maybe it wasn’t all bad news; maybe there was some hope.